I'm an....MC!

The higher education fair was a success! As I said before, last year there were 6,000 attendees at the event and even though I don't have any concrete numbers to share just yet I would have to guess that about the same amount if not more attended this year.

About two days before the fair Linh, my immediate supervisor, informed me that I was going to be an MC and introduce the key speakers. For some reason I find it funny that just three weeks ago I had no attachment to IIE whatsoever and all of a sudden I was asked to speak in front of a few hundred people to introduce the director of IIE, the Public Affairs Officer of the US Embassy, and Vietnam's Vice Minister of Education and Training. I did the English version of introduction while my counterpart, Tram, did the Vietnamese one.

It was so exciting! The fair was held at the swanky Intercontinental Hotel in West Lake. Fifty-three Universities and colleges came and unfortunately none of them were from New Jersey. I have to admit that I was a little disappointed about that.

My job, besides MCing, was to sit at a desk in front of the main room and answer questions that people may have about the US college system, or the undergrad or graduate application process. Some of the FAQs were, "Which of the Universities here is the best?", "Which has the best MBA program?", "If a college gives you a large scholarship does that mean that the school isn't very good?" I couldn't really answer these. Even if I knew which university was "better" than the others, or had the "best" MBA program I wasn't exactly in a position to divulge that kind of information. I had to be as objective as possible.

I also wandered around the main room to make sure that all of the volunteer interpreters were okay. One of the volunteers was Mai Phuong (in the picture to the left), a customer service officer at Language Link as well as my friend. Huyen, Ben's girlfriend, also worked as an interpreter for the day.

I know that I am constantly vacillating between attending graduate school next Fall or traveling and teaching a bit more before "settling" back in the States again. After working at this fair I believe that the pendulum has now swung back towards graduate school. I loved speaking to the students and getting a chance to do some advising.
Oi gioi oi.