14 June 2006 – Wednesday – 20:38 – Hotel room
Internet does not work today. I tried to connect many times but it did not work. I still think as if I had a sweet dream last night. What else it could be?
Yesterday, I met with an American guy in a fast food restaurant. He recognized me as a Turkish person from my accent. He said he used to work at a Turkish school in HCMC. I was surprised since I did not know there is a Turkish school in HCMC. I know there is one in Hanoi. He said he has been living in Vietnam for more than 3 years and always working as a language instructor. When I told him that I am working in RMIT, he said it is one of the best place to work for foreign teachers. We later talked about rent prices and books. Today, I sent him an e-mail and still waiting his answer.
Yesterday in workshop, we discussed plagiarism for one and a half hour. We all know that plagiarism is a bad thing and it should be considered as stealing. When I asked the members of my group the pirate movies, they said it was different. Actually, I did not raise the real question which was in my mind: Is it possible to have an idea for which we will not be blamed for plagiarism? We all learn from each other and we all owe something to others. We usually do not give names when we repeat a piece of information. At the end, we are the sum of all the knowledge we have got through books, newspapers, magazines, TV, radio, internet etc… Therefore, how can we claim that an idea is ours? How can we know that we did not steal it?
I am definitely against plagiarism, especially for the students’ assignments and homework. In Asia, it is quite common to let someone else do one’s own homework or to copy it exactly and submit it as an original work. As a math teacher, it is very easy to detect those students since when one makes it wrong then all the others make the same mistake. When the instructor asked us what kind of measure we should take to stop this, I said, “punish them”. I knew that it will not work but it is the only thing that can be said. If plagiarism is a crime –it is a crime I believe-, then commiters must be punished. Someone offered a “board of shame” for those who plagiarise, someone offered “fail them”. One Vietnemese lady said it is cultural. I disagreed with her since identifying something as ‘cultural’ is an easy way to avoid the solution. “It is cultural” then we can not solve it! I am 100 % sure that plagiarism has nothing to do with culture. If we want to say Asian culture encourages people to steal, then it is an insult to all these people! Culture is shaped by the people; it does not come from space. These are the people who created this culture and these are the people who will change it. Plagiarism does not come from the culture; it comes from lack of culture or cultural confusion. Asian societies want to catch up western societies without taking the steps which had been taken by western civilization. In this race, money, business, science, finance and technology are important things but ethics can be considered secondary. People in this society worship only one thing: Speed. Truth is much behind the speed. If my friend does his homework, I copy from him not because it is correct but because I am not willing to do it myself. Since I do not have my own voice, I have to steal from others. This may seem like a cultural problem but no parent in Asia encourages their children to steal. Someone said it is because of lack of confidence in a second language. It is correct. My question is how many of us can write an article in a language which is not our first language? Many of the instructors in the university can only speak one language: English. Although some of them have been living in Vietnam for more than 5 years, they do not bother to learn the language of the country. They can not read, they can not write, they can not speak! But the same people can easily judge students who are trying to write and study in a foreign language. Writing an assignment in a second languge can not be an excuse for plagiarism but those who blame students for laziness should first look at themselves.
Today, I took a public bus to go back to my hotel room. Behind me, there was an old lady sitting. When I tried to close the window, she said “don’t close, I need fresh air”. I was shocked because she spoke very clear English. Later I learnt that she is 63 years old –am I not supposed to meet younger girls?- and she had studied French in high school. She also said she was fluent in French. She said a few words in French but I did not understand. When we both stopped talking, I started to look at out of the window. There were motorbikes and bicycles around the bus. The bus driver was trying to break all the traffic rules by driving at the middle of the road –closing one half of the opposite road- and scaring all the bike riders –or only me-… The air outside was very dirty and most of the people were wearing masks on their noses and mouths. I wondered at that time what that old lady meant by saying “please keep the window open, I need fresh air” …
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