Cut! Take 2 - Interview with Mr Dung

Today was my final day on client site and since Mr Dung had decided that we should finish the video interview we had started earlier on in the week, that is what we spent most of the day doing.

Once arriving on site, Mr Dung announced that he was off to get changed into a suit and tie (minus shoes) for the interview. I was not expecting for this activity to turn into something quite so formal but he was obviously a man on a mission and I let him do what he needed to do. We congregated in his office, where he sat behind his desk (and computer) and began the filming. He’s got quite a quiet voice and the microphone on the camera was struggling to pick it up over the sound of cutting steel. We overcame this by using the karaoke microphones (the same microphones we had used during our midmorning karaoke session the other week) to amplify the sound. It gets more bizarre and I was starting to wonder why I had even suggested such an activity when we’d experienced so many challenges with communication already. After seeing himself sat behind his desk, he decided he wanted to be filmed standing up, but I think his nerves got the better of him and we all collapsed into a fit of giggles while he tried to answer the 3 questions I had asked my interpreter to translate. An hour and about 6 takes later, he was still not satisfied and so he decided we should have a break for coffee.

We congregated in his office again after lunch, minus the suit jacket and tie (thankfully), but this time armed with queue cards. He had obviously spent his lunch break preparing. A dozen takes later, we finished the day with a 4min interview, which I will be editing and adding subtitles to over the next few weeks. The amount of time we spent on this today, anybody would think that it was going to be shown on the BBC or CNN, rather than used for internal IBM communications purposes. The interview itself is ok, but the out cuts are a better representation of the client I have worked with over the past 4 weeks - shyness, smiles and lots of giggling.

The rest of the afternoon was spent taking lots of photos and saying my good byes (sounds like daam bee-uht) to everyone, from the accounts team to the foreman and Mr Dung’s family. I’m quite sad to be leaving them as I’ve had such a wonderful experience working here despite some of the challenges we have faced. Tomorrow, the other IBMers and I return to Hanoi for our final day together as a team, before everyone starts heading off in separate directions. As my trip to Vietnam isn't officially over until I board the plane home on Saturday, I will save my final blog until tomorrow as a lot can happen in a day, especially as it sounds as though we may be getting a bit of a send off in the morning.