So I started my own club. It's very exclusive. So exclusive, in fact, there are only three members including myself. Don't even ask me about trying to get in. The hazing and initiation are more than you could bear.
Doan Thuc (left, pronounced like "dwayne top") and Thong (right, pronounced like "tom" said quickly) are my Tieng Viet sparring partners over coffee every Sunday at 10am. Both are 20-something Vietnamese who are eager to practice English. They speak quite well already and certainly have better pronunciation on some words than I do. They're also great teachers who will absolutely *not* let me off the hook until I can pronounce a word. Their favorite torture method is the word for "Wednesday," "Thu tu." I just hate that one. The "th" sound in Vietnamese is tricky. Plus the "u" sound is amazingly tricky, kinda like an "ooof!" pronounced unnaturally deep in your throat (see my Learning Vietnamese post). Combined with having to produce both the "th" and "t" sounds ("t" is pronounced almost like "d" in certain situations) it's deadly. My teacher joked that I should never schedule anything on Wednesday. Haha.