Re-PUBLICIZE the city
In Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) dining outside on the streets, sidewalks is very common. Like New York City, life is on the streets. People are on parade and few spend their times indoors for entertainment as is the case in most Western centres.
BRIEF
History, culture, philosophy, religion and politics shape urban centers. Architecture and urban planning respond to these factors. There are invisible borders between private/public behavior in Vietnam where life and livelihood is on outside and the 'inside/indoors' space becomes smaller and smaller. From morning to evening, inhabitants dine on mobile plastic chairs and tables. Vietnamese cities were originally organized according to the communal village. However, later colonization added a different layer to the urban landscape. For instance in Hanoi the French colonists tore down the temple on Hoan Kiem Lake and a post office was built in its place. For the Vietamese city, religion shaped the city center. For the west the city center was commerce and communications systems. With this influence and the global economy, inhabitants of new asian cities like Singapore and Ho Chi Minh City experience a mismatch of psychogeography. 
Cinema centers replete with restaurant, store, gardens have replaced the town square as a meeting place in Western cities. The fountain is replaced by the screen.
ACTION
These actions will examine the differences between the Western City and the Eastern City using New York City and Ho Chi Minh City as examples.
1. The performers in New York will experience the reactions of this behavior in the Western city by reinacting an urban dining room. They will use the props(miniature stools) to place in the middle of a public space such as the sidewalk, on the steps of a building.The performers will take the living room one step further by identifying atypical private behavior and perform it in a public space.
2. Performers in HCMC will explore the sociological affects of mobile devices (cellphone, ipods, videopods, headphones) on one's conduct in public. Each performer will sms, listen to his ipod, wear sunglasses, conduct a conversation with another participant while following a map. His actions will be documented by another participant using a video camera. The performer will retrace his steps a 2nd time without the devices and be give his feedbak on the differences on his observations of his environment.
RESOURCES
Looking at Cities
Village Community
Natural History of Urbanization
