Pace of Change
In September 1992 I visited Vietnam, a country whose population is highly-educated, as a scientific guest of National Centre for Scientific Research Institute
of Informatics, Hanoi and two organizations in Ho Chi Minh City, a
University and a Mathematical Society. This UNESCO sponsored travel deepened
my awareness of the rapid change taking place all over the world, and
the number of well trained scientists in what we normally think of as
developing countries, in computers and mathematics.
This image of rural Vietnam should be placed against the reality of my
hosts' depth and their numerous students educational breadth. I met many
individuals trained in Russia and Ukraine to the Ph.D. level, large
numbers of bright knowledgeable computer scientists whose programming
skill outstripped my own and many UCLA students', and watched the
Institute in Hanoi become an active participant in the internet during
my visit.
For an idea of the speed of change, March 1998 travel in China provides some contrast at the academic side. A newspaper article from
May 1998 makes this evident at a human level with respect to a notable
social event.