vim isn't working as expected

[William O'Higgins]

I am a new user of FreeBSD migrating from Red Hat Linux.  There are a
few differences that I am having trouble with.

vi - my editor of choice, and it doesn't work in the ways I expect it
to.  I am used to vi being aliased to vim (which I have done in FreeBSD)
and having syntax highlighting, arrow keys, and a tell-tale line at the
bottom of the xterm to remind me which mode I'm in, which line and
position, and how much file I'm looking at.  All these things are gone in
FreeBSD.  Could someone tell me what I'm missing?  Thanks.
-- 

yours,

William