Epic Vietnam Journey (Day 13-Ha Binh-Sam Son)

I get up and leave early, because there is really nothing to see in this town.  As I’m driving, I get questioned by a lot of motorbike riders about my lack of a helmet.  It’s getting a bit annoying, as I don’t like to follow laws that make no sense (i.e., a law that allows you to wear an unsafe helmet that need not even be buckled, and that does not require children under 15 to wear a helmet).  I get to the edge of town, and there appears to be some type of police checkpoint as they have a bunch of people pulled over.  Sure enough, two policemen jump out into the road and direct me to the side of the road.  I’m like here we go.  They ask me where my helmet is.  With a lot of hand gesturing, I explained to them that my chin strap broke, and and . . my helmet flew off my head and and . . . it then went bouncing off the road behind me.  They started laughing along with other people and told me to get on my way.  I was like, really?  That’s it?  Another chance to poke the lion in the cage I guess.  I shake my head and get on my way, relieved that I didn’t get fined or worse. 

About 10km down the road, my back tire starts getting squirrely and I almost lose control of the bike.  Flat tire.  I push it down the road a little and ask in my broken English if someone could fix the tire, of course, pointing to my flat tire.  I am directed to this hole in the wall place about 50m from where I pulled off the road, which apparently specializes in fixing flat tires.  I ask the guy to fix the tire, and he obliges.  Children gather around and I kind of try to speak to them in Vietnamese.  Usual questions.  What’s your name, how old are you, etc.  As my tire is getting fixed, I take pictures of them and show them the pictures, and they are delighted.  They were so cute, probably ranging from 5-9 years of age.  Children that age have no preconceptions.  They are just curious and interested in people who look different.  I guess you can say that I got lucky with the flat tire.  If it happened a day before, I would have been completely F-d.  I got a flat at the most convenient time.

I go on my way, waving bye to my adoring fans.  I get close to Vinh, where I was originally planning to go the previous day, and this guy with a girl on the back of a motorbike comes riding up to me.  The good looking girl starts smiling and talking to me, and of course, I start smiling and talking back as we are riding down the road.  The guy makes hand gestures and points to his girlfriend, obviously asking me if I wanted to have sex with her.  I’m like really?  Isn’t she your girlfriend?  Holding up two fingers, she said “two.”  I’m thinking either she already has two boyfriends, or she wants me to be a second boyfriend.  Damn, this is one wild couple, especially for Vietnam, since I don’t think they are into the whole sharing thing here.  Anyway, it dawned on me, that “two” indicated 200,000 VDN (about 10 bucks), which seems to be the going rate for sexual services around here.  Dude was prostituting his girlfriend.  I told them I must be moving onto Hanoi and took off.  Crazy.

I know, at this point, that I am getting somewhat close to Hanoi, because it is very dry and dusty, which is stinging my eyes, especially when I’m driving behind a truck or bus.  I get to Sam Son, which is a beach resort, and I find a hotel.  I go the reception desk to give them my passport, walk back to get my backpack from my bike, and I was lifting my backpack from the bike, the seat fall off.  My motorbike is falling apart before my very eyes, but as long as the engine and drive train keeping working, nothing will stop me from getting to Hanoi (which is now only 150 km away).  In addition, I apparently lost my bike key somewhere between the reception desk 40 feet away and my bike.  How? I have no idea.  Perhaps I dropped it into some crevice in the bike when my seat popped off.  I have lost four sets of keys since I’ve arrived in Vietnam.

One of the hotel workers told me it would be no problem getting the bike re-keyed and he did just that. Before doing do so, he sat me down for some tea, and told me a story that he was one of the crew members who sailed a bamboo boat from Sam Son, Vietnam to California in the 1990’s, stopping on the way in Taiwan and Japan.  A book was written about it called the “The China Voyage.”  Kind of makes my journey pale in comparison.  His voyage took 8 months.  Interesting fellow.

I go to the beach and drop my sandals off at the nearest hill, so that I can walk barefoot in the sand.  

I get the usual looks.  In this case, I’m pretty sure that there have been more Lockness Monster sightings in Scotland than there have been white person sightings in this town.  It’s 150km from Hanoi, and unless some idiot happened to be passing through on a motorcycle, no Westerner would even think of coming here.  I walk a couple kilometers in both directions along the beach (waving hello to, you guessed it, my adoring fans), come back to get my sandals, and they are gone.  WTF?  If you don’t tie things down around here, people will walk out with them.  Since my sandals do not fit well anymore, I don’t mind too much.  I have no idea whose Vietnamese feet they would fit as they were too big for me.  Good thing I brought my sneakers, which before now, I had thought just wasted space in my backpack.  Now I have more room in the backpack.

I go eat at the hotel, and then walk the streets along the beach to get some ice cream, providing much needed entertainment to the Vietnamese people.  Tomorrow, I will travel the final leg of my journey to Hanoi.  Although I lived there for over 6 weeks, I am sure to get lost.


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