Bound for Vietnam (31 page)

We came to a place at the water’s edge where a series of tall sticks stuck out of the water close to the shore. They were there to let everyone know not to land. Hanging from the tops of the sticks were pieces of reed attached to strings that connected to hand grenades. Our guide told us that they were warnings that said, ‘Keep off. This is our place.’ He also showed us how the local people set traps for mongoose and rats. Everything was made from natural materials, so there was no litter.

Having survived the jungle trek, we tramped back to our boat and moved to a populated area where people grew produce, mainly fruit such as longans. I liked the bath house arrangements that were built over the water behind the dwellings. And I loved the pig pens made entirely of bamboo which had slatted floors and stood on stilts over the stream.

Our guide took us to a place in one village that he called a factory, but was a hut with a rammed earth floor on which two women were weaving sleeping mats on a frame. Then we hiked a great way through a garden where flowers, bonsai plants, and pine trees were grown commercially.

Then, after a cheap and tasty
baguette
– a Vietnamese torpedo-shaped, crusty bread roll filled with choice bits and pieces – from a street stall, it was back on the bus once more to drive into a spectacular pink sunset that was etched with the black outlines of coconut palms and reflected in the still waters of the rice paddies.

Just on dusk we were held up at the site of a bad road smash. A motorbike was crumpled on the side of the road and directly under my window sprawled a dead body. Lying on his back with one leg bent under him and a pool of blood fanning out from his head, the deceased man’s bloody face looked up at me. The bare skin of his torso was an un-natural yellow and there was no movement of his chest. The dead man lay all alone. No one covered him or came near. I was the only one who seemed to see him. There were no police or ambulance in attendance. Another limp body was being man-handled into a cyclo like a sack of flour, while a crowd stood around and stared. The bus had to wait quite a while for the traffic jam to clear and all this time I looked down on the abandoned corpse.

It was dark by the time we got on the ‘fairy’ that transported us across the vast expanse of the Mekong River to Can Tho, 169 kilometres south of Saigon, for the night. Everyone was put off the bus to hike onto the ferry except me. I think the driver had got the message that I wasn’t all that keen on walking. When the others climbed down he turned to me and said, ‘No, okay you stay.’

The hotel in Can Tho, passable downstairs but a real dive above, was the worst place I stayed in Vietnam. To add insult to injury, I had to pay an extra three dollars to have a room to myself. I was very glad I had invested in this luxury when I saw that all the rooms had double beds. I did not fancy hopping into bed with some female, or even a bloke that I did not know, as the other single travellers had to do. The hotel had no hot water or electric plugs and although I had previously thought that I had experienced the ultimate in rock hard pillows, those of Can Tho took the prize. But there was a marvellous mosquito net over my big double bed. It took, however, a lot of manoeuvring and swearing to get it up and assembled on all its little hooks.

Our merry band of wanderers trooped down to the bus like Good Little Tourists and were taken to a restaurant, where we were shunted upstairs for dinner. It was more secluded on the second floor, but it was much hotter – and so were the prices. The Israeli contingent and I did an exodus and went next door, to an outdoor café.

I had a delicious omelette washed down by a large bottle of beer. Then I decided to go off on my own to the market to buy a pair of shoes. I got lost and didn’t ever find the market, instead I found a street of shops. I bought a pair of shoes for four dollars. I was still lost, so I produced the hotel card I’d had the sense to ask for after my unforgettable experience in China. Sent in the right direction several times, I got lost again and went into a shop to ask for help. A small girl took me by the hand and towed me around the streets and delivered me personally to the hotel. In the doorway she announced me, the translation of which probably ran something like, ‘Look what I found. Here is one of your stupid tourists who got lost.’ It was the ultimate indignity to be hand-delivered by a pint-sized know-all with a superior attitude.

I was up at the crack of dawn, courtesy of the propaganda machine that started business at five outside my window. The guide also smashed on my door at six and told me to get up. After a good breakfast at a sidewalk café next to the hotel, I waited half an hour for the bus.

We set off again and drove thirty-two kilometres south to the village of Phung Hiep, passing a snake farm along the way. I asked where all the snakes came from and the guide said that they were caught locally. Soon afterwards some of the group asked for a toilet. The guide told us, ‘I will stop the bus and you can go in the bushes.’ Not on your Nelly, I thought. I was convinced that I had done the right thing when we got to the main street of Phung Hiep and found a very active live snake market in progress. All along the roadside countless furiously arching and whipping reptilian specimens were displayed for sale in wire netting enclosures. Cobras raised their hoods and hissed at me and writhing, deadly poisonous green mambas eyed me with menace as I walked past. I stopped to admire lines of tall racks on which dangled row after row of small round objects like nuts that were attached by strings in artistic arrangements. They turned out to be snake livers that had been hung up to dry. It was very good to eat snake liver, I was told.

Then it was back on the bus again to a floating market where an armada of sampans sold all manner of goods and services from hair cuts to coffins. An example of what the boat offered, such as pineapples or bananas, hung like a flag on a pole above it. There was even a floating bar, a sampan filled with brightly labelled bottles.

Later we climbed into another boat and cruised along more canals, waterways and channels until we were again deep in another part of the delta. Everywhere we went we were greeted with shrieks of joy and choruses of waves and hellos. Waving back, I began to feel like Queen Elizabeth on a royal tour. Stepping ashore at one small compound, we were taken to visit a family home on the riverbank. The house was only half enclosed and much of the family’s living was done outside, under a canopy of big trees, in an elfin green gloom that felt like being underwater. The occupants of the house fed us pomelos, pineapple, bananas and jack fruit, as well as goodies made from coconut milk, fruit and rice that were wrapped in banana leaves. I tried the homebrewed rice wine that was offered. It tasted like brake fluid and was not terribly well received by my stomach.

After several hours on the water, we were marched in crocodile file back onto the bus, taken across the Mekong on the ferry and progressed to Vin Long where we were shown a huge, and I mean
huge
pair of snakes. These hefty fellows were a mated pair of pythons that were about five metres long and so heavy that I could not lift the female off the ground. No one else, except a couple of local two-year-olds for whom Ms Python was no big deal, would even touch her.

Back in Saigon the bus dropped us at Kym’s café where I bought a beer for the driver and the guide and collected a monetary reward for them from the other passengers. The amount I was able to extract from our generous mob was minute, but the two men thanked me profusely. Their wages were only four dollars a day, I discovered.

I wheeled home to Vien’s in a cyclo in the cool evening air to be received like a long lost family member returning from a distant voyage. Then I had to sit down and tell everyone about my adventures.

The next morning I asked Vien to drop me at a gold shop on her way to the market. I wondered why she hung around watching as I stepped up to the counter. Then she called me over and said, ‘Lydia, Lydia, come, this is not good for you.’ She must have known something that I did not. I got back on the motorbike and Vien took me to another shop where I disposed of almost the last of my dong in readiness to leave the country.

The Qantas staff had told me that the only available ticket to Adelaide was via Bangkok and Melbourne. They told me that the plane left at half past one, explained how long I would spend in Bangkok and gave me the time I would arrive in Melbourne. When I went to collect my ticket, two young women told me again that I went via Bangkok, how long I stayed there and what time I left. But this time I was told that the plane left at five past three. ‘How long does it take to get to Bangkok?’ I asked. The two girls exchanged blank looks. Then a bloke wandered up from the back of the shop and said, ‘Can I help you. I’ve just come from America to do some work here.’ He looked at my ticket and said, ‘You are flying direct to Melbourne.’ I said, ‘No I’m going via Bangkok.’ ‘No no,’ he said, ‘This is a through ticket.’ I read the ticket. The departure time was twenty past four. This man then took me aside and said, ‘I’m here to straighten out a few problems.’ I said, ‘I think you are very much needed.’

One of my extended family was summoned to drive me to the airport. I loved the car that was produced for the purpose: a tiny, ancient, but lovingly hand-painted Renault.

On the way to the airport we passed a Buddhist funeral. Not another omen, I hoped. There were gongs, drums, a band, a float with a dragon on it and monks waving burning incense who walked in front of the ornate coffin that was borne on the shoulders of the male relatives. This was the way to go.

At the airport check-in counter I was asked if I wanted my luggage sent direct to Sydney. ‘Why should I would want it to go there?’ I asked. ‘Because that’s where your ticket is for,’ was the reply. ‘And then on to Adelaide?’ I said. ‘No only to Sydney.’ It took an hour and the regional manager of Qantas to sort out this little hiccough, but in the end there was, after all, no stop off in Bangkok. The plane went via Singapore. But I was home for Christmas.

Wakefield Press is an independent publishing and distribution company based in Adelaide, South Australia.
We love good stories and publish beautiful books.
To see our full range of titles, please visit our website at
www.wakefieldpress.com.au
.