finale

My flight left Sai Gon at 6:10 AM, so the idea of trying to get some sleep before seemed like not such a good one. Even though I left a wake-up call request at the reception, this is, after all Vietnam, and a wake-up call is still performed by an actual person who has to wake him or herself up first to wake you up. I harbored misgivings as to when or even if said wake-up call would occur. At 4:00 AM to the minute my room phone rang and the friendly voice on the other end informed me this was my requested call.

It was about 4:20 when I made my way downstairs to the dark and quiet lobby. I opened the door to the reception and woke up the sleeping hotel employee to return my key and pay for the Red Bull I had downed minutes before to provide me the impetus to make it to Tan Son Nhat airport on no sleep. There was no indication from the drowsy employee whom I wakened from a dead sleep that he was the one who'd phoned me only 20 minutes before. Next, I woke up the employee sleeping next to the locked gate so I could exit the hotel. I guess these disturbances are all part of working the night shift at a Sai Gon hotel.

In the side street next to the hotel, a foreigner was slumped in a fitful sleep in his plastic chair outside the bar where he had spent a large portion of the previous night. He was dreaming on his own now, but hours earlier I had peered down from the hallway outside my room and seen him actively engaging a Vietnamese woman in an obvious attempt to gain her companionship. For just the evening or for the rest of his life, I don't know. Perhaps neither did he. On the table next to him lay the small bouquet of roses he had purchased to aid him in his amorous pursuit. Perhaps the roses would still be fresh enough the following night and his batteries sufficiently recharged that he might not even need leave the perch he had apparently become quite comfortable with. Perhaps his friend might even return. In Vietnam tomorrow really is another day.

My concerns that I might have trouble finding transport to the airport at the early hour were instantly dispelled when 2 motorbike taxis offered their services not 20 feet from the hotel gate. I would proceed to the airport in true Sai Gon style, on the back of one of these fine hardworking gentlemen's motorbikes. I approached the nearest and we had our brief negotiation over price and he took my large bag and placed it between his legs in front of him and I put on my helmet and we were off. We reached the airport in very good time, there being almost no traffic, but not after a few harrowing moments in which I was reminded of the tenuousness of my position on the motorbike by some sharp bumps and potholes. I paid the driver and in the darkness I could still see some of detail of his smile, the stains on the teeth that still remained, as he said 'See you again.' In the darkness I could see and feel that it was genuine.

So that's it for now. As I write this, I'm back in California. And it's cold! I'll just say that if you're thinking of visiting Vietnam and have any hesitation about it, don't. Don't hesitate, that is.