Welcome to Scam Central 2 - Those Affable Filipinos

This is the second post on the topic of the small industry that swirls around the tourist areas of Sai Gon existing solely for and because of the loose money jangling around in the pockets of ignorant and starry-eyed foreign tourists. The longer one sees how this industry operates the more one comes to realize that it's the tourists themselves as much or more as the parasitic individuals who stalk them that perpetuate this business. It's no news to anyone that the scammers simply want money, preferably in the form of a somewhat reliable income stream, i.e., the same thing 99% of us on the planet want. What may surprise some is how much many of the tourists want to give it to them.

"Hello, how are you? Where did you get that/those shirt/hat/bag/shoes/glasses (ad nauseum)?" After a few days walking around the parks and streets of district 1 in Sai Gon you'll quickly lose count of how many times you've heard these opening lines. Nowadays a new one is "Excuse me, can you tell me where the Ben Thanh market is?" Asking about the Ben Thanh market (Chợ Bến Thành) is the equivalent of asking someone in San Francisco about the Golden Gate Bridge. Initially you'll do a double-take of the speakers of these lines because while clearly Asian, they're not Vietnamese, and their English is noticeably better than that of the average Vietnamese. Most likely they'll be members of the league of affable Filipinos that roam the streets here looking to snare gullible tourists into one of their many scams. I've heard that Laos and Malays have now joined their ranks, but the ones I've encountered have all been from the Philippines. And my oh my, they're so friendly!

In normal circumstances, for example back home wherever that is, you'd immediately ask yourself, 'what does this schmuck want and why is he/she being so friendly to a complete stranger?'. But it's interesting, and I say this based on my own susceptibility to it, when you're traveling in a foreign country, especially if you're a little lonely, you don't question it as strongly if at all. At least not at first. After all, what's wrong with a friendly little chat?

Once they have your attention and you've told them what country you're from, the next line is usually along the lines of 'I have a sister/brother/aunt/uncle/cousin there working/going to university'. Followed at some point, often after a fairly long conversation, with an invitation to meet them on a later day to go to a house to meet the family member who resides in your country but happens to be visiting Sai Gon at the present or some other person who just wants to talk to an interesting person like you.

This is the point at which reasonable individuals think (sarcastically) to themselves "Sure, I'll get in a taxi with you and let you take me to some unknown location to meet some people I don't know". Recall the motorbike whores and their tactic to get you on the back of their speeding motorbike to drive you straight into their well-laid trap.

Being a somewhat reasonable person I always declined the invitation and said good-bye, but was always curious about exactly what would happen if I did accept. So, I'm now ready to make this confession since it's been over 1 1/2 years since it happened. Purely out of curiosity I once accepted the invitation and showed up in the park the next day to meet the Filipino and go to this house to meet these people. I know it wasn't a particularly smart thing to do, but at the time I was extremely bored, and I was at least smart enough not to bring any significant amount of money or anything of value or any important information or documents with me.

He was there on time and we proceeded to hail a taxi and head off into what was then unknown territory for me. Based on my memory, I believe we went to the Bình Thạnh district just north of district 1. It took 10-15 minutes to get there and the house we arrived at was quite nice, big and well-furnished.

We entered and I was greeted by another (friendly!) middle-aged Filipino and offered a seat in the living room area. My guide sat with us and a Filipina emerged from the back with tea cups and a pot of tea and poured each of us a cup. Of course the alarm bells were sounding in my head regarding the tea and the prospect that it was spiked with something that would render me unconscious. I waited to see that the others drank some before feeling comfortable enough to join them. The tea, it turned out, was fine.

After some casual chit-chat the topic turned to the fact that there were gambling casinos in Viet Nam and that only holders of foreign passports were allowed into them. I wasn't aware of the foreign passport rule and have never verified it, but I believe it because otherwise there would be too many stories of Vietnamese who lost their (likely meager) life savings in a matter of hours, seduced by the draw of easy money. It also fits with the general attitude of the government.

So the pitch went basically like this: they had an accomplice who was a black jack dealer at a casino who could cheat the casino by tipping off his hand to players at the table, allowing players to increase their bets at the right times and win big. What my new-found friends said they wanted me to do was agree to be an informed player at their friend's table, win big, and then share the winnings. My response was non-committal (there's no way in hell I would ever get involved with something like that), but nevertheless the middle-aged man wanted to teach me how to read the tip-offs and use them to win.

He pulled up a small table and had me sit at one end while he began dealing black jack. At this point I was ready to get out of there and I think my general lack of enthusiasm registered with him and after a few minutes he called it off. I have a feeling he would have asked me to start placing actual money bets with him at some point. Or quite possibly the story about the unscrupulous dealer was true. It sounded plausible enough.

In any case, both Filipinos accompanied me back out and into a taxi and they took me directly back to district 1 and dropped me off. That was it. I was unscathed and hadn't spent a single Vietnam dong! I imagine they were looking for certain characteristics that I didn't exhibit that would have led them to continue investing their time in the scam.

Another individual, someone a bit more gullible than myself, that I knew from my English teaching certificate course, had a different story involving the affable Filipinos. This bloke actually began informing his classmates one day that he had won some ridiculous amount of money (I believe it was $30,000) playing poker the day before. After some grilling, it was discovered that he had followed in the same general path I had, but had been invited to join a poker game at the house. They told him about a certain person they had a grudge against for cheating them (ha ha!) and in an incredible turn of events, the person in question showed up at the house and wanted to play poker! They quickly informed our bloke that they were going to conspire against this person and take his money and our bloke only had to play along and he would get a share of the winnings. This was how he came to be on the receiving end of a $30,000 participation bonus. Oh the good fortune. Good things happen to good people.

My first question to the bloke was 'So, do you actually have this money in your possession?' and of course the answer was negative. The money was in a safe back at the house and he had to go back the next day with some sort of goodwill deposit of a few thousand dollars in order to secure it. I told him not to do it, not to go back, or if he did, not to give anyone a single dime. The problem was that he really wanted to believe he had actually won this money and I detected a little anger and disappointment on his part that I wasn't patting him on the back telling what a smart fortunate fellow he was. But this is what scammers prey on, the characteristic they're looking for, people who want so badly to believe that they're doing something good or that something good will happen to them that they're willing to suspend any good judgment and rationality in the hope of getting it. As is the case with most scam stories, we never heard the outcome. He said he went back but didn't pay any money. We know he didn't get the 'winnings' because we never would have heard the end of it. I imagine they took him for something and he's too embarrassed to ever admit the truth.

Most people who get scammed never say a word about it out of shame and embarrassment and this is one of the important aspects of it that keeps the scammers in business. I know a lot of people must fall for the Filipino scams simply because of their constant presence and never-ending gambits. If it didn't pay, they would have given it up a long time ago.

The one important thing to always keep in mind is that the same principles of human behavior apply in Viet Nam and everywhere else as do in your own home country. The fact that so many tourists want to believe otherwise is one of the main 'business drivers' of the scammers and keeps them going year after year.

So much for the affable Filipinos. My tactic with them now when they ask me where I'm from, etc. is to simply fire the same questions back at them. The fact that I'm on to them usually hits them fairly quickly and they move on. Or if I'm bored and have time to waste I'll play along for a while. If they ask where the Ben Thanh market is I tell them in a very authoritarian tone that there is no Ben Thanh market in Sai Gon. I've really grown to love the perplexed silence that follows.

Last month I attended my first Vietnamese wedding in the Mekong Delta area south of Sai Gon. We had to walk a long way down a pretty path from the road to the house of the bride's parents and, as always , make way for motorbike traffic.

The ceremony took place in the main room of the house. Symbols and messages of good luck and fortune were plentiful and the ceremony was short and interesting.

Welcome to Scam Central

Most tourists to Saigon who aren't too sedate will spend at least some time in the Pham Ngu Lao (Phạm Ngũ Lão) (PNL) backpacker district. It's the area with the densest and cheapest array of all kinds of services for foreigners and with the most easily available information for anything you might want to know. It's also where you'll see the highest concentration of foreigners lumbering about along with the parasitic element that preys upon them.

By my own completely unscientific estimate, over 90% of the foreigners you see strolling around PNL at any given time will be gone within a week. It's a transient stage of travel for most which only lends a stronger incentive to the predators who have become consummate professionals at taking a bite out their asses while they're there.

Single Western males are subject to an obvious form of solicitation more so than others as I can attest to. I remember my first night in PNL, almost 3 years ago now, when the area seemed an endless and interesting carnival of activity. It's nice to be able to walk down a series of connected streets and find restaurant after bar after travel bureau after convenience mart after barber shop after etc., all with price levels that are cheap by any Western standard and with all the signage and communication in English. That first night, as I ventured a little away from the frenetic center of the district to one of the bordering parks, I experienced what any foreign male walking alone or with other foreign males after 9 or 10 PM on any night will encounter: the motorbike whores.

Usually you don't see them coming. Like predatory big cats, they've spotted you long before you're aware of them and they often approach from behind. Since sidewalks are considered an extension of the street in Vietnam, they will drive right up to you and usually attempt to cut off your path to gain a little extra persuasion time. They almost always ride in pairs and the driver is the salesperson while the 'wares' are perched seductively on the back usually wearing low-cut tight pants or a short dress and often with exceptionally long dyed hair. You know it's dyed in Vietnam when it's anything other than jet black.

The driver often appears to be a cross dresser or 't girl' as they're sometimes referred to. This must be one of the occupations they've made a niche for themselves in. The pitch begins immediately: 'you want massage, boom boom, 1 hour, very cheap, very good, go hotel near here'. While the driver pitches the girl on the back smiles invitingly and strikes various provocative poses. What you're supposed to do if you decide to take them up on the offer is to hop on the back of the bike after your girl steps off. She will then take a taxi or some other mode of transport for your rendezvous at the hotel. The motorbikes they drive are usually new high-end bikes. I've been told by a local Vietnamese that they're usually rented just for this purpose.

Luckily for me I've never been even remotely interested in this idea. Even if I were interested in a massage, my better judgment has always prevented me from getting on the back of a stranger's motorbike to be driven away somewhere. I've heard various stories about what happens to those who are not so reluctant, from being directly robbed to actually experiencing the offered service. I met an American here who did try it out and he was obliging enough to share with me his experience.

Immediately upon hopping on the back of the motorbike, the driver took off at a breakneck pace, veering through traffic and not bothering to stop at traffic lights as she whisked him off to some unknown hotel in some unknown location. I imagine she drove this way simply to not give him a chance to change his mind and jump off the bike. That and to get down to business.

At the hotel he paid for the room and the girl who had initially enticed him actually did show up and they proceeded up to the room for the 'massage'. Upon entering the room, she instructed him to disrobe and join her in the shower. He says that while in the shower he kept his eye on the room door and noticed someone opened it and started to come in the room, but backed out when they could see he could see them. This was to rifle through his belongings to rob him of whatever they could get, no doubt. The only part of his story that I find a little hard to believe was that he didn't just leave at this point if not before!

After the shower they proceeded to the bed where she began massaging his back. After a few minutes she began hitting his back with her hands cupped in a way that made a loud sound. He says this was a signal because soon thereafter there was a knock on the door. The girl opened it and had a brief discussion and informed him that she had forgotten to leave her ID at the desk and had to go back to the lobby to take care of that. She left and that was the last he saw of her. He didn't actually disclose how much money he paid or lost, other than paying for the hotel room. He probably just didn't want to say.

Bottom line is that the whole business is a set-up and all parties are in on it. Not that that should be a surprise to anyone.

I've developed various tactics for deflecting these solicitations. Mostly I just don't spend much time around PNL anymore and if I do go there I ride my motorbike or bicycle. I've found that elevating yourself above walking status saves you from all the annoying sales pitches. But if I am walking and get approached I tell them I have a wife or girlfriend waiting in my hotel room and that's usually enough to get them to move on. If they're especially aggressive and won't leave, I turn the situation around on them by walking up and standing directly behind their motorbike, taking away their ability to block or see me and putting them in a vulnerable position, and begin blabbering English at them. They hate this and I've never had them wait more than a few seconds before roaring away when I do it.

I will cover more of the various PNL scams and traps in a subsequent post.

At a construction site near PNL, an old wall has been exposed revealing these billboards in French! I imagine they're from the pre-1954 era when the Viets kicked the French out for the last time with their surprising victory at Dien Bien Phu (Điện Biên Phủ).

Unfortunately I couldn't get as good of a shot as I wanted. This one is for a rum (Rhum) with what would now be a politically incorrect name.

This one is for a baby food.

Sure, But Couldn't They Just .....?

Anyone who visits a foreign country, even if the visit is a short one, will inevitably make comparisons to their own way of life back home.

Some of the comparisons fall into obvious categories : the architecture, the food, the modes of transport, the clothing, the weather, the geology, just to name a few. Others require a longer period of observation and sometimes a keen desire to understand. Only after shedding one's tourist skin is it possible to see the deeper and more meaningful differences in a society. My cumulative time in Viet Nam is now approaching 18 months and while I would never to claim to fully understand Viet Nam, many of the aspects, both positive and negative, of its basic societal structure, economy, and government have become clearer to me. They offer a glimpse into basic human nature and how societies function.

When a European or North American visits pretty much anywhere in southeast Asia a number of comparisons always come up besides the ones already referred to. One is the state of the environment especially around the larger cities. Exhaust belching motorbikes, trucks, and other vehicles cause the general air quality to be far below that found in more economically developed areas. Not only is the air polluted by western standards but the waterways are not something you would want to dip even a toe into and the landscape is littered with, well, litter.
My impression on my first trip to Viet Nam was that the cities are just generally grimy and I still feel that way. But it's amazing how adaptable we are and how I now accept and rarely take note of the grime. The air pollution is the only aspect of it that really still bothers me. I've been doing a weekly bicycle ride and I restrict it to Sunday mornings. Mornings because of the lower traffic volume, heat, and possibility of rain, and Sundays because there is even less traffic than any the other days.

An important point is that even though the environmental quality is lower here in Viet Nam than in the USA and elsewhere, it's not as though it's perfect anywhere. A trap I often catch myself falling into, and based on comments I hear I'm not the only foreigner who does it, is to judge Viet Nam as if somewhere else were perfect. I think it's a basic human characteristic to ascribe a state of perfection to places we think of as our homes. As far as air pollution and almost anything else go it's a matter of degree. Depending on exactly where you are at a given time the air pollution in the USA can be worse than in Viet Nam.

Back in December when I was still in Thailand on the train from Chiang Mai to Bangkok I shared a compartment with a European man and a young English woman. The woman brought up the topic of how Thailand has so many good qualities and is a nice place in so many ways, but wouldn't it be nice if they could just pick up a little more of their garbage and put it into a rubbish bin and start recycling like they do back home. The man then pointed out to her that in Thailand, as in Viet Nam and elsewhere, they already do recycle but it's done by an informal army of individuals who scour the streets and garbage cans collecting all the usual recyclable materials like aluminum, glass, cardboard, plastic bottles, etc. The non-recyclable garbage like the scourge of the earth, those disposable plastic shopping bags, well, that is another story altogether.

But the woman later made a good point that punched a big hole in my longstanding stance that all municipalities should have drinkable tap water in order to cut down on individual costs and plastic bottle use. She pointed out that some high percentage of potable tap water just ends up going down the drain and that it's a wasteful system in that regard. I don't really know the costs of maintaining a potable tap water system, but she could be right. Furthermore, when the plastic water bottles are largely being recycled, the environmental impact of bottled water goes away. Interestingly enough, in the USA with its universally potable tap water systems, many people voluntarily buy bottled water under the assumption that it's somehow better. Whether that behavior is based on status consciousness or if there's a genuine distrust of municipal water systems I don't know, but it wouldn't surprise me if reports start coming out about degrading tap water quality in the USA. It seems to be the trend of things there and points out that there's a cost to maintaining potable tap water systems beyond their initial setup. Here when we're living in a house or apartment we buy drinking water in 20 liter water cooler style bottles that are always reused so I can't see that it has any significant environmental impact and the cost is low, anywhere from 10,000 vnd (about 48 cents US) t0 30,000 vnd (about $1.45 US), depending on the brand you buy. So I have to admit that maintaining potable municipal tap water systems may not carry any of the benefits I long thought it did.

While sitting at one of the plethora of sidewalk cafe-bars that dot the Pham Ngu Lao (Phạm Ngũ Lão) area of Saigon, an Aussie that I'd struck up a conversation with pointed out that the Vietnamese system basically works. Specifically he pointed to the street in front of us that was clear of debris and handled a regular high volume of traffic without any significant problems. Another aspect of Vietnamese infrastructure that tourists marvel at is the tangle of power and telephone lines that hang in sagging disheveled clumps off the concrete support poles that usually stand at some disturbingly non-vertical slant exposing the truth that the support between the lines and poles is actually mutual. Yet the power in Saigon, at least in my experience, is rarely out and often when it is it was for planned maintenance. And the mobile phone systems here are an order of magnitude better than in the USA. I never even think about the quality of the signal here because it's always so good no consideration is needed.

While Viet Nam certainly has various branches of law enforcement, you rarely see them doing anything other than the traffic cops (CSGT) handing out traffic tickets. Almost all disputes are handled quickly and informally with involvement limited to the initial parties. In many ways it's similiar here to the way towns in the Wild West of the USA probably operated back in the 1800's. Groups of people, societies if you will, do and always have had the same basic needs, chief among them being sufficient infrastructure and resources for a sustainable and fair economy and the right balance of individual freedom and social order. Of course exactly where the lines are drawn to achieve these goals often leads to disagreement intense enough to destroy the possibility of having them!

Societies naturally seek out and maintain a certain level of order largely on their own. But it's also in our nature to always want more, more of anything and everything that we feel improves our individual quality of life. Got to at least keep things interesting.

One of the municipal street sweeper workforce that keeps the roadways throughout Viet Nam debris-free. You'll even see them out on busy highways. They all use the large broom and some of them hang an oil lantern on their wheeled bin to be better seen at night.

A member of Viet Nam's large and dispersed recycling army. They often call out as they make their way through the labyrinth of roads and alleyways of Saigon. I've seen only women doing this.

This woman has what I refer to as a 'rig'. In this case it's a bicycle kitted out with large bags containing the various forms of recyclable materials she collects. There are many different types of rigs in Viet Nam as covered in my previous post 'Xe What?!'.

Mama got rig! Same woman conducts her recycling rig through a busy Saigon intersection as seen through some of the hanging jumbled power lines characteristic of Viet Nam. Newer areas of Saigon now bury lines underground, so enjoy this view while you still can!

Mua Mua (Mùa Mưa)

I'm on the precipice of uncharted territory now as the June days tick by. Last year it was late June when I left Vietnam and went back to the States for my summer stint volunteering for the US Forest Service. So there's a looming sizable block of the calendar beginning then and extending up to the beginning of November during which I've never been in Vietnam.

As many know and I've mentioned a few times there are essentially 2 seasons here in Vietnam, the dry and the wet. There was an adaption of an Eastwood movie here entitled 'The Dry, The Wet, and The Muggy'. That's a (ok, very bad) joke, so all you copyright attorneys can just chillax. The dry season runs from November into April and the wet is the rest. I had envisioned the wet season (mùa mưa) to be a time of ceaseless wind-blown downpours during which one would only dare leave the house wrapped in the standard plastic poncho or risk being drenched to the skin. I had also imagined it to be mostly hot and sticky temperaturewise. On my first trip to Vietnam 2 1/2 years ago I even packed a fairly bulky pair of REI all-weather pants to help ensure my survival through those adverse conditions. I at least learned enough in my 2 previous trips here to leave the rain pants packed away back in the States instead of lugging them around in my pack.

At this point, almost 2 months into the rainy season, I have to say that I rather like it. Yes, there is definitely rain but it seems to be confined to only the afternoons and nights. That leaves the entire morning of each day predictably free of rain. And if that weren't good enough, many days there is little or no rain at all. So you can see it's really not so bad. And seriously, an added benefit of the rainy season is the often cloudy sky which blocks out the searing rays of the tropical sun and some good gusts of wind that combine to knock down the temperatures so that it actually feels cooler than the dry season (mùa khô).

In light of this I've become a bit more of a morning person and try to get any shopping and other errands done in the AM. I find that before I ever venture out in the latter part of the day I first tiptoe out onto my small balcony and check the sky for the dark laden clouds that seem, from no matter which compass point they're spied, to be marching towards Saigon to empty their watery payload.

If you're caught out when the large drops begin to plop you can usually just duck under some awning or other cover and wait maybe 30 minutes for it to clear. Except for the times when it goes on for hours. Oh well, it's only mostly water.

Sooner or later you'll see a Vietnamese man standing out in the rain with a bar of soap taking advantage of the opportunity for a convenient free shower. Shirtless but otherwise clothed, thankfully. At least I haven't had to bear witness yet to the au natural version. Let it rain.

A neighbor defiantly flies a kite against the leaden sky heralding rain (and lightning!).

Tracy Nguyen is the best landlord ever! She left this delicious tiramisu cake in my refrigerator on my birthday. She usually writes my name as 'Mr. Christ'. I guess I must have done something wrong.

Me with my trusty Honda Cub silhouetted against the small but growing Saigon skyline. This is an area of district 2 that is poised for a lot of development. Nearby is a bridge under construction that will connect to district 1.

Can I Call You Tom?

Unable to stop the momentum that began with my purchase of a Honda Cub motorbike, I've added a bicycle to my stable of Saigon conveyances. It's a hardtail mountain bike that I bought after seeing it advertised for sale on a Craiglist post. I can now thank you, Craig Newmark, for 1 car purchase, my last 2 car sales, my motorbike purchase, and now this! I think it's safe to say that without Craigslist I'd be doing a lot more walking.

Craigslist is still getting traction in Vietnam, but it seems the activity has been picking up in the 2 1/2 years I've been watching it here. The apartment rental agents caught on a long time ago and there's always an extensive list of posts for apartments for rent aimed mostly at foreigners. Interestingly, there's a single Craigslist for all of Vietnam and I'd estimate at least 80% of all posts are associated with Saigon. Saigon continues its long tradition of embracing change and commerce with a much higher level of acceptance and enthusiasm than that other city in Vietnam up north somewhere.

I get more comments and attention when I'm on my bicycle than when I'm on the motorbike. I guess it's just more unusual and interesting to see a foreigner riding a mountain bike than mingled in with the thousands of motorbikes on any given Saigon street. You're also more easily spoken to and maybe seem more accessible sitting quietly on a bicycle without the rumbling engine that seems to create some sort of social barrier.

I don't get passed by many other cyclists on the streets of Saigon. As a matter of fact I enjoy speeding along while leaving motorbikes in my wake as I'm often able to do especially when traffic gets a little heavy. Once in Nha Trang a Vietnamese man on a bicycle went creaking past me on the Tran Phu (Trần Phú) bridge and I could tell he was pushing it pretty hard to keep his pace. Whether he was doing it to pass me or not I don't know. Neither did I care. The competitive cyclist in me still comes out at times and I let him quickly know the only reason he was able to pass me was that I had been taking it easy.

One Saturday afternoon in Saigon another Vietnamese man in long pants and leather dress shoes made a similar passing maneuver accompanied with a drawn out and, it seemed to me at the time, taunting 'Heeeelllllooooo!'. This occurred just before a traffic light that had just turned red. Red means stop in Vietnam also.

He proceeded to weave and wobble his way through the red light and across the intersection probably thinking he had now put an insurmountable barrier between us. Of course he hadn't. I wouldn't be writing this if he had now would I?

I moved up to the front of the traffic and jumped the green light just a little and it didn't take me 10 seconds to pull up beside him. "You wanna race?" I blurted out in English and motioned forward with my hand. I didn't wait for any response before I turned up the crank and left him way behind.

After maybe 1 kilometer there was a red light at a major intersection and as I pulled up I glanced back to see if my fellow cyclist was coming up. Nothing. I figured he must have turned off. Then about 10 seconds later I heard someone shout from up ahead and looked up to see him ahead of me at the light looking back and smiling and waving! I laughed and waved back. He then turned right and continued on his way. I know he didn't pass me while I was pedaling. There's a side road along the main lanes of Tran Hung Dao (Trần Hưng Đạo) street that is open to 2-wheeled vehicles and he probably took that and cruised by me while I was already stopped or slowing down. But nevertheless he ended up ahead of me by the time he shouted and waved.

Vietnamese children (and probably a large percentage of adults) love the American cartoon Tom and Jerry. One reason is that there's no spoken language so anyone from any country can enjoy it equally. Genius. Another reason, and this is my own opinion, is that Vietnamese love the idea of the wily mouse Jerry outwitting his bigger rival and surviving despite the overwhelming factors of size and physical strength arrayed against him. I have no doubt that every Vietnamese who has ever watched Tom and Jerry immediately identifies with Jerry and associates with Tom those of other nationalities that have 'visited' Vietnam including we Americans, the French, and their biggest nemesis of all, the Chinese.

That morning I was Tom and was outwitted by a Jerry who didn't and probably couldn't win the brutish contest of pedaling strength (to his credit my bike was also a bit better than his), but who nevertheless saved face and won something else. Perhaps I'm reading far too much into it but in any case we both rode on with smiles on our faces.

My basic mountain bike purchased from a Canadian in Saigon. By Vietnamese standards it's a high-end bike. I've worked out a 2-hour loop from my house that includes crossing the Phu My Bridge (Cầu Phú Mỹ), a beautiful suspension bridge between districts 2 and 7.

Sorry, Your Money's No Good Here

This was a phrase some of my San Francisco friends use to pull out to mean they were picking up the tab for drinks or dinner, etc. It was a good natured joke and always nice to hear!

In Vietnam you might hear this or some variation of it and it's not a joke nor is it nice to hear. In Vietnam, and maybe elsewhere in Asia or the world, people are real funny about money, literally the condition of cash. If you try to pay with cash that is not in good condition, for example it has a piece missing or is torn, many establishments will not accept it or will try very hard to get you to fork over some good cash instead.

This is one of my pet peeves about Vietnam because I find it to be so silly and such a waste of everyone's time. It's also an interesting study in conformist herd behavior.

Other than the government issued Vietnam dong (đồng, vnđ or vnd) the US dollar is still widely circulated and used in Vietnam. Many landlords who rent to foreigners request or demand rent payment in US dollars. It can be roundly debated how stable the US dollar is these days, but there is no doubt that it's many times more stable and reliable a store of value than the vnd.

In the case of US dollar cash, it's logical to be leary of bad cash because the nearest US bank that can recycle it is, well, kind of far away. During my first trip to Vietnam in 2008 I was rudely introduced to this when I went into a jewelry shop in Hanoi to change a $100 US bill into vnd and the lady wouldn't take it because it was a little worn.

I was a little taken aback at the time because the idea that cash has a certain lifespan and could become worth less as it physically disintegrates had simply never been something that I needed to think about. In the US as long as you have 51% or so of a bill you can send it or take it somewhere and have it replaced with a new one or so I've heard.

One of my housemates, another American, who pays the rent in US dollars has told me that some Vietnamese banks will accept worn US dollar cash, but they'll charge a fee to do it so it's easy to rationalize that worn foreign cash truly is worth less.

But here's where it gets silly. The Vietnamese also play the same game with their own vnd cash. Why they do this I don't know since Vietnamese cash, even torn or worn, is accepted at banks here. Or perhaps the banks also charge a fee to accept bad vnd cash.

I've seen vnd bills in denominations as low as 200 (less than 1 US cent) up to 500,000 (about $23.25 US). The bills in denominations under 10,000 are made of paper and tend to wear out rather quickly, but are still accepted in any condition since they're not worth very much. The denominations of 10,000 dong and higher are made of a high quality pliable plastic and will last much longer than paper and would be difficult and expensive to counterfeit. I've been told by a few sources that the Vietnamese cash is actually made in Australia and is similar to Aussie cash in composition.

I've only seen Vietnamese merchants balk at the condition of Vietnamese cash when it's at least 50,000 vnd ($2.33 US). This happened about 1 week ago when I was at one of the popular Pho24 restaurants and a foreigner at a table nearby paid with a 50,000 vnd note that the staff didn't like the condition of. He was very accommodating and happily took it back and gave the waitress a better one. How he eventually dispossessed himself of the mortally wounded note I wish I knew.

It took a long time for me to notice this game the Vietnamese play with their cash, but as is often the case, once I did notice it it became hard to ignore. Now I believe there's a game of hot potato that goes on and I believe foreigners are often a target since they rarely have any clue about it.

Most tourists in Vietnam exchange their cash for Vietnamese dong at an official foreign exchange counter. There are many of these scattered around Saigon and other tourist areas. I still obtain my dong the same way since I've found I get the best rates at the exchange counters around the high-end hotel area of District 1 along Dong Khoi (Đồng Khởi) and Nguyen Hue (Nguyễn Huệ) and Le Loi (Lê Lội) streets. This is one service that the Pham Ngu Lao (Phạm Ngũ Lão) backpacker area does not offer the best prices for. It's better to do your exchange in the large cities since rates start dropping as you move away from the competitive touristed areas.

Numerous times after exchanging a $100 US bill for a small stack of 100,000 vnd notes at one of the aforementioned official currency exchange counters, I've later discovered they slipped in a chipped or torn note. I'm trying to get myself into the habit of not only counting the cash when I do an exchange but also to look for any of these notes they might have inadvertently slipped in. By the way, I've never found any counting errors nor heard of any when exchanging cash this way. They're pretty good about that.

I've found the only way to get rid of a bad 100,000 vnd note is to force a merchant to accept it after I already owe the money such as when paying a restaurant bill. I actually go through a ridiculous process of separating my good cash from the bad in my pockets and after I pay with the bad note and they inevitably bring it back and ask if I have a good one, I pull out the small change from the staged pocket and tell them sorry I don't. That's what it takes to get rid of these 'bad' notes! I feel silly doing it, but I have no choice unless I want to either eat the $4.66 US every time I get one of these or take a trip to a bank to exchange it.

After a stay at a hotel in Nha Trang I paid the bill in US dollars and received change also in dollars and later discovered they had given me a really thin and torn $20 US bill. Luckily I hadn't left Nha Trang because I was only switching hotels so I took it back and the receptionist switched it for another no questions asked.

Before writing this post I found a badly chipped 20,000 dong (93 cents US) note in my possession and thought I would write about the difficult time I had passing it on, but at the Highlands Coffee shop I went to they took it without protest. This and my observation at Pho24 have led me to believe that 50,000 vnd is the generally accepted protest threshold.

You'd think we'd all have something better to spend our time on here.

On this trip to Vietnam, I've noticed a word that I didn't notice before that's used when expressing prices in vnd. Instead of saying the Vietnamese equivalent of 'twenty thousand dong' for example you'll hear 'hai (2) chục', so this word 'chục' means ten thousand dong. It sounds sort of like 'chup' in English. I consulted with a local and was told it's not a new word, but it's used informally in markets, etc. and you wouldn't use it in a more formal setting such as a bank.

If you're coming to Vietnam as a tourist and bringing cash with you, it's a very good idea to make sure it's all in good condition. If you want to make lots of friends here bring an abundant supply of crisp $1 and $2 (they love those here) US notes to hand out. You'll be welcome back any time.

One of my favorite cafes around Nha Trang. This is one is a little north of town, too far to walk, and I've never had any other customers disturb my private serenity.

Saigon, undoubtedly developing and modernizing at a rapid pace, still retains a lot of its rustic character. Here chickens hang out near a park in District 1.

Xe What?

I decided I had to finally take the plunge and get over one of my silly fears even if it meant dying in the process. That and the fact that I grew tired of walking and taking xe om's (ôm) everywhere. What's a xe om you ask? Xe (pronounced like 'say') is the general word in Vietnamese for a conveyance. Xe dap (dạp) is a bicycle, xe may (máy) is a motorbike, xe oto (ôtô) is a car (get it, ôtô = auto). Om is a word for hug. Think about it. Answer is at the end of the post.

What I finally did that I've been so nervous about was buy a motorbike. I've seen a few foreigners cruising around Vietnam on motorbikes and even full-fledged motorcycles and haven't heard too many stories of injury and death, other than my own accident in Hue (Huế) last year, so what could be the danger? I've been understandably apprehensive since that accident about driving a motorbike again, but I've now thought about it extensively and decided the accident was all my fault. In new agey parlance I've 'taken ownership' of the accident and the upside to that is that it puts me back in control and so by changing my driving techniques I can avoid having another. That's what I'm going with anyway. That can be my epitaph, 'He Took Ownership'.

The most common motorbikes in Vietnam seem to be the Honda Dreams and Waves. You see so many of them that they quickly become non-descript. Sort of like a Honda Civic or Accord in the USA. You also see a few larger real motorcycles like Honda Rebels and the old Russian Minsks, but I've never tried a large bike and was only kidding about that dying thing, so I decided to start with something on the small side but hopefully with a little style.

The real styling motorbike to have in Saigon and all over Vietnam is undoubtedly the Vespa. The Vietnamese fall for that Italian style just like the rest of us even though the Vespa bikes are significantly more expensive and costly to maintain. But I have to say they sure look nice. You see plenty of new Vespas and also a lot of older restored ones and they all look good.

I hear varying versions of how much a Vespa costs. I've seen ads for old ones with asking prices of around $1000 US and up. I heard from someone who seemed reliable that a new one will run around $3500 US. I also heard from someone else that a new one runs $9000 US which I have a real hard time believing since I see too many of them on the streets of Saigon and don't think so many Vietnamese could or would spend that much on a motorbike but it wouldn't be the first time (today) that I've been wrong about something.

Most motorbikes in Vietnam are made in Japan, and increasingly, China. The Chinese also noticed that Vespas look good and that even though they're expensive there's a lucrative market for them so the Chinese did what they're infamously known for, they started making a version of their own that looks remarkably and coincidentally similar to the Vespa. You see many more Attila Syms on the streets here than you do Vespas and the Attilas have a reputation for being more reliable at, of course, a fraction of the cost. Many Vietnamese I've spoken to said they would prefer the Attila over a Vespa even if they had the money for the latter.

Since I wasn't looking for a new bike I perused the Vietnam Craigslist, yes that same Craig of San Francisco, and found a post from someone who restores old bikes such as Honda Benleys and Cubs among others. After meeting him, a Vietnamese who lived many years in the USA - in Vietnam they're known as Viet kieu (Việt kiều), I decided to just take the plunge and do it. I decided on a Honda Cub for a few reasons. First and foremost I like the way they look, especially the pics of the nicely restored bikes he showed me. The second reason is that they're relatively small bikes and there are 2 reasons why I like this. First is that since it was going to essentially be my trainer/starter bike I figured I should start small both for my own personal safety and also the cost of the bike. That way if I realized I just didn't have what it takes to navigate Saigon's swirling maelstrom of traffic, I could bail out at minimal cost. And maybe also minimal personal injury. The other reason for driving a small bike is there's no driver license required in Vietnam for bikes with engines under 50 cc. The beauty of this restored bike is that it actually comes with a newer engine that just may be larger than 50 cc, I mean I just don't know since I'm no expert and who can tell just by looking at the engine from the outside, wink, wink. The motorbike registration card which dates from over 10 years ago under some Vietnamese name says the engine size is 49 cc and who am I to question an official registration document? Bottom line is that I can get by without a driver license on a Honda Cub.

Vietnam is not the free-for-all it was years ago. You will often see the traffic police, the CSGT, dressed in their tan uniforms standing by the side of the road flagging down drivers to pull over. They do this by blowing a whistle and pointing their baton at the driver of interest. The most common offenses I believe people are cited for are driving a motorbike without a helmet and not having a license, registration, or insurance. I've been told driving sans helmet will cost you 1 million vnd, about $50 US. In the past the CSGT have mostly left foreigners alone largely, I imagine, because they don't want to try to communicate with them but last year I saw a few foreigners pulled over and being spoken to in English by CSGT officers. I bought insurance since I am supposed to have it and am also planning on getting a Vietnam driver license since I may want to upgrade to a larger bike and it's just a good idea. Insurance for 1 year currently runs 86,000 vnd, about $4.25 US.

As was pointed out to me by an Aussie who's been driving around Saigon on a motorbike for almost a year, it's the acceleration that's important and not so much the top end. The obvious reason for that is the ability to surge out of tricky spots like finding yourself in a 4 foot corridor between a bus and the curb with the 4 feet diminishing right in front of you. One of the principles of driving in Vietnam is that if you don't move into an open space in front of you someone else will. Vietnamese drivers, like Mother Nature, abhor a vacuum.

I have to say my bike sure seems to have a lot of guts for that small engine. Top speed I've hit thus far is 75 km/hr (47 mph). Must be because I'm such an excellent driver.

Another nice aspect to buying the Honda Cub is that it was custom made so I could pick out the colors. I thought red and black would look menacing enough, but I have to be honest and add that a Vietnamese girl riding a pink bicycle told me my motorbike was cute. I guess a small motorbike, even one painted in those macho colors, can't transcend its true self. I did mention that it's only my starter bike didn't I?

I've also gotten many curious looks and a few smiles and thumbs ups from Vietnamese who see me on the bike. It's not so unusual to see a foreigner on a motorbike in Saigon, but most will be riding bland rental bikes.

So far I've logged 200 km (125 miles) on the Saigon streets including 2 stints in rush hour traffic with no scratches or dents on the bike or myself. Once you figure out the few rules about driving here the experience changes from one of white-knuckled terror to being actually enjoyable. Except for the rush hour traffic.

Xe om? It's the name for the many free-wheeling motorbike taxis in Vietnam. All that's required to go into business is the bike and a helmet for your passengers. Om refers to hugging the driver in front of you as you ride on the back seat though I don't think many of them actually get much of that. I use them a lot and have even gotten to/from the airport on one. They typically run about half the cost of car taxis, though you'll usually have to bargain to get that price, and are faster than a car when traffic gets heavy as they weave their way through the tangle. You'll sometimes be thinking 'xe omg, never again' when you reach your destination.

My 'cute' restored Honda Cub. I'm liking it!

This and the next 3 pics were all taken in about 10 minutes while I sat at a cafe in district 7 in Saigon. This one is your basic Honda Wave or Dream or whatever.

Another Honda loaded up like you'll often see. You'll see washing machines and refrigerators transported this way, too.

One of the contraption variety. Some of these 3-wheeled vehicles are leg powered. A lot of loose material gets transported this way in Vietnam.

Yuppie girl on her Vespa.

One of the common Chinese-made Attila Vespa knock-offs. This guy looks to have lost a sandal, but he's got his obligatory coffee drink.

Quintessentially Vietnamese, the squid bike. Xe mực? Those are the dried squid you can see hanging. He first pounds them to tenderize them and then heats them using power from the battery. Also note the fluorescent light. OK for a snack, but don't fly to Vietnam just to try it.

Veni, Vidi, Visa, Vietnam

"I came, I saw, I shopped." I wish I could take credit for that one, but the truth is I saw it somewhere years ago in one of those clever pieces in some publication like The New Yorker. I just now Googled it and there are numerous references so maybe it can be considered in the public domain at this point.

In my situation here in Vietnam, however, visa is not the credit card but the official document they paste onto a page in your passport that allows you to remain legally in the country. In the expat and tourist circles here in Saigon visas are a constant conversation topic against a backdrop of ever-changing rules cloaked in politics, mystery, and various degrees of indirection.

Ask anyone here about anything related to a Vietnam visa and you'll get an answer as definitive and useful as the weather report for the dark side of the moon. You can find official information regarding visas on the web, for example, but what you'll find is about as close a reflection to reality as the official currency exchange rates. Oh, please, don't make me laugh too hard!

There are some exceptions to that though and it all depends on exactly whom you deal with. Any expat who's been here long enough to have dealt with getting a new or extended visa has their connection, their trusted emissary, who assists them in the visa process. Your Vietnamese visa agent is regarded similarly to your auto mechanic or dentist or tax adviser in the USA. You have one, you like them, and you actively promote them to others.

You grow to depend on your visa agent because he or she (often she) is the one you can go to for definitive answers to your simple visa questions. Or definitive answer to your simple visa question: what do I need to do to extend my visa? Whether he or she is in command of the latest information and provides the best service at the best price becomes a minor issue as your primary concern is simply to get your visa without having to spend days of your life doing it and sleepless nights worrying about it. Ultimately the transaction is based on a large amount of trust: you hand over your passport and maybe advance payment to someone who promises to return your passport to you within some reasonable amount of time with a new valid visa. A British friend last year paid a Vietnamese woman he knew to extend his visa and she disappeared with his money and passport for a period of weeks. He eventually was able to find her and got his passport back but, needless to say, it was not a stress-free period of his life.

If you scour the Pham Ngu Lao tourist area of district 1 in Saigon you can find dozens of establishments offering visa services. If you're willing to put in the time and legwork you'll find someone who'll do it for a good price. One way to know if you're dealing with someone who knows the system is if they pick up the phone and call someone to discuss your visa after hearing what you want. Of course the conversation will be in Vietnamese so you won't really know what they're talking about, but it's a safe bet. Then the next time you're sitting around with a group of expats and the visa topic arises, as it so often does, you can offer up your experience as the most recent and reliable and thereby be crowned the visa king for the day. Just don't forget that it's only for the day.

I don't know all the parameters that go into granting a visa, but I imagine your recent (or not-so-recent) history in Vietnam and your nationality factor in, but the visa situation here really is similar to the weather. And of course different weathermen give different reports.

The maid at a mini-hotel I was staying at in the Pham Ngu Lao area offered her own cut-rate visa services when I informed her how much I had paid to get a visa. The reason she offered to do this is because any Vietnamese can perform this service and it can be quite lucrative. For each type of visa or extension, Vietnamese immigration charges a set and relatively low fee in US dollars. Relative, that is, to what you'll actually pay a Vietnamese agent to do it for you. Someone representing a foreigner to immigration can charge whatever he likes to the foreigner and pocket the difference. And it's in US dollars which is still a big plus here. As an example, in my most recent visa transaction the fee I paid to my agent equaled the immigration fee.

Something that might occur to many is to cut the Vietnamese agent out of the loop and instead go directly to Vietnamese immigration and pay only the base fee. That's an interesting idea but it would be wrong! There are at least 2 reasons why Vietnamese immigration doesn't want foreigners tramping into their offices submitting visa applications, at least inside Vietnam. The first is that they don't want to have to deal with your language barrier. I've heard stories of foreigners who learned to speak Vietnamese well enough that they could do their own visas and maybe they were treated favorably, I don't know. Which leads to the second and more important reason, which is that by using a Vietnamese agent you're providing an easy and well-paid job likely paid in foreign currency. There's nothing about that not to like.

When you're dealing with a Vietnamese visa office outside of Vietnam everything is different. I've dealt with US, Thai, and Cambodian offices and had varying experiences with each. The US office was the most straight-forward, but also the most expensive. I've heard many praise the Phnom Penh office but my own experience there was unpleasant to put it mildly (previous blog post). Once you're inside Vietnam it's a much easier process.

I like my visa agent and know she's the best in the business and I'm lucky to have found her. Though I have been hearing rumors of others doing it for less...

I took a trip to the Mekong Delta region soon after arriving back in Vietnam. This bubbling churning body of water is one of the many catfish (tra) farm ponds in the area.

Tet (Tết) is the Lunar New Year in Vietnam and was celebrated from Feb. 2-4, though in reality many businesses were closed for up to 2 weeks. This is HSBC's light display at their main office on Đồng Khởi street in Saigon. It's the Year of the Cat.

What greater tribute can be paid to a country than to brew a beer in its name? "To Capture the Spirit and Strength of America" reads the label. Were they successful? Well, let's just say I bought it for the label but won't be buying any more.

Koh Kood

While still in Bangkok, I received an email from a friend of mine whom I had met on my first trip to Vietnam in 2008, a free-spirited Aussie named Dick. We met up again during my second trip to Vietnam and I'd informed him about my month in Thailand. He told me that he too would be in Thailand on the island of Koh Kood (or Kut) visiting his friend there, a Thai lady, and threw out the idea that I ought to visit there. Well, after cancelling a few important appointments (ha ha) and juggling my schedule sufficiently (ha ha ha) I was able to squeeze a trip to Koh Kood into my busy itinerary. Besides who wouldn't want to visit one of Thailand's representative island paradises? I'd been to Koh Samui back in 2000, but it was fairly developed then and I can only imagine how it looks today. Koh Kood, by contrast, is small and still relatively undeveloped. It sits off the coast of southeast Thailand not far from Cambodia and the only way to get there as far as I know is by boat or helicopter.

I returned to Bangkok from Chiang Mai in the same fashion by which I had gone the other way, that is by overnight train in a second class sleeper car. I didn't even inquire about first class passage for this trip since I had no complaints with my experience in second class on the on the way to Chiang Mai from Bangkok. My veteran Thai rail passenger status also prompted me to eat a large dinner before boarding and to bring my own snacks and drinks as I now thought I knew all the nuances of how to make my journey as pleasant and cost-effective as possible.

Upon arriving in Bangkok around 9 AM I proceeded directly to the guest house I had stayed at about 10 days before and where I knew I owed about $45 US for 3 nights there that the manager had previously insisted that I had paid even though I knew I hadn't! She had made a mistake in the ledger and credited me with someone else's payment and at the time refused to admit even the possibility that the ledger, akin to some biblical stone tablets, could harbor in its orderly columns of neat figures a simple clerical error. Well, 10 days of enduring what was probably a chafing mismatch that screamed out at her from the usually sombre and content pages of the ledger had worn down her resistance to the idea of a mistake and softened her stance considerably and she smiled graciously and gladly accepted the payment I offered when I reappeared in the lobby. I rewarded her patience and understanding by staying an additional 2 nights there.

The logistics of getting from Bangkok to Koh Kood include the Sky Train, a 5 hour bus trip, an overnight stay in the town of Trat, a group taxi ride to the ferry dock, a 2 1/2 hour ferry ride, and finally another group taxi ride to wherever you're going on Koh Kood and you do need to know that final piece of information before you arrive. If you're traveling in style you can fly to Trat and take a speed boat that makes the crossing to Koh Kood in only 1 hour but why travel in the fast lane when the journey is so soothing?

Anyway, in Bangkok take the Sky Train to the Ekkamai station which is right beside the Ekkamai bus terminal. Cherdchai Tours has buses all day that depart about hourly for Trat. Trat is the central point for ferries to many of southeast Thailand's islands and gets a lot of traffic just for that reason. While I'm sure Trat has much to offer the determined and imaginative traveler, I really didn't see much reason to stay there except for getting to the ferry the following day. You can buy a ticket for either the fast boat (called 'speed') or the slow boat (called 'express' so as not to feel inadequate or inferior) at many of the guest houses in Trat. The taxi rides to and from the ferry dock in Trat and on Koh Kood are included in the ferry ticket price, but you will need to tell the taxi driver on Koh Kood where you want to go as there's no central hotel area on the island. Luckily for me, Dick had given me the name of the Cozy Guest House, a good low-budget acccommodation option on Trat near where he was staying with his friend Wan.

The ferry ride over to Koh Kood was smooth and pleasant and I was quite happy to be on the slow (express!) boat as I was comfortably reclined on the upper deck in a lounge chair enjoying the mild breeze and views out over the sea. After docking at Ao Salad on Koh Kood, there's only one route to take off the boat and out onto the street where a large truck taxi will be waiting to take passengers to whatever locations are given to the driver. There's essentially a single paved road that runs along the western side of the island and rounds the northern and southern ends before petering out. Currently the Ao Salad dock is the northern terminus of the road.

While the taxi was making its way southward from the ferry dock, during which we passengers were huddled together in the back in the covered bed being jostled to and fro and occasionally startled by the loud bang of the cover colliding with an overhanging tree branch, I looked back over my shoulder only to catch sight of Dick and Wan sitting at a roadside cafe. I yelled out and Dick yelled back, but I couldn't stop the truck and figured it was best to continue on to the guest house with my bags anyway. It's not a big island if you're sticking to the main road.

By the time I arrived at the guest house, Pi Noi, the owner was talking in English on his phone and handed it to me to speak to Dick as I stepped into the guest house lobby area. It's not a big island at all.

Travelers in southeast Asia are often bombarded with incessant solicitations for every kind of service imaginable, but this is notably absent on Koh Kood. Strangley enough my initial reaction to this was a feeling of abandonment since I had grown so accustomed to it, but it didn't take long to start enjoying the peace and freedom dividend that Koh Kood offers.

Once you're checked in to a guest house you'll have access to rental motorbikes and bicycles and likely discover many destinations within walking distance. I had another option afforded me though since Dick and Wan had had her motorbike shipped down from her home in Chiang Rai and they let me know I was free to use it while on the island.

The house Dick and Wan are renting, only a few hundred meters from the guest house, is perched up on a hill just south of Klong Chao beach, so my first full day on the island I decided to take them up on the motorbike offer and do an easy self-guided tour of the parts of the island accessible by motorbike.

As the taxi ride had come in from the north I naturally chose to start the motorbike tour by
continuing southward on the island road into territory I hadn't yet seen. The road is lightly traveled but offers up some challenging hills that will plunge a motorbike into a sputtering stall if you're not knowledgable of the upcoming climbs or really paying attention. In some cases you'll round a curve only to find yourself at the base of a steep wall-like climb and very likely in too high of a gear to scale it. Nothing to do in that situation but stop, drop it into first gear, and try to torque your way up the ascent at whatever speed you can manage. Once when I was in this situation I inadvertantly popped the front wheel of the motorbike up in the air when I juiced it a little too hard. I was glad I didn't have a passenger on the back at that point or they would likely have been plopped unceremoniously onto the pavement with outstretched legs and something very much unlike a smile on their face.

When you're not preparing for or dealing with a steep climb or sudden curve the motoring is a pleasant affair given the thick forests of palm trees and calm scenic beaches and sparcity of traffic. Koh Kood still has a down home feel to it, in a southeast Asia sort of way, with many cafes and restaurants that look like they were converted by parents into commercial establishments after first serving as forts and clubhouses built by their kids. There are many unpaved roads branching off the main paved road along with many a hand-made sign announcing this restaurant or that resort dangling amateurishly on nearby palm tree trunks. I can't imagine any of these resorts falling into anything other than the rustic category, but that's all part of the charm of Koh Kood. Koh Kood is such a beautiful place, however, that one could be forgiven for having a 'resort unless proven otherwise' attitude about it. Throw up a few thatch roofed huts along the water here and you've got yourself a bonafide resort. Maybe the huts aren't even really needed. A few well-slung hammocks might suffice.

I first preceeded straight to the southern end of the road where there's another boat dock, Ao Yai, and then backtracked to an unpaved road I'd noticed on the way down with a sign, this one looking professionally made, pointing the way to a resort.

When I arrived at the resort after an undulating meandering ride of 1-2 km I instantly could see that this resort was a real one. The bungalows and grounds at the Ao Phrao Resort are high quality and well maintained and their guests were definitely not of the backpacker variety.
As it was now lunchtime, I sat at one of the tables in their open air restaurant and enjoyed a very well prepared and delicious rice and chicken dish. The conversations around me that I could catch little snatches of carried the trill of what I'm guessing was Russian.

After lunching at the Ao Phrao Resort and waiting out the brief rain shower that sprinkled the southern part of Koh Kood, I started back down the unpaved and now somewhat muddy road on the motorbike towards the main island road. I eased the motorbike along the road that was red as a knife wound cut into the jungle, doing my best to avoid the puddles and finesse the bike through the channels cut by running water with my feet protruding like outriggers in case the motorbike should suddenly slip and snap to the side. After making it about 3/4 of the way out to the pavement I had became comfortable with nudging the motorbike along with occasional boosts from the throttle and quick small pulls on the handlebar and with its muted slippery response. The only problem is that as I neared the pavement and the ground beneath became firmer and drier the squishy yielding feel of the tires, the back one specifically, didn't abate. I slowed and looked back to confirm what I knew, that the back tire was flat.

After stopping and fuming for a few minutes over the malediction the jungle spirits had cast upon me, I calmed myself enough to consider my options for handling the situation, options more productive than sitting by the side of the road querulously demanding of the ground, trees, and sky to explain what I had done to be in this predicament.

I had never bothered to get a SIM card for my mobile phone for Thailand, but realized that my phone, which thankfully and inexplicably I had with me, had Dick's Thailand phone number in its database. At least it was his number from last year. So back to the Ao Phrao Resort I went on foot to try to explain that I'd like to use a phone to call Dick. After liberal use of gestures and my phone as a prop, I succeeded in getting one of the staff to call the number. At many businesses the scope of the English and other foreign languages spoken by the staff is limited to that of the normal course of business and trying to step outside those bounds results in half nods and confused polite smiles. Anyway, the call was made and there ensued a brief phone exchange in Thai and the phone was handed to me and Dick's familiar Aussie voice was like a lifeline tossed my way.

Dick offered up a few suggestions including just leaving the bike and hitching a ride back out on the main road but he knew exactly where on the island I was and also knew a small market that sold gasoline was nearby and that they could probably help me out in repairing the flat.

I walked back down the unpaved road and found the gasoline shop sign in front of a row of shacks along a small stream, but couldn't determine which was the shop and there was no one standing around. I wandered over to one of the shacks with a footbridge that crossed the stream that led to a covered porch where about a dozen Thai men were sitting around talking and smoking. Using the English words 'gasoline' and 'motorbike' I was able to get one of them to point me back to where I had been standing before. As I turned and began walking back over the footbridge I heard one of the men shouting something. He shouted again and as I began to turn to look back I felt something slam into my upper calf and looked down to regard a small dog aggressively attacking my leg. One of the Thai men was running towards us brandishing a small machete and I admit to a terrified instant in which I was uncertain just who or what the weapon in his hand was intended for. As I kicked at the dog which had not relented, he stood over it and threatened it with his lethal weapon until it finally backed off but not before taking another few lunges at my leg. I sort of wished the man had not come out as then I would have taken great joy in kicking the dog off the footbridge into the filthy black stream that oozed and gurgled below.

Unfortunately the damn dog had broken the skin on my leg with its bite and I was immediately concerned about its health only out of concern for my own of course. I could see it was a female evidenced its hanging teats and that it looked at least generally healthy and wasn't foaming at the mouth at least. It was also apparent that it was a family. The man was saying something to me, hopefully apologizing, but there was nothing more to be done at that point so I continued back to the gasoline shop to deal with my transportation problem.

I walked down to the shop and this time there was a man out front. Again, using sign language and the obvious sibilant sound effect and the word 'motorbike' which seems to be understood all over southeast Asia, I was able to convey without using any English, which he would not have understood, or Thai, of which I can say 'hello' and little else, that I had a flat tire and that the motorbike was located down the road a bit (about 1 km or 1/2 mile). Following Dick's suggestion I also mentioned his name, Khun Dick, which sort of translates as friend Dick, and tried to make sure they knew I knew him and was a friend. This was to preempt any temptation the shop staff may have had to begin licking their chops at the prospect of this helpless stranded wealthy (it's relative) tourist who desperately needed their help, all of which without question I was. Whether or not he knew Dick who had already spent considerable time on Koh Kood I didn't know, but a second man appeared and they jumped on motorbikes and the first motioned for me to hop on the back of his and away we proceeded.

I had left the motorbike at the point where I first noticed the flat tire thinking it not good to ride the flat, but the 2 shop men held no such restraining views and 1 of them drove it back to the shop where they were joined by 2 more men and 1 young spectator and they began feverishly working on removing the tube of the flat back tire. While they worked they talked animatedly amongst themselves about I had no idea what but I imagined they were working out how much they could fleece me for and what each of them would buy with their respective cuts of the action. At the same time I was pouring water on my fresh dogbite, the only immediate treatment I could think of, and wondering what possible turn for the worse events could take. I was already thinking of the length of time it takes for rabies treatment and that I had less than 1 week left on my Thai visa and only 1 month on my visa for Vietnam and how I would manage to receive effective treatment. My thoughts tend to careen off towards the darkest scenarios when I feel events have started turning against me as those of the last hour or so most definitely had.
They took about 10 minutes to complete the job, choosing to install a new tube instead of patching the old one. That way they can justify charging me even more I cynically mused to myself as I began to gear myself up for a confrontation over the pending presentation of the repair bill. 3 of the men then wandered away leaving me with just the first I had spoken to. So he's the hatchet man I thought, and the others are no doubt waiting and watching from not far off. He then motioned me towards the nearest shack and then he himself wandered away. Oh I see, the bill collector is over there in that shack and he's going to do your dirty work for you. What kind of man do you think you are? I strode forcefully, but unable to completely hide my slight limp, over to the shack which turned out to actually be a small general store but it was difficult to know by looking at it from the outside. Inside was a young girl standing behind a counter. Oh, now I really see the setup. Use the young girl on me so I'll relax my defenses and compliantly hand over whatever exorbitant sum she requests. Well, aren't you all such clever operators? I managed a slight smile and braced myself. '90 baht' she said non-chalantly through her Thai accent. 90 baht = $3 US.

I paid and turned to look for any of the 4 mechanics and thank them and offer an additional tip, but they were nowhere to be seen. So I cranked up the motorbike and started back down the dirt road, relaxed and relieved to have emerged from my difficult situation unscathed and feeling good about the island and its inhabitants and with nothing now to trouble my carefree state of mind but a lengthy and painful rabies treatment.

As I reached the end of the unpaved road I realized I should fill up the fuel tank on the motorbike and went back and purchased a liter from the girl in the store. On my way back out, for the third time, I noticed some of the mechanics sitting under a cover off the road near where I had first left the motorbike with the flat tire and they had left theirs when retrieving mine. They shouted and waved and I returned the greeting, but thought I'd better not press my luck by stopping again. Whether they had treated me differently from any other tourist I do not know, but they had certainly done a good job of undermining my cynicism.

Even though Koh Kood is a relatively small island, I only explored the southern and western part of it. As with anywhere, you can take as much time as you like to see a place and with Koh Kood seeing the east side of the island is not easy. Maybe it could only be done on foot, by boat, or by off-roading. I know there are a few resorts on the east side, so there's obviously some way to get there, but it's not on a paved road. My feeling is that making it over there would be a worthwhile endeavor especially if seclusion and nature are to your liking.

From my guest house, I was able to walk to the Klong Chao waterfall, which is well worth the small effort it takes to get there. It's like a scene from a tropical paradise movie with a ribbon of water cascading over a rock ledge into a large pool perfectly suited for a swim and surrounded by green jungle. There was another path, a small road really, into the jungle near the waterfall. It appeared to angle towards the northeast in the general direction of that wild east side of the island so I was naturally drawn down it. It was a very pleasant trek through forests of thick tall trees and I eventually emerged into a cleared area that was a working rubber tree farm. The rubber trees on the island are about 1 foot in diameter and usually have a spiral cut in the bark with a small cup to collect the bright white latex that seeps out. The latex is so white it looks unnatural. At the far end of the cleared area I came upon a shack with some small guard dogs who erupted into raucous barking once they'd detected me. I'd had enough of Koh Kood dogs and turned back, not sure how far I was from the east edge of the island. It would have to wait for another time.

Dick and Wan are doing more on Koh Kood than just kicking back and contemplating the pristine beaches and rich sunsets. Their house sits on a tree-covered mostly undeveloped hill right above the water, the sort of location that could really use a cafe, so they tapped into their Koh Kood entrepreneurial can-do spirit and decided to put one there. While I was there, in December 2010, they had cleared off a small plot on the water-facing slope and had begun gathering the necessary local wood and other materials that would be needed to fashion a simple cafe that would blend harmoniously into its surroundings. Wan had done the necessary bureaucratic legwork to obtain the proper permits, etc. so that it was an above-board strictly legal enterprise and to avoid getting on the bad side of the Koh Kood island political machine.

It was only a few weeks later that Dick sent me the first photos of the newly opened cafe, appropriately christened The Viewpoint Cafe. From Klong Chao beach it's about 2/3 the way up the first hill you'll encounter as you continue southward on the island road and it's about 50 meters off the road towards the water. In December there was a small bar called the Chill Out located roadside just below where you'd exit the road to get to the Viewpoint. See below for photos.

Almost every day during my stay on Koh Kood I would pay a visit to Dick in the late afternoon when he was ready for a respite from the the cafe work and we were both ready for an afternoon beer or 2. I've always thought of Dick as having a Hemingwayesque appearance and possibly because of this I fell into a Hemingway sort of reverie on one of the afternoon strolls to their house that went something like this:

"Dick raised the hammer again but paused this time as he glanced out over the restless sea at his shoulder, the sea that was his constant companion and the keeper of the souls of so many and whispered their secrets and vented their rage. The angles of the sun and shadows told him that this was the time to pause and pay homage and lay down the hammer. The day had struck another note and summoned him away from the forest back to the house he shared with Wan. He knew this was the time that Chris was walking to the house looking down at the cracked road at his feet cursing the bright air and the heat. The beer bottles in his pack announced his approach like the tolling of church bells. A very small church that could fit inside his pack."

Well maybe I should have left that on Koh Kood but have a look at Dick's photo below and maybe you'll offer me some leniency.

After a too short stay of only 3 days I jumped on the ferry taxi in the rain (it's true) and myself and about 15 others already on board began making our way back to the Ao Salad dock. Perhaps it was the rain but the truck taxi was not exactly firing on all cylinders that morning and stalled out a few times before finally dying on the road. The driver ran over to a house by the road and retrieved some tools and we all got out while a few men tipped the cab forward and worked on getting the engine running again. The nice part of sharing the only taxi on the island is that we all knew the ferry wasn't leaving without us because if it did it would be making the crossing to Trat devoid of passengers! Besides this was the express ferry so what would be the rush? After 10 minutes or so of futile tinkering and banging on the reluctant engine a back-up taxi was called that delivered us to the dock.

After I'd left Koh Kood and worked myself into a state of petrifying fear as a result of reading too many horror stories on the web of rabies and its symptoms and treatment, I realized that Dick and Wan could do me a tremendous favor if they could locate the dog that had left its toothmarks in my leg and get a report on its health. I contacted Dick about this and within a day he responded that they'd found the dog and its owner and as far as they knew the feisty little pooch was not suffering from any illnesses other than being an overly protective new mother. I was genuinely relieved to hear this of course and it made perfect sense. I know the prudent course of action for me to take would be to seek out rabies treatment anyway, but I feel secure enough that the dog's aggression was due to its new litter and that since it's a family pet they would notify Wan if it did begin to exhibit any symptoms so I'm choosing to do nothing about it. I only need live long enough to visit Koh Kood at least once again.

View from my reclined position in an upper deck chair just prior to the "express" ferry departing Trat for Koh Kood.

View from one of Koh Kood's many peaceful west side beaches.

View from the back porch of Dick and Wan's house from where I enjoyed daily beers.

Khun Dick. Hemingway, no? Just a little? He has also been known to impersonate Santa Claus during that time of year.

Looking up at the completed Viewpoint Cafe.

Some of the cafe customers. There have been no complaints about the view.