A haphazard chronicle of my inevitable misadventures during a year in Vietnam and points east.

p.s. I'll be pitifully grateful if you send me email during my exile: TravelerKaty@hotmail.com

October 2002 November 2002 December 2002 January 2003 February 2003 March 2003 April 2003 May 2003 June 2003 July 2003 August 2003 September 2003 October 2003 November 2003 February 2006 March 2006 May 2006

 
PART 2: What Vietnamese Drivers Really Keep in That Compartment Under the Motorbike Seat

When we left off, I had just been thrown ass-over-teakettle style onto the median strip of Dien Bien Phu Street. I did not lie there looking at the sky for long, however, because within seconds I was surrounded by concerned motorists. This is, apparently, a bit of an anomaly in Vietnam. Most of the expats I told about the accident were truly amazed that people actually stopped to help me at all, and all found it very hard to believe that The Armwrecker stayed with me rather than zipping away as fast as his mangled motorbike could take him.

In any event, I was surrounded by hovering concerned Vietnamese faces, and as I had apparently led with the chin on my way to the pavement, I was bleeding rather profusely all over myself. This is when I found out what they keep in that compartment under the motorbike seat. As I looked around, at least three people were rooting around in their respective vehicles pulling out gauze and tape. It's reassuring, yet disturbing, to know they so prepared for disaster at all times. Two people worked together -- one held a huge pad of gauze on my chin while the other wrapped a loooong strip of gauze around and around my head.

Meanwhile, I was awakening from my daze, fully aware that my arm was broken and that a hospital visit was in order. Clearly things weren't going to improve on that median strip. So I began to moan "taaxxii" over and over to the closest hoverers until the light dawned and they flagged me down a taxi. At this point I began to moan "Columbia Asia, Columbia Asia" in an attempt to preclude any attempt to take me to a standard Vietnamese hospital. And it appeared to work -- we all were in agreement that we were going to Columbia Asia, the place I had checked out several weeks earlier which looked like a clean, western medical clinic open 24/7 for emergencies.

Once I got on the cab, however, things began to go a bit awry. The cab driver turned the wrong way, at least as far as I was concerned. The Columbia Asia I was familiar with was in the center of town in a lovely new building. We were heading out further into the suburbs, quite the opposite direction from my house and my desired medical destination. Until this point I had been fairly calm, as is usual for me in such emergencies. But as we headed out of town I started getting frantic. I was still steadily bleeding in the back seat and was holding up my broken right arm with my left, but at this point I began wildly gesturing and fruitlesslly attempting whatever Vietnamese I had learned in the previous three weeks. Sadly, we had spent most of those three weeks on pronunciation, so my vocabulary was rather distressingly limited. For example, I knew how to say "right" but not "left", "here" but not "there", etc. So mostly our "conversation" consisted of me gesturing wildly to the left and wailing "Columbia Asia, Columbia Asia" while he gestured to the right (with increasing annoyance) calmly saying "Columbia Asia, Columbia Asia". Imagine my surprise when we pulled into the emergency room entrance of an actual Columbia Asia hospital. Hmmm, guess he was right after all, though this certainly wasn't the Columbia Asia with all the fancy new equipment like I was expecting.

So after a brief argument about the fare, I stepped over the large pool of blood in the driveway and walked into the hospital.

Tomorrow, Part 3: Could I Get Some Pain Medication Over Here?.

© 2003 Katy Warren



posted by Katy at 7:06 PM