wandering Lucy: The Village

It was a dark and misty night in Hoi An, Vietnam.

So there we were, a week in to Vietnam and basically in the very middle of the gangly teenage country. We had loved our adventures thus far, Saigon, the Mekong and Hanoi, but we were ready from something a bit...calmer.

And well, we definitely fished our wish.

We arrived in Hoi An pleasantly surprised to find a French Riviera. Hoi An was calm, beautiful, and fancy this, quiet! It's known for it's fine silks and tailors (so if you're looking to get all fancy like for cheap, head to Hoi An), and it's known as a UNESCO world heritage site thanks to it's gorgeous old part of town, but this fact, combined with the abundance of tailors has led to a bit of a movie set town. (Kelly and I are convinced those boats above are props).

While strolling along the promenade like streets, we couldn't help but notice tourists happily riding on bicycles. They looked so peaceful, so much so, that we soon became jealous.

We decided to one up them and ride bikes on our very own island. We found a ferry, paid white girl fee's, and next thing we knew, we were off exploring!

Rice fields and Kelly. Her bike matches her shirt!

Beautiful blue sky.

Now that's actually a bit scary...

Jungly

A cow that I almost killed.

I wish I had pictures of the preceding events, but...it probably would have been rude.

It was Kelly's turn as lead bicyclist. She was doing a great job. We were wandering, Miyazaki-ing as we like to call it. We'd arrive at an intersection and turn the most interesting looking way. Well, after a few turns, we ended up on this rocky brick dirt trash road thing. It was well, bumpy. After arriving at a dead end and turning around, we kept going. Everything seemed fine, no harm no foul. Sometimes your Miyazaki may lead you astray...

No. Within three minutes my tire was flat. Dead flat.

So there we were, a good thirty minute bike ride away from civilization out on these muddy back roads with rice fields. We're sitting there discussing what we're going to do when all of a sudden, a Vietnamese woman comes out of her house and starts talking to us in Vietnamese.

We of course, don't understand. We motion to her. She motions at us. We turn and look at each other and all three of us laugh. Kelly and I whisper about what we're going to do and what we want. Finally she motions towards our tires and we understand that she understands our problem. At this point, the neighbors are also intrigued. Three other women come over and are all laughing and enjoying themselves. Our first friend brings out her pump, but it doesn't have a needle. I'm sitting there with three Vietnamese women all of us with our hands on my tire trying to make this pump work.

One woman yells to her daughter. At this point Kelly and I are feeling bad that we're taking up all their time and making this a big deal when we both know that a pump isn't going to fix this tire, but we figure we'll just fake it after this...

There is really no way out though, and I'm enjoying myself too much to care.

The daughter comes over, she tries the pump. No luck. She says something quickly to her mom and takes off running. Kelly and I look at each other and shrug.

Another woman comes out and motions towards her house. We understand that we're supposed to follow her, so I push my bike along down another lane. She gets out her pump and we all get ready to make it work.

The girl comes running back with another pump!

We now have:

3 pumps.

5 Vietnamese woman.

1 teenage Vietnamese girl.

2 bikes.

2 white girls.

1 tire that won't inflate.

I feel like there is a lightbulb joke somewhere in that but...

Next thing I know, a motorbike turns the corner on to the lane where all of us (bikes included) are blocking the path. As Kelly and I start to move, the women begin to talk and motion to him. They seemingly knew him, and the poor guy was beckoned in to this clown circus.

Somehow he gets the tire to inflate. We all cheer and everyone feels so accomplished. I bow to them all and use my few words of Vietnamese I know to say thank you.

You would think the story was over what with a successfully blown up tire...

Like I was saying, Kelly and I knew that the inner tube was popped, so we knew it wasn't going to stay inflated. I was hoping we could get away before it re-deflated...

As soon as we turned the corner back to our initial location, the tire officially was flat.

Teenage girl comes running up to us and starts speaking in Vietnamese. An epic conversation of pointing and nodding ensued. Three minutes of confusion later, she pulls out her bike, motions for me to get on, and next thing I know, she's hopped on the back of her bike that I'm riding. She gets my bike in her arms, and well, I pedaled us the twenty five minutes back in to town with her dragging my bike.

There we are! Kelly snuck a picture.

First off, as we were driving, we passed motorbike dude at the basketball/soccer area and he just pointed and laughed. It was awesome.

To add to the trouble, Kelly's tire popped on the way back. It really was quite a show on this little rural island. (People kept yelling at us and saying hello. Kelly and I felt like celebrities)

Vietnamese girl proceeded to lead us to the bike repair shop. We figured we would just return our bikes to the rental shop and hope for the best, but...there we were at the town repair shop. We even got to meet his cute daughter as we chilled on the porch for the next half hour.

Our new Vietnamese friend really was very kind. In the end, she spent over an hour and a half trying to help us fix our bikes and figure out our situation.

All in all, attempting to converse with 6 Vietnamese women in the middle of a tiny rural island is probably one of my favorite memories of Vietnam.