Every day I go to work at my NGO for about eight hours. We live in an area in the outskirts of Hanoi called Tay Mo, which is so remote that about 70% of cab drivers do not know where it is located. I work in a district called Dong Da, which is packed with houses and businesses and also has a very fun nightlife. Last weekend we went there with our friend Nam to watch an acoustic guitar performance, and I just found out this week that a couple of the other Vietnamese friends we made here live really close to where I work. I know one of them reads this blog, so shout out to Duy (pronounced szweeee).
The distance between the dorm and my work is about 8 kilometers. With a taxi, without any detours (unlikely), it is about a 15 minute drive. However, with the bus system being what it is, it normally takes me about an hour and a half to make it to work. My commute starts with a 10-15 min walk from our dorm to the bus stop. This walk is on a dirt road without a sidewalk, that is constantly filled with motorbikes, cars and huge open-backed trucks that often splatter you to the waist with mud. It is a very tricky walk to navigate, because in addition to avoiding being hit, you also have to dodge mud puddles and the occasional aggressive dog tied up to a nearby tree. I make this route more difficult for myself by eating breakfast along the way, bringing in a fourth element of eating bananas while walking. Which reminds me, the bananas here are AWESOME. They are really small and taste way better than our bananas. I probably eat around six a day.
After reaching the end of the dirt road there is another 300 meter stretch across a bridge, which has two flights of stairs that I go down to walk about 100 feet over huge dirt piles and rubble to finally reach the side of the highway, where I wait for the 201 bus.
My bus stop, being under a random bridge in a largely unknown district, is completely unofficial and only started because locals would flag down the bus and also because the bus tries to fill up with as many people as possible. So, to catch the 201, you need to stand a little out in the highway, and sort of wave the bus down. Unfortunately there is also a 214 bus that I have accidentally stopped at least four times now because I could not see the tiny "214" on the front until it was right in front of me.
To save as much time as possible, the buses do not actually come to a complete stop. You have to run towards the bus as it slows down on the highway for you, and hop into the front door as it passes. This requires a significant amount of coordination and depth perception, both of which I lack almost completely outside of the pool. This motion is further complicated when there are Vietnamese attempting to get on the bus at the same time as you, because they will push and pull at you in order to make it on to the bus themselves (I will go into greater detail about this pushiness in a later post). However, because I am a foreigner and the bus crew never ceases to be interested in us, I am often helped onto the bus, usually by having my arm pulled up, or more commonly and less helpfully, by having a hand reach out from the bus to push me in from the back of my head. Thankfully I have never really messed up this step of the journey, although I cannot say the same for the other legs.
Once on the 201, the bus crew (one or two guys that collect money for tickets), looks at you expectantly for the fare. The 201 bus costs 10,000 - 12,000 vietnamese dong depending on gas prices, which is around 50 - 60 cents. The first few times I was very flustered, as I had no where to sit or anything to hold on to while I dug out the money. Now the bus crew always hands me a tiny plastic stool to sit on (the seats are always taken), while I hand them my change. Also to note here is how much we are stared at on these buses. There is really no reason any foreigner would use Vietnam's public transportation. Most cab rides don't cost more than $2, save a large amount of time, and require no complicated planning. Long term ex-pats in the country use bikes or motorbikes, so I am left in an impossibly small percentage of white people who ride the bus.
I have grown accustomed to the staring now, as it has happened all through our trip in Vietnam. It is usually quite comical, for example, people on motorbikes will do triple takes and turn their head as far as they can so they can watch you for as long as possible before they drive away. Most are excited to see you, some are shocked, and a few seem a tad grumpy at your presence. The staring is always the worst on the bus though, because they are all trying to figure out why the hell you are there in the first place. The staring is also much more intense. One time I was sitting and a teenage boy would not tear his eyes away from me for 15 straight minutes. He was standing about a foot away.
After riding on the 201 for about 30 minutes, I get off at a bus transfer point. From there I wait for the number 9 bus, which can be as short as a two minute wait, and as long as a forty minute wait. The first few times I caught the 9 I had no problems. The third morning it stopped about 150 feet from where I was waiting for it, with everyone sprinting toward the bus to catch it. I was half running half walking all while trying to figure out why the bus was stopping in a different place. It turns out I should have taken a cue from the locals and went for the all-out sprint, because I missed the bus by about three seconds.
I was in a pretty bad mood at this point, because I had already waited for the bus for a half hour and I was running late. I decided to just grab a xe om (they are motorbike taxis, cost less than cabs and are faster b/c they can weave through traffic) but as I was negotiating a price, a Vietnamese came up to me and asked "Do you speak English?". Finding this funny, I replied "Yes... do you?". He then went on to ask me in broken English what I was trying to do, and very quickly realized I was traveling alone and proceeded to freak out. "You should not travel alone here, very confusing... oh mah gawd oh mah gawd oh mah gawd" which was really annoying me at that point because I did not feel like my attempts at travel should be made a mockery of (although honestly they really should...) and walked away to try to hail a cab.
The cab driver did not know where he was going, and at that point neither did I, so by the time we got there it cost much more than I planned on. (Here if the taxi meter is on (you can negotiate to have it off) the taxi driver will expect you to pay what is on the meter, even if he drove in circles while he called all of his friends to figure out where your destination is). The total was 57,000 dong (little less than $3) and I only have 52,000. After motioning that I had no money by showing my empty pockets, and sitting through the taxi drivers temper tantrum, I pulled out a purple ring that I had bought in Hoi An, and offered it to him as consolation. Thankfully he was incredibly excited about this ring and put it on his pinky, which is the nail that all middle class Vietnamese men grow out almost an inch long to show that they do not partake in hard labor (because if they did, it would mean they were poor). And I was finally able to leave the cab and go to work almost an hour late.
Phew alright I didn't even get to write half of what I wanted to on my bus trips, but this is getting long so I will write a second part tomorrow. I will finish with a "Fun with Huong" section, which I hope to feature at the end of every blog post.
Here we go -
Fun with Huong (that actually rhymes pretty well if you pronounce her name correctly):
- Our building has two elevators, one of them broke down on Monday, and the other one they literally removed and brought to an adjoining tower because both of their elevators are broken. So, little Huong, with her little heels, had to walk up 12 flights after bringing me down to buy some lunch. By the end she could barely breathe and was clinging to me as we finally arrived at our floor. She asked me what we would call her condition in English, so that day she learned the phrase "out of breath."
- Over lunch she told me that the place she hoped to visit most if she ever traveled to the United States was Michael Jackson's Neverland Ranch.
- She excitedly learned that I had watched the Lion King, which lead to all staff members yelling out random names of characters. These were very difficult to identify, imagine "Zazu" and "Mufasa" with a heavy Asian accent.
- She loves Winnie the Pooh, and thinks that he is very silly.
- She has huge collections of postal stamps and foreign money, both of which she brought in to work so she could show me. The next day I brought her American and Cambodian money to add to the collection.
- The other day I taught her the word "shocked" because she was very frightened when the printer started on its own accord. Later in the day I accidentally knocked a glass off the table and it shattered, and she yelled "YOU ARE SHOCKED!!!"
- Yesterday she pulled me aside and said "Lisa I have very bad news." And then went on to tell me Man U had lost to Chelsea because of an unfair penalty shot. She also took this time to remind me that Liverpool was playing Man U this weekend and that she hopes I lose.
- She loves Celine Dion and plays it for me frequently.
- She randomly asked if I had any nicknames, and I tried to explain to her that my friends jokingly call me meesa, weesa and miso (soup) but that maybe she shouldn't use those in the office. Shes trying Lis.
- Upon finding out that Matt is almost 2 meters tall, she gasped and asked me if he gets cold being up so high.
- I taught her how to pound it yesterday.
- She is picking me up on Sunday and giving me a motorbike tour of Hanoi!!!
I'll write again soon!
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