Flie Lice a Chika

One more bus ride to Saigon, Lou made sure it was the “top of the range”, not a double Decker (remember the Barf Bus) and no changing busses at the border.

A 4 hour bus ride out of Cambodia awaited us before reaching Saigon (Ho Chi Min City).

Cambodians can’t pronounce the R sound or use consonants at the ends of words so Fried Rice and Chicken becomes Flie Lice a Chika. Somewhere near the border with Vietnam we stop for lunch. I decide Flie Lice a Chika would be a safe bet and was I wrong!!! All of us felt squeamish as its plopped down in front of us, Bill got a sharp bone stuck in his cheek, I am busy scrapping all the chicken off and just gonna eat the rice, when Craig in true style casually asks, “do you think this is dog or snake”? the mental picture was too much to swallow, I heaved and almost vomited in my plate, tears flooded my eyes, and Craig laughed, oh my the thought of those poor mangy dogs, or even a snake eeeeewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.

Shortly thereafter we arrive at the border. Borders can be pretty intimidating places and this was no exception, first up this medical man, dressed in swine flu mode takes everyone’s temperature using this syringe looking device which he inserts into your ear. All forty people on the bus – one syringe, nice. Louise has fed Nicky a Myprodol in desperation half hour before the border because Nicky had been running a temperature and we can’t face a six week quarantine dining on local cuisine at the Cambodian border. Anyways we all pass the swine test and join the queue to go through passport control. Nicky is REALLY feeling fiiiiiine after the myprodol and fooling around big time, once again as the blonde baby of the bus he is getting the rock star treatment. Whilst we are all standing waiting to X ray the bags and obtain stamps he jumps the rows and is led of by the guards for a behind the scenes tour to watch all the bags being scanned. One more mention of snakes, Louise starts heaving, I feel bad and before we know it we are in Vietnam!

Once again we cross the Mekong, there are no bridges so our bus boards a ferry, I get out of the bus and watch Cambodia fade away. Whilst standing with the truckers and some locals this adorable little girl approaches selling bits and pieces. I buy some tiger balm and Wriggley’s and in exchange get a photo, our last memento from Cambodia.

We arrive in Saigon, Craig points to one taxi man and says okay you’re our guy. He was an extraordinary little creature with small teeth (like he never got his adult ones) and a round button mouth, a gruff voice- “where you going” he barks, we give him the name of a hotel we have chosen in mid range lonely planet, he assures us he is a meter taxi (which the book also tells you) and we squeeeeeeeze our bags into his Mazda.

Bill hops in the back and as he is moving across the seats the man slams the hatch and almost propels Bill into the front seat, I just couldn’t hold it the laughter was so good Bill and I had tears running down our face. Off we wiz across traffic in the middle of the road on the wrong side of the road, Vietnam is a city of motor bikes its incredible, like swimming through a shoal of fish.
Eventually the mad one screeches to a halt at the hotel we requested (which turns out later not be the one) Craig goes in and comes out $ 90– too expensive so then this strange creature now becomes animated and writes $25-30 on his hands and goes befok , he knows where to take us, before we could do anything he whizzes off the meter clicking away. In a land of crazy drivers we have picked the outer fringe, he moves over into oncoming traffic and just stays there, cars veering off all around. Finally he slams on brakes on the wrong side of the road and disappears with Craig into another hotel and he comes out gesticulating like mad, still too expensive for him – yeah right and the meter seems to be speeding up!

Anyway we end up at this cool clean oasis exactly 30m from where we got off the bus, Craig negotiates a good deal for 2 rooms while I draw local money to pay the rally driver. I am about to walk into the hotel with “The Driver” to pay (always better when hotel staff are around and he whips it out my hand and gives me change, all the locals are laughing and I know I’m being ripped so I walk into the hotel to find I’ve paid $28 when it should have been around $4.

Anyway we all agreed that it was a fabulous entertaining ride and worth the money, Nicky has the action down pat, and if we need some cheering he does a rendition of the mad taxi driver and we all fall about. Time to explore Saigon!