20th of October, 2924.
Hitchhiking in Vietnam: La Lay Border
While I’m still walking, a truck stops. As I imagine, lots of trucks are going to the border, so instead of keep walking for a long time until a more strategic spot;, and taking the risk of waiting for regular cars, I decide to take the truck.
Hui is going all the way to La Lay Border. He is not so senior, as most of truck drivers, and actually he doesn’t look like a truck driver at all.
The views are stunning! I had no idea that this area of Vietnam was so gorgeous! For a very long time, an amazing river follows the road, and it’s very scenic, like in the movies!
We stop at a particular spot, where a young boy, only fourteen years old, is selling water. Yep! Water from the river, which they bring up here using pumps and hoses. The truck drivers fill their huge water tank, the one between the cabin and the back of the truck, in places like this because it’s cheaper. I am so surprise with the boy though, he is so young and already smoking. Hui and I tell him that he should stop because it’s very bad for him.
At a certain bridge, Hui stops and indicates that I should carry on straight and he will take left, the bridge, to La Lay. I’m a bit confused because my sign (as you can see in the photos) it reads La Lay Laos. So why would he do that? Or wasn’t really him doing that…? Yep, as it turns out, I think it wasn’t “really him” but the universe trying to warn me about NOT going to La Lay boarder. And there was even another sign, as I crossed the bridge, I saw it and felt something weird, as the bridge was a portal or something. But I was stupid enough to ignore it. Well done, Lei!
Hui must stop a few kilometres before the border, as usual, so I keep on going. I think I take two motorbike until I arrive near to the border. They are mostly workers around here, working on the road. Again, the views on these last kilometres to the border are stunning!
When I get to the border, as there is a delay and I even have to sit to wait, I think it’s just another one of those cases (so many), when the immigration officers don’t know if Brazilians need Visa or not for their country. It’s weird, as this is still the Vietnamese border control, but it could be that he just don’t know what to do (it happens sometimes), I start to get angry. But finally the officer with my passport comes with someone on the phone who can speak English. This man tells me that, as I need a Visa for Laos, I cannot cross via La Lay Border because they don’t issue Visas here. What? What a bullshit! I ask him many times if he is sure, and even explain that I am travelling by hitchhiking so going all the way to Lao Bao border it will be a bit of a nightmare for me, and a huge waste of time; to what he insists that is the only way. In the end, I am glad that they make that kind of checking, before letting people cross the border, leaving Vietnam, and then having to turn around.
But that doesn’t change the fact that now I am screwed! I had so much time to arrive until half way to my volunteer work place, and now everything changes. I not only must to get all the way to Lao Bao Border, as entering Laos from there, which is way norther than here, it will make my journey much longer.
I walk and I hitchhike. I get a few lifts in motorbikes, including one young man in a sports bike, who was driving quite fast. And I thinking I am about to die in the back. Laugh.
Finally a car stops, and after checking on the maps, I figure out that they are going to that bridge, the one I should’ve taken, to go to Lao Bao. Yay!
The sky looks heavy for rain, and I’m glad that these family took me. Half way to the bridge, the rain starts, and it is a little devil one.
I take shelter in a restaurant, and as it is after 4 in the afternoon already, and as it is pouring rain, I decide to eat something while I wait. I have a fried rice and that’s it.
When the rain gets really thin, I walk a bit on the road, and take shelter in another restaurant, so I can come to the road only when cars are coming.
It takes a long time until someone finally stop, which is very weird as this road ultimately leads to Lao Bao Border. A white car stops. There is a lady sitting in the passenger seat, so I don’t even assume it is a taxi, but I tell them that I cannot pay, to what their answer is to leave. Well, at least I thought they did. They didn’t. They were waiting a bit farther for a while, probably the taxi driver was checking his conscious and deciding if he would take me for free or not. They come back.
The lady who was in front moves to the back seat. When I get inside, I notice that there is another lady on the car too. The taxi driver is not the nicest of the men, but what to do.
We get to the border, and now I must find a family house around here where I can stay tonight.
Being a border town, and at this time of the night, it is really difficult to find someone to help me. I mean, two young people, from two different houses, a boy and a girl, even listen to me, but in the end I cannot put my tent inside their houses. Why? In another place, I try to explain what I need, and I really thought they got it, but then the lady just give me two rain covers: one for me and one for The Hulk. Laugh.
I walk around, hopeless, for a long time. Two young boys tell me I can put my tent in a big building, looking like a warehouse mixed with a government building. I am doubtful but I go to check. It looks like a market but with some people living on it too. Which means it could be safe for me. But one family to whom I ask chooses to ignore me; and a senior man is rude to me, manifesting that I must leave. How rude!
When I get to a house where some classes are being administrating I think I am finally saved. Teachers tend to listen, at least, and that could give me more chances to explain myself. And I do. This lady teacher is teaching Maths, actually it’s an exam, and she listens to me. At first, she seems like a reasonable person who will either let me camp in front her house, or invite me in. Nope! After sometime she starts to express that her family wouldn’t like for me to camp in front of the house. In front of the house! As I could break in in the middle of the night! Lady, if I want to break into somebody’s house, I will not ask to camp in front of it. I will come silently, in the middle of the night, and then break in! Dear, Loki! She even suggests that I can camp across the street (laugh), in front an abandoned building, where there is a truck parked! Why don’t you go and camp in front of an abandoned building with a truck parked by, go on, after you!
Anyway, after a long time, and after her students left, she calls a relative of her, who is coming to pick up one of the students, and she tells me that he has a guest house where I could stay tonight for free. I am a bit doubtful but as it is nearly 22.00 hours, and she hasn’t agreed on helping me simply by letting me camp in front of her house, I decide to accept.
When her relative arrives, what a surprise: it’s the taxi driver. Laugh. Not a very pleasant surprise as I don’t think he is very happy to “help” me again. The husband of the teacher, who honestly strikes me as a kind man, takes me in his motorbike to the guest house. Once there, the taxi driver and his wife show me to a room, which is honestly good and clean, and that’s it. I haven’t eaten anything since the fried rice, and don’t have any food with me, so I think Vietnam is the first country where I went to sleep with an empty stomach in all my travels. Yep! A “Communist” country, ladies and gentleman, as some people insist to be. People from Vietnam and foreigners too. It seems like that a slogan, still nowadays, can full many people.
When I leave next morning, quite early and under some heavy rain, I don’t see anyone at the guest house.
10 Years Around the World 