Day 1 and 2 - Sydney departure - 6th and 7th September 2014
Leaving Sydney Day 1 and 2
6th September 2014
I have flown back this morning from Queensland where I attended Cindy Taylor’s wedding to the strangely named Wog on Saturday. I have known Cindy since she was about ten years old, her mother Priscilla is my friend and the three of us have been through both tragedy and happy times together, but that is another story. This is another happy time! Gerald and Cino have been without me for a few days. Gerald has dropped our little girl with David of VIP Kennels in Kangaroo Valley, thank you dear David, and collected me at the domestic airport, driven us to our parking at the international airport, and waited patiently as I re-packed, removing all the unwanted wedding clothing, warm winter gear and boots into our car – definitely not needed in Vietnam or Cambodia. I already have another small suitcase packed to be left in the car in our absence, as on our return, we are not going home, but staying an additional five days in Sydney, to meet our grand niece who has been here for six weeks on exchange in Adelaide from South Africa. We have Teigan for only two days and intend to give her the Groom Style intense experience of Sydney, and I have also invited all the family to meet at Bondi Beach on Sunday. It’s been a packing nightmare, and I hope I have covered all eventualities.
In the light of two tragic air accidents with this airline in the last six months, we considered changing flights, but we had missed the one week window to do so, and they wished to charge us $600 to change to another airline. We figure we are helping to keep them afloat, but they are not very helpful, efficient, nor friendly. When we get on board the elderly aircraft, the seats are narrow, close together, and uncomfortable, even for lightweight me, but the flight is uneventful, except for the inedible meals and the lousy movies. An excess of wedding bonhomie and champagne with Jane and Priscilla have fatigued me. Normally an afficionado of long haul flights, even the boring filmsand closely rigorously rationed wine don’t put me to sleep, and I sleep fitfully.
We disembark at Kuala Lumpur at 3.45 am and have a hideous six hours till our departure for Hanoi. Unfortunately our Qantas lounge pass is not honoured with Malaysian Airlines.
This quote says it all:
“At some point you just have to let go of what you thought should happen and love in what’s happening.”
The airport is closed, deathly quiet but littered with sleeping bodies, on those coveted rows of seats which have no arm rest separating them, and I am immediately envious, but research and tenacity win out, and we discover an area which belongs to Juice Bar, with lolly coloured armchairs, and I settle down for a nap. Gerald guards our gear, he would never consciously sleep in public, it is far too intimate an activity for him to share with the world at large, but I rearrange furniture and my faithful pashmina, my ear plugs and eye mask, and I sleep a little.
At 7 am shops open, music starts, and I discover Gerald, inelegantly asleep, jaw dropped but our luggage all safe. I search out tea and coffee and fresh French bread with cheese for our breakfast, and time inches towards departure time. Malaysian Airlines ARE diligent with security and we finally pass several security checks, and board a much newer, and more comfortable airline, and there appears to be a spare seat next to us. At the eleventh hour, a very large man arrives and sits next to me, overflowing his seat, and he considerately keeps both arms resting on the back of the seat in front of him for the whole flight. For the whole flight. I discover ten minutes out of Hanoi (I know how to maintain distance when I need to …) that he is a theatre nurse at the Royal North Shore and when I ask if has heard of Sue Hobson and her Self Expression and Leadership Project, when 120 of us abseiled off the Harbour Bridge, he has.
Finally we arrive in Hanoi, and whilst there is a large crowd waiting customs clearance, it is not long before we are through, and find our travel agent with the group we will travel with. In my sleep deprived state I immediately hate all of them, something I hope to alter in the next little while. I want a shower and a bed and some decent food and a drink. Thankfully we have a car all to ourselves for the trip to the hotel where we have an interminably long briefing, long because nobody listens to what Tea, our charming guide, is telling us about the next two days plans. My intolerance increases, and I want to cry with relief when we get to our room.
An hour later, we are off walking, having nimbly avoided meeting the group for dinner and also avoided agreeingt to an 8 am Group Breakfast. We walk for a long time where we narrowly avoided death on at least three occasions, with every road congested solidly, with all the 7,000,000 people of Hanoi on it, with their preferred mode of transport, olus face masks and plastic helmets. I was intent on a massage, which the hotel tried to talk me out of, preferring instead to send me to a tourist destination. It was advice I should have heeded. The reception looked promising, Gerald left to find a beer, and I was taken upstairs to a seedy rooms, where a young woman slept on the very bed I was told to lie on, the towels underneath me were warm and rumpled, and I was given a pair of unwashed short pyjamas to wear for the treatment. I closed my eyes and tried not to think about how many others had worn them before me. She was rough and ready, and her hands on my body reminded me of how I have seen African women beat their washing on rocks, but my hip was sore, I was tired, and I persisted. My disappointment was enhanced when before I even got dressed she demanded ‘Tip!’ I had no money and gesticulated so, Gerald would pay downstairs, so she took our her mobile phone, punched in a number and put it under my nose ‘Tip!’. I had no glasses either, so could not see, which clearly displeased her, and we walked downstairs with a distinct chill in the air between us. Gerald paid the advertised $10 and now the male boss demanded ‘Tip!’. All we had in a small notes was dismissed with a sneer and something nasty said, so we left. Gerald was in fine form, as not being able to find a bar, he sat on a child’s stool on the pavement with a group of Vietnamese men, and drank two plastic cups of beer, siphoned from a plastic vat with a hose, eating peanuts, and served by a small lady – for the princely sum of 50 cents.
After a shower we walk out once more for dinner at KOTO. This involved a hair raising walk across terrifying traffic and broken roads. This restaurant supports and trains street youth in the hospitality industry, and we had a fine meal of green papaya and green mango salad, squid stuffed with pork and rich tomato dressing, and a plate of fish and all the makings for our own Vietnamese spring rolls. Stuffed, we walked home, the traffic marginally quieter, but still death defying in the dark.
Another shower, and a glorious bed, and my Beloved.