I had to do it sometime.
In a city where you can measure social activity in mps - motorbikes per second - I could not remain a pedestrian forever. Lucky for me today is a slow day, the city still waking itself up from the mass exodus that is Tet, when pretty much everything really does stop for a week so that people can visit, eat, and visit some more. I have a limited number of people to visit here, and most of them don't speak English, so I'm glad to see the world start getting back to normal.
Normal? Has Saigon started to become normal to me? Not really, but it is not completely strange anymore, either. I easily recognize the purposeful nuances of back-to-work traffic. But, getting ready for my first motorbike lesson, I also appreciate the fact that not everyone has settled back into their new work year. It is only about a 2 mps morning in Phu Nhuan District. I should be able to manage that.
I knew this was coming so yesterday I bought myself a helmet. They are required equipment now. Everyone is wearing them. I think they were required when I was here last year, too, but enforcement is everything. Somewhere, some Communist official became convinced that too many people were getting killed or maimed in unprotected motorbike accidents and decided that helmet laws must be enforced. Change is in the air in Saigon.
Uncomfortable as it sounds to wear a helmet when it's 90 degrees and humid, I am happy about this development. They may have been required last year, but virtually no-one wore them, and they certainly weren't available to the common back seat rider. Asking for one resulted in a hearty round of laughter, after which your driver would hop on his bike and motion for you to do the same. Dork!
Last year, insisting on a helmet was akin to wearing a seatbelt in a car. All it did was tell your driver that you didn't trust him. "Scared are you?" he would think, giving you a good look up and down. "I'll give you something to be scared about."
Which only increased the likelihood that your ride would be... memorable.
Now it's the drivers who are scared... scared of fines of up to $15 - an astronomical sum in a country where the per capita income is still somewhere around $100 a month - and so they gave in, and now everyone wears a helmet.
There are helmets, though, and there are helmets. The most important features of Vietnamese helmets are aesthetic. If you actually want your skull to be protected in the event that it somehow falls into the path of a large vehicle, you're out of luck. At least you'll look good going down.
I mull this over as I examine my options at the helmet stand near my hotel on Truong Chinh. Change is in the air, I think, but it's coming in baby steps. I could borrow a helmet, of course. Huong has an extra, and every honda om (motorbike taxi) driver has an extra on hand for the dozens of passengers he carries every day, but somehow the idea of using the "guest helmet" is so unappealing. Bad enough back home where people shower obsessively and wash their hair every day. A complete turn-off anywhere else in the world, where washing hair is more likely to be a weekly event, if that. No, I'd like to have my own, thank you. I spring for a fancy vented design... an extra dollar but it's worth it if it'll keep my obsessively-washed head from sweating.
Seven dollars later, my new purchase dangles proudly from a strap on my backpack, signaling my membership in the elite group of foreigners who walk around dangling toy helmets. It's a status symbol of sorts. "I'm not just a tourist," it says, "I belong here."
Do I?
The irony is that this helmet cost me less than a cab ride from Union Square to Fisherman's Wharf. All it really should say is, "I might ride a motorbike at least once while I'm here and I care about my hygiene." Hopefully, that's not saying much.
Anyway, here I am, helmet in hand, ready for my motorbike lesson. My old friend Vu - my guide during last year's Mekong Delta tour - has been assigned to teach me.
No problem, I think, this should be pretty simple. I assume that the motorbikes that whiz around town are actually just mopeds. Simple things any kid can drive. In fact, I had a moped when I was a kid. I remember driving my friend Brenda all around San Jose on it one summer when we were 13 or 14. We had a blast, but then it disappeared somehow... must have been my mom's doing, but I don't remember the circumstances.
Vu shows up and starts talking about gears. "Gears?" I ask. "It's got gears? You mean like a real motorcycle?"
"Yes, simple."
Uh oh... I remember what he can mean by a word like “simple.”
"Four is slowest, one is fast."
"Isn't it the other way around?" I ask. "One is slow and four is fast?"
"No, not like a car. Four is slow."
I look from him to his assistant. I don't think I ever heard her name so I’ll just call her Ms. Ti, which is probably a good guess since every third person I meet, male or female, seems to be named Ti.
Yes, this lesson apparently requires two teachers - one extra to go for help, I assume, when I fall into the path of a swarm of mopeds. Sorry, a swarm of motorcycles… with gears. Ti nods agreement, "yes, opposite of a car. Four is slow, and when you stop, go back to one or two."
"But stopping is slow," I say. I should know better than to argue but I can't help myself.
"Yes," they agree.
"If I am on the highway will I be in one or four?"
"On the highway you use four."
"So four is faster than one."
"No, four is for slow." They are becoming exasperated with me. I give up trying to understand and hop on to give it a try. They show me how to rev the gas and both explain, emphatically, that when changing gears you put the gas back to zero. “No gas!” they shout. Then they look at each other and laugh. “No gas.” In case I didn’t understand the first time. They think I’m going to crash.
I’ll show them, though. If I can fly an airplane, surely I can ride a simple motorcycle. It’s not like it’s a Harley or something. Still, maybe they know something I don’t know.
Back home I would take a class to learn how to ride a motorcycle. Three or four sessions on Saturday afternoons probably… the first one just to go over all the safety information – laws, licensing requirements, accident statistics, mechanical systems, what to wear…
Hmmm, what to wear. I look down at my bare legs and arms, then glance over at the street. The average Vietnamese girl on a sticky tropical morning wears thick jeans, wooly toe socks, a long sleeved turtleneck and a jacket for good measure. Just in case she gets cold. That’s just for walking around town. Getting on her motorbike she’ll pull on an elbow length pair of gloves, a smog mask and now, of course, her helmet. Not one cell of skin exposed to the sun… or to the pavement.
My outfit – shorts and a tank top - is less practical. Never mind, though… it’s just a little toy motorcycle to match my little toy helmet. I will probably never get it over 20 mph anyway. I hop on, put it into first gear, and carefully give the gas a try. I lurch forward, experimenting with the gas… more, less, more, less… OK, time to put it into second. Vu and Ti see my foot push down on the gear.”No gas!” they yell in unison.
“That’s OK,” I yell back. “I think I’ve got it.” And I do. I go round and round the paved entryway to the park we’re using – speeding up, slowing down, changing gears, turning right, turning left. All the basics. No problem. Then I decide to explore the park a little. I pull into a shady lane only to be waved back by some angry security guards. Fine, I think I’m ready for the street anyway.
I pull over to let Ti and Vu know that I’m just going to give it a try… merge into and out of traffic a couple times. Traffic is flowing at about 4 mps now but I manage OK. I pull out of one driveway, go down the block a bit, then pull back into another driveway, come back, get the thumbs up from Vu and Ti, then try it again. They don’t have much to do but watch me go round and round, but they don’t seem to mind. They are patient teachers and let me practice as much as I want, standing by all the while to wipe me up off the roadway if something should go horribly wrong.
As long as I stay close to the right side of the road, though, things go OK. On one circuit somebody pulls to my right, forcing me further into traffic, then someone else pulls right, and another… pretty soon I’m on the wrong side of my lane but I just merge back over, pull into the driveway and announce to my teachers that I feel comfortable riding the bike. Dealing with traffic and keeping track of where I am at the same time will take some practice, but I think I’ve got the basics of operating the machine.
“Good,” Vu says, and hops onto the back of Ti’s bike. “So now follow us back to the school.”
That would involve crossing the street.
I feel like I did on the very first day of my last trip when I wanted to buy a map and the store was… across the street.
Taking on city traffic full force on my very first day isn’t what I want to do. But it would be nice to culminate my first lesson with a solo ride back. So we do what any sensible Vietnamese driver would do if she didn’t want to deal with turning left. We go the wrong way. Driving directly into oncoming traffic might sound more dangerous than going through it to make a left turn, but it’s actually not. Directions are really just recommendations here… as long as you stay close to the sidewalk it doesn’t really matter which direction you go. So we pull onto the street, go the “wrong way” for a couple of blocks, then head down toward the school, where I park my motorbike. Huong’s motorbike.
Huong looks at me and smiles. No fresh abrasions. “How did it go?” she asks.
“It was fun,” I said. “I think I’ll rent one when I get to Phu Quoc.”
“Good. Just remember, when you change gears,” she scrunches up her face, “no gas.” This really must be the most common error among new motorbike riders.
“Right,” I say, “no wheelies.”
I let Huong get back to work. The school is still gearing back up after the Tet holiday and they have a lot to do. I spend a few minutes helping with an inventory project before heading into town to… well, to do pretty much nothing for a couple hours. I feel a little guilty that I didn’t stick around and help with some project or other, but I suspect I would be in the way more than anything else, so instead I walk toward my favorite wifi café just off Duong Dong Khoi, helmet bouncing gently against my backpack. Even though I haven’t fully graduated to the street, I feel like I can now dangle it with pride.
In a city where you can measure social activity in mps - motorbikes per second - I could not remain a pedestrian forever. Lucky for me today is a slow day, the city still waking itself up from the mass exodus that is Tet, when pretty much everything really does stop for a week so that people can visit, eat, and visit some more. I have a limited number of people to visit here, and most of them don't speak English, so I'm glad to see the world start getting back to normal.
Normal? Has Saigon started to become normal to me? Not really, but it is not completely strange anymore, either. I easily recognize the purposeful nuances of back-to-work traffic. But, getting ready for my first motorbike lesson, I also appreciate the fact that not everyone has settled back into their new work year. It is only about a 2 mps morning in Phu Nhuan District. I should be able to manage that.I knew this was coming so yesterday I bought myself a helmet. They are required equipment now. Everyone is wearing them. I think they were required when I was here last year, too, but enforcement is everything. Somewhere, some Communist official became convinced that too many people were getting killed or maimed in unprotected motorbike accidents and decided that helmet laws must be enforced. Change is in the air in Saigon.
Uncomfortable as it sounds to wear a helmet when it's 90 degrees and humid, I am happy about this development. They may have been required last year, but virtually no-one wore them, and they certainly weren't available to the common back seat rider. Asking for one resulted in a hearty round of laughter, after which your driver would hop on his bike and motion for you to do the same. Dork!
Last year, insisting on a helmet was akin to wearing a seatbelt in a car. All it did was tell your driver that you didn't trust him. "Scared are you?" he would think, giving you a good look up and down. "I'll give you something to be scared about."
Which only increased the likelihood that your ride would be... memorable.
Now it's the drivers who are scared... scared of fines of up to $15 - an astronomical sum in a country where the per capita income is still somewhere around $100 a month - and so they gave in, and now everyone wears a helmet.
There are helmets, though, and there are helmets. The most important features of Vietnamese helmets are aesthetic. If you actually want your skull to be protected in the event that it somehow falls into the path of a large vehicle, you're out of luck. At least you'll look good going down.
I mull this over as I examine my options at the helmet stand near my hotel on Truong Chinh. Change is in the air, I think, but it's coming in baby steps. I could borrow a helmet, of course. Huong has an extra, and every honda om (motorbike taxi) driver has an extra on hand for the dozens of passengers he carries every day, but somehow the idea of using the "guest helmet" is so unappealing. Bad enough back home where people shower obsessively and wash their hair every day. A complete turn-off anywhere else in the world, where washing hair is more likely to be a weekly event, if that. No, I'd like to have my own, thank you. I spring for a fancy vented design... an extra dollar but it's worth it if it'll keep my obsessively-washed head from sweating.
Seven dollars later, my new purchase dangles proudly from a strap on my backpack, signaling my membership in the elite group of foreigners who walk around dangling toy helmets. It's a status symbol of sorts. "I'm not just a tourist," it says, "I belong here."
Do I?
The irony is that this helmet cost me less than a cab ride from Union Square to Fisherman's Wharf. All it really should say is, "I might ride a motorbike at least once while I'm here and I care about my hygiene." Hopefully, that's not saying much.
Anyway, here I am, helmet in hand, ready for my motorbike lesson. My old friend Vu - my guide during last year's Mekong Delta tour - has been assigned to teach me.
No problem, I think, this should be pretty simple. I assume that the motorbikes that whiz around town are actually just mopeds. Simple things any kid can drive. In fact, I had a moped when I was a kid. I remember driving my friend Brenda all around San Jose on it one summer when we were 13 or 14. We had a blast, but then it disappeared somehow... must have been my mom's doing, but I don't remember the circumstances.
Vu shows up and starts talking about gears. "Gears?" I ask. "It's got gears? You mean like a real motorcycle?"
"Yes, simple."
Uh oh... I remember what he can mean by a word like “simple.”
"Four is slowest, one is fast."
"Isn't it the other way around?" I ask. "One is slow and four is fast?"
"No, not like a car. Four is slow."
I look from him to his assistant. I don't think I ever heard her name so I’ll just call her Ms. Ti, which is probably a good guess since every third person I meet, male or female, seems to be named Ti.
Yes, this lesson apparently requires two teachers - one extra to go for help, I assume, when I fall into the path of a swarm of mopeds. Sorry, a swarm of motorcycles… with gears. Ti nods agreement, "yes, opposite of a car. Four is slow, and when you stop, go back to one or two."
"But stopping is slow," I say. I should know better than to argue but I can't help myself.
"Yes," they agree.
"If I am on the highway will I be in one or four?"
"On the highway you use four."
"So four is faster than one."
"No, four is for slow." They are becoming exasperated with me. I give up trying to understand and hop on to give it a try. They show me how to rev the gas and both explain, emphatically, that when changing gears you put the gas back to zero. “No gas!” they shout. Then they look at each other and laugh. “No gas.” In case I didn’t understand the first time. They think I’m going to crash.
I’ll show them, though. If I can fly an airplane, surely I can ride a simple motorcycle. It’s not like it’s a Harley or something. Still, maybe they know something I don’t know.
Back home I would take a class to learn how to ride a motorcycle. Three or four sessions on Saturday afternoons probably… the first one just to go over all the safety information – laws, licensing requirements, accident statistics, mechanical systems, what to wear…
Hmmm, what to wear. I look down at my bare legs and arms, then glance over at the street. The average Vietnamese girl on a sticky tropical morning wears thick jeans, wooly toe socks, a long sleeved turtleneck and a jacket for good measure. Just in case she gets cold. That’s just for walking around town. Getting on her motorbike she’ll pull on an elbow length pair of gloves, a smog mask and now, of course, her helmet. Not one cell of skin exposed to the sun… or to the pavement.
 |
| Vietnamese gas station |
My outfit – shorts and a tank top - is less practical. Never mind, though… it’s just a little toy motorcycle to match my little toy helmet. I will probably never get it over 20 mph anyway. I hop on, put it into first gear, and carefully give the gas a try. I lurch forward, experimenting with the gas… more, less, more, less… OK, time to put it into second. Vu and Ti see my foot push down on the gear.”No gas!” they yell in unison.
“That’s OK,” I yell back. “I think I’ve got it.” And I do. I go round and round the paved entryway to the park we’re using – speeding up, slowing down, changing gears, turning right, turning left. All the basics. No problem. Then I decide to explore the park a little. I pull into a shady lane only to be waved back by some angry security guards. Fine, I think I’m ready for the street anyway.
I pull over to let Ti and Vu know that I’m just going to give it a try… merge into and out of traffic a couple times. Traffic is flowing at about 4 mps now but I manage OK. I pull out of one driveway, go down the block a bit, then pull back into another driveway, come back, get the thumbs up from Vu and Ti, then try it again. They don’t have much to do but watch me go round and round, but they don’t seem to mind. They are patient teachers and let me practice as much as I want, standing by all the while to wipe me up off the roadway if something should go horribly wrong.
As long as I stay close to the right side of the road, though, things go OK. On one circuit somebody pulls to my right, forcing me further into traffic, then someone else pulls right, and another… pretty soon I’m on the wrong side of my lane but I just merge back over, pull into the driveway and announce to my teachers that I feel comfortable riding the bike. Dealing with traffic and keeping track of where I am at the same time will take some practice, but I think I’ve got the basics of operating the machine.
“Good,” Vu says, and hops onto the back of Ti’s bike. “So now follow us back to the school.”
That would involve crossing the street.
I feel like I did on the very first day of my last trip when I wanted to buy a map and the store was… across the street.
Taking on city traffic full force on my very first day isn’t what I want to do. But it would be nice to culminate my first lesson with a solo ride back. So we do what any sensible Vietnamese driver would do if she didn’t want to deal with turning left. We go the wrong way. Driving directly into oncoming traffic might sound more dangerous than going through it to make a left turn, but it’s actually not. Directions are really just recommendations here… as long as you stay close to the sidewalk it doesn’t really matter which direction you go. So we pull onto the street, go the “wrong way” for a couple of blocks, then head down toward the school, where I park my motorbike. Huong’s motorbike.
Huong looks at me and smiles. No fresh abrasions. “How did it go?” she asks.
“It was fun,” I said. “I think I’ll rent one when I get to Phu Quoc.”
“Good. Just remember, when you change gears,” she scrunches up her face, “no gas.” This really must be the most common error among new motorbike riders.
“Right,” I say, “no wheelies.”
I let Huong get back to work. The school is still gearing back up after the Tet holiday and they have a lot to do. I spend a few minutes helping with an inventory project before heading into town to… well, to do pretty much nothing for a couple hours. I feel a little guilty that I didn’t stick around and help with some project or other, but I suspect I would be in the way more than anything else, so instead I walk toward my favorite wifi café just off Duong Dong Khoi, helmet bouncing gently against my backpack. Even though I haven’t fully graduated to the street, I feel like I can now dangle it with pride.
No comments:
Post a Comment