Bai Bien Cua Toi (XXIII & XXIV).... Work, Wondrous Light & Wretched tire repairs

Flashlights being directed onto my windows?   The rolling thunder indicates it is lightning that frequently illuminates the space in front of my closed eyes...

7:00

 





















8:00

9:00
Muoi, who is pregnant, has to make breakfast for the family, then clean the newly empty room into which I am moving today, and then the room that I am moving out of.    I try to make it easier for Muoi by doing some of the tasks in my room already while the OWNERS enjoy their breakfast......  Neo-Colonial?  Neo-Feudal?  I don't know what it is, but IT FEELS WRONG !

 



















10:00

Time to go for a swim!
As soon as I approach the waterline.... there is PUPPY ;-)

 I watch the four coracles in their fishing business and I just KNOW that they are approaching a perfect composition ....

 not quite there yet ...... there is something missing.....

..... there it is.... the dog that doesn't know how to swim yet and gallops along the waterline barking at the waves ;-)

11:00

12:00

It's POURING and I'm drunk at noon..... time for a Banh mi trung chien ;-)

13:30

16:15

17:00
I've finally taken the first shower of the day..... shaving can wait until tomorrow...  but NO, I don't look like THIS guy YET ....

17:30
There is too much shouting and bad energy at my hotel's restaurant again, so I head to Sweden....

Talking to the Swede is fun until he starts the newly fashionable Trumpish rant about rapist refugees.   Fucking Facebook has done a great job!  

By now it's pouring like I have never seen before.....  I'm running the 50 meters back to my room and I'm  SOAKING WET !

19:00

5:15
The rain has finally stopped when I wake up......  time to marvel at the dawn?

Not bad.... I head back to my room.

5:30
Happily I decide to check the light again 20 minutes later ;-)

What is this?  Last night's torrential rain filled some depressions along the beach and created little lakes......  little lakes that reflect the dawn light show !

I hop back on forth on the pre-sunrise beach....

.... because the light is changing quickly.....

.... and I try to find the perfect angle to catch the cloud reflections.

6:00
It's all over long before 6:00....

a river bed passes the house now ...

The colours are gone...... and all the other guests are still sleeping !

6:45
That fucking rear tire is FLAT AGAIN.....  
oh screw it, I need to go to the market today !

The tire fixing guy is CLOSED !  I make it to the market and get smokes and another Bun Cha Ca..... 

A gorgeous woman sits across from me and smiles at me.... and all the other women at the table are giggling....

























7:30

8:00
M gives me directions to a tire repair shop (Coming from M, they're not entirely accurate, of course, but after asking people in the street "su'a point-at-rear-tire", I get there.) The woman there fills up the tire with a compressor ignoring my "khong".  Ah well, at least I'm no longer riding on the rim.

9:00
Everyone in the kitchen area wants to solve my tire problem differently, with Quang even offering to come with me to a Song Cau tire store.   
Too complicated and he has done enough, so when it's quiet I race to the tire place just before Market street and this time it is open.   
He also wants to pump air in my tire.
"KHONG !"  "SU'A!"  He understands that I just did that (?) and he agrees that I can pick it up at noon.  We'll see.

I always wanted to walk back through the village, I only wish I had a decent camera with me ;-)

Fishing nets imitating rock formations?

Well.... it still works.... doesn't it?

11:45
Chau drives me back to the tire-repair place....... 
Hai Chang?  TWENTY THOUSAND? That seems NOT enough!
OMG, PLEASE tell me he didn't just pump up the tire again...... I'll find out tomorrow, I guess, LOL.

12:00
Back in the kitchen area, I check the tire.
Yup, it's DEFLATING again........  The DUMB idiot only pumped air into it. But then people warned me about him.... and he's the one that went shopping on my repaired scooter last time I had a tire fixed here, LOL.

12:30
Chau motions for me to ride to the tire repair place again.....   there is no one there so we keep going to ANOTHER one down the road...   they're still having lunch so we wait....  

The front yard is a maze of ancient scooters..... there are roosters running among the parked scooters.......   while the family eats next to more parked vehicles ;-)

Then this ~35 year old tall and gorgeous man shows up in his often-patched TIGHT white jeans .....and that posture...... am I imagining things ...?  
NO, the looks and grins when he leaves are obvious...... OH, I like it here, lOl.



Lunch is finished, the master of motorcycle maintenance steps out and pumps up my tire.  He finds the hole just be listening and moving his finger along the outside of the tire.  It's a tubeless tire just like on the car.   

He doesn't take the tire off.   Some rubber string gets threaded into an awl and that is SHOVED into the tire (it looks as if he's STABBING my tire; HOW is that going to help?).


But it WORKS, lOl.   I got a motorbike rear tire puncture FIXED for ONE DOLLAR......



OMG I LOVE this country.... and NO, not primarily because of the prices, but because of the INGENUITY of the people !







14:00

15:00
B&T have Vietnamese family visiting from Tui Hoa.  It's like the family visits you remember when you are young..... the kids are BORED while the adults sit around and talk....  I spawn a cunning plan and walk over to the people with The Frisbee.....  I throw it ...... the ~10 year old Viet kids (who have NEVER seen a Frisbee before), get big eyes......one of them JUMPS out of his hammock and GRABS the Frisbee........ I point at the beach and say GO!

.... and do they ever....

.... and they're still GOING NUTS with that plastic disk when I come out of the water again ;-)

Is it morning? Is it evening?  Is it light or dark outside?  OMG, it's 19:00!