"Eddie Murphy" rolled up next to me checking out the menu at the "Same Same, but Different Cafe" in Nha Trang and offered me a charming smile and a motorbike tour of Vietnam's Central Highlands. His pictures were incredible--scenery, smiling tourists, goofy shots of Eddie himself. His journal of past satisfied customers was convincing. I balked at the $40/day price and asked if there was any chance of a discount...he said no. He's always honest and never cheaper. Wow, an honest businessman in Vietnam. This is a rarity. His timing is a bit off as I need to return my rented bicycle before the shop closes (in 5 minutes) and I agree to meet him for tea at a cafe.
The bike shop is farther from where I met Eddie than I realize and I consider blowing him off. My current plan to stay an extra day in my $2 dormatory in Nha Trang, visit the hotsprings (because "soaking in hot mineral water is very interesting" according to their advertisements), and swim in the ocean. I have already had some amazing minorty people's experiences in Sapa. I have seen the rural/agrarian life-style of the small villages in central Vietnam near the DMZ. I wonder if this condensed 2-day tour of the Central Highlands is worth $80 at this point in my journey.
I decide to try to find him because I said I would and I wanted to walk back to that restaurant anyway. Eddie finds me and we go to a nice outdoor garden cafe for tea and coffee. We chat and get along famously. He is very funny and I trust him. Another few times through the photo album and journal and I decide to go for it. Accomodation and entry fees are included. He drives me to an ATM and I pull out almost a third of the last of my funds alloted to this trip. We agree to meet at my hotel at 7:30AM the next morning.
I am packed and ready early (shock of shocks). Nausea churns my stomach a bit and I wonder again if this trip is the best use of my resources...Eddie arrives and I swallow my hesitation and follow through with my commitment. He takes me to a nice restaurant for breakfast overlooking the ocean (I think it's the same place I boycotted last night because they had sea turtle on the menu, but I'm not sure so I don't raise a fuss). At the edge of town, he takes me to see men weaving bamboo boats on the beach near a very poor fishing village (we're talking urine stench in the alley corners, plastic bags and other rubbish everywhere, children with holes in their clothes, homes made of wood scraps and rusting corrigated steel), then a baguette factory where I learn the bread in Vietnam is made from yam flour, not wheat. Wow, I am very impressed and excited by this (new wheat-free bread technique!).
We also see a brick making village, where a few cigarettes buys us smiles and welcome (this process is repeated at every stop), a knife/tool forge with scrap metal of all sorts littering the ground waiting to be returned to usefulness, a yam farm (I get to dig up some yams, ruining several in the process), some hot springs where I swim in the warm pond (by the time we arrive around noon, the spring-fed pools are too hot--between 70 and 80 degrees? If we had an egg, we could cook it in about 15 minutes. Eggshells litter the ground as evidence), a former battle field where America used napalm, agent orange, and many many bombs--30 years later and the hillsides still will not support trees or crops, the minority people have moved away and cannot return, and the water is still bad. We also visited a mass grave where 115 Vietnamese were secretly buried over the course of 3 months in 1975--the bodies had to be stolen from the above battle field and carried under cover of darkness to the hidden grave site. Wow.
Shortly after this, we drove a section of Highway 14, the Ho Chi Minh trail used by North Vienamese troops to inflitrate the south during the war. The part we traveled was all developed, though, so it felt no different from any other Vietnamese thoroughfare--crowded, noisy, lined with shops and fruit stands and motorbike repair places. Then on to see a French colonial-era bridge, a coffe plantation (where Eddie climbed a tree and braved a black ant attack to snap me an improvised aerial photo), two beautiful waterfalls, and to bed at a resort near a third small waterfall. We have a huge vegetarian dinner of spring rolls, fried tofu, sauteed veggies, french fries (I did not realize that's what he meant by "fried potatos"--fun with cross-cultural communication), an omelette, and rice. It was way more food than I wanted, but I did not want to be rude, so I ate myself sick. Eddie taught me some great card tricks and we sang songs and enjoyed the sound of the waterfall below the thatch-roofed gazebo where we ate dinner. We slept in separate beds (to Eddie's shagrin (joking, I hope?)) with 8 other tourists in a copy of a minority long-house.
Up at 7 again the next day, he repairs the clutch lever which had broken off the night before (because what would a motorbike trip in Vietnam be without some sort of mechanical failure?) and I wander off to explore. I sit and meditate by the waterfall, do a little journaling and generally revel in the solitude I find in this place (rare for me on this trip). I return to the resort to find Eddie worried over a cup of coffee. He's been waiting for me for an hour. oops. I drink a little tea, pack my stuff, snap a few photos and we're back on the road.
Today's scenery includes a black pepper farm, silk-worm growing, general scenery photo opportunities--lush rice paddies, decrepit churches, the jungle highway, a minority village where he explains the complex courtship ritual of their matriarcial society (perhaps I'll expand later--there's wood harvesting and uncles get involved...it's a long story). The women do the work while the men stay in the long house and watch the children (mostly, I saw the men napping in hammocks and the children playing by themselves). We stopped at Chicken Village where I bought some souveneirs and arrived in Da Lat after dark.
It was quite an action packed two days. Walking Da Lat's streets, Eddie and I share a few last laughs and some sticky rice before he heads home the next morning.
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