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Vietnam:
Final Scam
 Author:
Gavin Lees - 2000
In theory the plan was as follows. Bus to Vinh, arrive at 2am, wait
for a local bus to Cau Treo, cross the border and then take a local
jumbo truck to Nam Keut. God, I wish it had been that easy.
I waited for my bus,
which was only 30 minutes late. I managed to secure two seats and
made myself comfortable. We stopped at a few more places to collect
passengers and then ended up heading out of the city with loads
of motorbikes. We were barely out of the city when a guy on a bike
told the driver something and we drove around a bit more and ended
up exactly back where we had started. This Hanoi city tour was not
expected, nor appreciated, and took an hour. Apparently they had
forgotten one girl; she sat beside me and fell asleep not really
caring that we had come back to fetch her.
Anyway, we continued
along the road to Vinh. I fell asleep and woke up at Vinh. There
were people everywhere; tourists were standing on a tourist bus.
I got up, trying hard to wake up the sleeping girl next to me, and
met some other people who were doing the same thing as me. We found
a café, had a coffee and watched Lazio playing Chelsea to
kill the time. There was a nice German couple and a young Danish
guy and we all were on the same mission. As we were in the middle
of nowhere we were approached by drivers who gave us info about
the border crossing. They all had a " FRIEND" with a mini
van. It approached 5 am and there was a lot of activity. The whole
town seemed to be doing a morning walk. We walked to the station
and were told that there were no buses to the border, but that we
should go to the market, 2km away. We organised our last cyclo ride
in Vietnam and in the dark were pedalled down towards the market.
In fact, we stopped at
one of the FRIENDS mini-vans and the driver asked for $100. We expected
to pay $4 and this was a little high. He wanted $100 each. We bargained
and got him down to $20 each and then told him to get stuffed. We
walked to the main market, which was still a distance away, and
were told that the price was $7, but not to the border. Another
friendly minibus driver found us and told us he would take us for
$5. This was our best deal and we got him down to 50,000 dong, which
is about $4 something. By now there were seven tourists and a van
packed with local people. We all sat in the back and headed off
soon after.
After a while the driver
demanded our money. This was suspicious and this is where it all
started getting ugly. Most other rides you pay for when you get
off. We refused and he threatened to dump us in the middle of nowhere.
After some screaming and calm negotiating we agreed to pay, but
the young Danish guy did the stupidest thing I have ever seen a
tourist do. He rolled up his money in a ball and threw it in the
driver's face. Granted we had not slept for ages and were a little
irritable, but this was inexcusable. Then a small scuffle broke
out and we tried to separate the Danish guy from the money collector.
Locals were holding him back. He then babbled something in Vietnamese
and told us that he'd drop us here, and that he did not need our
money. We tried to calm him down, and when we did, the ride was
very pleasant. We chatted and joked and laughed...UNTIL.... We saw
a crude sign that said FRONTIA AIREA and the guy said that we could
not go any more. By now the locals had already gotten off the bus
and we were the last ones left. We asked him how far the border
was and explained that we had paid him in good faith to take us
to the border. He lied to us and told us it was 2km away.
We walked 2km with our
bags and came to another mini-van and a sign that said, "Cau
Treo 40km"; we were fucked. Then started the bargaining and
the scam just got more and more impressive. Obviously the two drivers
worked together, and when the 2nd driver asked for $100, everyone
just told him to fuck off and we continued walking. After a few
more metres we decided to try and hitch a ride. This bastard would
not let any trucks stop as he followed us like a vulture up the
hill. He waved a few trucks on and then it got ugly again. The German
girl walked to the van and told him his fortune. He smiled, as he
knew that they had us. Some guys walked ahead and tried to organise
a ride. As soon as we were close to getting a ride the arsehole
came up in his van and waved the car or truck on. Now what? We still
had 35km to go and it looked like it was starting to rain. Then
our luck changed. A truck that had not even stopped when it passed
us waited around a bend. When we saw it we ran like crazy for it
and threw ourselves in. The driver wanted $1 each to get to the
border. We nodded, smiled and drove on. The mini-van followed and
he was disappointed that we had found alternative transport. He
tried to pull the truck over and the driver had nothing of it and
sped away up the hill. We all gave him the international one finger
wave and were relieved. Then it started pouring. In the van were
four guys from Laos in army fatigues.
We stopped about a kilometre
away from the border, and they got off with torches and ropes and
any snacks we still had that we gave to them, and joined a few other
people climbing up the mountain and made an unofficial border crossing.
We then stopped at the border and gave the driver a dollar each,
and were greeted by pouring rain and four very noisy quacking geese.
The border was quite small and there were two officials. They stamped
us out and then pointed us in the direction and said it was 1km
to Laos. We walked in the rain and a truck offered us a ride, which
we accepted. At the other side we were warned not to take any pics
and were stamped in. The entire border crossing from Vietnam to
Laos took only 15 minutes and was ironically one of the easiest
and quickest ones that I have ever made. I was relieved to be out
of Vietnam.
http://www.angelfire.com/ga/vinlees/
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