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even this conveys a sort of sci-fi sexiness. It's like there's a zombie virus spreading through the city, and
they're racing to meet their lovers in the quarantine zone.
THE final night of the trip, the whole group goes out for good-bye drinks. We quickly lose the Aussie
blokes, who've split off in search of romance. The retired ladies are early to bed. It's down to Yukihide,
Kim and Tim, and Rebecca and me. We order a last round on the rooftop of the Rex Hotel, not far from the
Continental—the lovely French colonial grande dame where Graham Greene lived for a time, and which
he used as the setting for several parts of
The Quiet American
.
Looking out from our rooftop perch onto downtown Saigon, we can sense the lingering differences
between northern and southern Vietnam. Up north, Hanoi has the somber Ho Chi Minh memorials, and the
city still feels like it's still not entirely at ease with capitalism. Aside from the western hotels, the buildings
are for the most part simple and modest. And good luck finding much in the way of high-end retail. Mean-
while, here in the south, Saigon has blazed an enthusiastic course toward flashy modernity. Several tall
towers spike out of its skyline, and there's oodles of brand-name shopping. I imagine this is what Bangkok
must have looked like twenty-five years ago, as it began to mushroom into the metropolis it's now become.
We're all exhausted from the cumulative abuses of two weeks of cycling. And the alcohol isn't helping.
When Yukihide nods off at the table, we decide it's our cue to call it a night.
“Ohayou gozaimasu,”
I mur-
mur into Yukihide's ear (“good morning”), and he blinks his eyes open with a chuckle. We all pay our bill
and stumble back to our hotel.
The next day, most of the tour group heads for the airport. Rebecca and I aren't sure where we'll go
tomorrow, but almost everyone else in the group knows precisely where they'll be first thing tomorrow
morning: back at their desks in Australia, battling culture shock and attempting to achieve a stable reentry
into their lives. For a few nights after they get back home, the Aussie lads will give a Vietnamese-style
“Mot, hai, ba, yo!”
toast at the pub (translation: “One, two, three, in!”). But soon enough they'll revert to
“Up your bum!” Within a few weeks, all will be back to business as usual.
Meanwhile, Rebecca and I—to the burning but good-natured envy of the others, who've only just found
their traveling rhythm—will keep right on rolling. We're on a voyage, not a vacation. We've already mem-
orized “hello” and “thank you” in Khmer, preparing for our arrival in Cambodia.
THE twelve-dollar bus from Saigon to Phnom Penh, the capital city of Cambodia, is quick and hassle-free.
It's less than 150 miles between the cities. Our fellow passengers seem to be mostly local middle-class fam-
ilies. The bus driver handles the border crossing, taking our passports from us and expediting the process.
The moment we cross into Cambodia, the poverty becomes brutally evident. Where huts in Vietnam were
often concrete blocks, here they're sticks and mud. Many huts are lifted high up on stilts, with brown flood-
waters lapping at the ground beneath them. Naked children run through the puddles, their flanks smeared
with dirt.
When we reach a river, Rebecca's GPS map indicates that there should be a bridge. But there is no
bridge. It's washed away. Our bus rolls onto an incredibly dodgy-looking ferry, which floats us to the other
side—along with at least a hundred motorbikes, pressed together in every open space on the boat's outside
deck.
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