The morning passed in a daydream. As I rode, I munched cucumbers given to me by a farmer at a roadside stand. When I was tired, I napped on a springy suspension bridge connecting stilt house villages to the highway. Below, Black Thai women did their washing and naked children played in the river. When I was hot, I stripped out of my bike clothes and took a swim. The silt that collected in the pools oozed pleasingly underfoot.
I reached my destination at noon and kept pedaling. With barely a thought, I decided to double up days. 120km over paved roads no longer seemed so scary.
The afternoon was blistering, and the day ended with a dusty climb. Although I was racing the sunset, I had to pull into a stand to rest.
I watched wordlessly as the men yanked on the cables of my bike. I lodged no protest when they rode it in wobbly circles up and down the road.
I waited patiently. My moment would come.
I remained silent when they snatched my wallet and emptied its contents on the table. Credit cards, bank cards, business cards passed back and forth, each side carefully inspected.
And when they were all distracted — entranced with the pretty hologram on my MBNA Elite Rewards Visa — I channeled the spirit of the Vietnamese and pounced, grabbing the unguarded VC combat helmet beside me.
The men watched me, but said nothing. Turnabout was fair play.
Savoring the moment, I turned the helmet over in my hands; peered through the eyelets; sniffed the brim; tested its hardness with my knuckles. It was, in every respect, entirely unremarkable.
Grinning triumphantly, I dropped it on my head. It was two sizes too large, and it felt great.
Valentine Dupris makes me feel as though I am just playing at adventure.
I thought I had been making a pretty good go of it. My parents had both had multiple aneurisms when I announced I was traveling Southeast Asia alone by bicycle, so the mission of the trip was accomplished before I even left the States. I had arrived in Phnom Penh with mounds of untested gear that I had never loaded onto my bike, so I came prepared with the requisite disregard for common sense. And I had pedaled for days through hotel-less wildernesses, so I could look down my nose at the package tourists.
Valentine, on the other hand, had arrived in Hanoi and decided that cycling would be a fun way to see the mountains of the northwest. She bought a Vietnamese mountain bike for $150 and had a tailor stitch together some panniers for another $6. So far the sum total of her investment was, oh, about one billionth what I spent on gear. And with this, she set off alone on the hardest ride in Vietnam.
As in any good adventure, Valentine suffered for her recklessness. Things went wrong immediately. Her seat post was too small for the tube, causing her saddle to sink. She fixed this with a shiv made from a Coke can. Her rack then broke, requiring a day of repairs in Hoa Binh. Worst of all, she lacked proper cycling clothes. Torquemada used to extract conversions from heretics by forcing them to ride Vietnamese mountain bikes over bad pavement without padded shorts.
I gave Valentine my spare cycling shorts. Normally, this is the type of gesture I horribly bungle. Seeking to say something like, “If they fit, you’re welcome to have the shorts,” I instead say, “If you can manage to cram yourself into them, the shorts are yours.” Then, realizing the implications, I launch into an insane lecture on comparative male-female anatomy, leaving the recipient both insulted and disgusted. I’m awkward that way.
In this case, I managed the gift with reasonable grace. More importantly, the shorts fit just fine. Valentine is now on her way around the loop in at least a little more comfort. I doubt she’ll make it all the way, but that’s OK. When she needs to, she can hop a bus like I did. Either way, she’ll have a wonderful story to tell.
The next night, I bequeathed my last spare tube to a man desperately in need who had eight days left in his 14,000km bike journey. I am the Wheeled Angel of the northwest loop.
