\"Beep-beep, beep-beep\" was the first noise I heard after the four o'clock revelry of whichever country won the World Cup this morning. Stumbling downstairs catatonically we nearly bumped into the manic waiter-cum-receptionist-cum-bellman who seemed to be everywhere at once. \"Football, you watch?\" he questioned us. Very disappointedly his face dropped upon the realization we would have no high-points of the match to share. He pulled us into the restaurant, sat us down at a table in front of the television and turned on the videotape he'd made of the bout between the French and Brazilians. We were decidedly more interested in eggs, coffee, juice and bread than soccer so he volunteered that the French had emerged victorious.
As I ate my eggs I thought I overheard our friend (now acting as a tour guide) try to sell a boat trip up the Thu Bon River to the Cham ruins to some other tourists. (In fact he was hawking a bus trip) I proposed the idea of taking a boat to see the ruins to Andrew and he was immediately enthusiastic about the idea. A Nguyen at the front desk (fifty percent of Vietnamese share this name so Andy and I have started referring to them generically as such) was anxious to accommodate this (what we will later realize as ill-advised) request.
For a mere thirty dollars we could be transported 3 hours upriver and two down. We'd need to bring bikes, we were advised, because the site is eleven kilometers from the riverside. We agreed that this sounded like the perfect day. A leisurely ride on a boat observing typical Vietnamese life, reading, playing backgammon and being tourists is just what the doctor ordered. A few moments later after a visit to the bank we were introduced to our crew and our bikes were placed on the bow of a boat proudly emblazoned with the word \"Tourist\" on all facings. We would not be traveling anonymously.
The captain was named Duc and spoke passable English through teeth much in need of some dentistry. His first mate looked to be in his early fifties, was skinny as a rail and missing the lower half of his right arm. He smiled warmly at us from the tiller while I wondered if it had been a boating accident or if our country's devilishness (more likely) had been the cause of his mutilation. Duc pointed out all the sights and made explanation while teaching us Vietnamese using our phrasebook as an aid. Duc was especially fond of the word prostitute, which he repeated often.
We shared bananas, cookies and drinks with them as we made our way up the river past Thu Bon boats. It seemed that far more folks lived on the river in a boat than in the towns. Fishing, doing laundry, cooking, bathing, boat repair, weaving fishing nets and mysteriously wading were but a few of the witnessed activities. Wading was something our crew would become well acquainted with. Hoi An had been a bustling trading town. Merchants from China, Indonesia, Malaysia and virtually all over Asia had come to purchase silks and porcelain that had been brought down the Thu Bon River and many of them had set up offices in Hoi An.
At some point the mighty Thu Bon silted up and that put an end to the trade along the river. Just a few kilometers out of Hoi An we became acquainted with this problem. At first we began to weave back and forth in the river, avoiding countless sand bars often stopping to seek the advice of other boaters on the correct course to take. Then we found ourselves stuck on the shallower bits of the river, forcing our crew to jump overboard and lift the boat off of the sand or walk in front of the boat seeking a navigable path.
In the end it took fifty percent longer than we thought it would to reach our docking, leaving us to ride to My Son in the hottest part of the day. We'd have to rush there and back in order to make it back to Hoi An before dark. The road to My Son was probably constructed and last maintained at the time of My Son's habitation (4^th^ -- 13^th^ centuries). Huge sharp rocks composed the roadway that rattled our bikes and the huge dump trucks that thundered by occasionally. Within a few kilometers of My Son we began to see that this was likely a tourist trap.
Drink stands and restaurants advertised \"Free Information\" and \"Free Parking\". The one thing that was strangely absent were other tourists, leaving us wondering if we had taken a wrong turn somewhere. The other question that baffled us is how other tourists would actually get to My Son as there was no way a large tourist bus could actually navigate the drive that led to the entrance of the site. At the entrance there was a little stand selling souvenirs and, thankfully, cold water. We greedily slugged down some water, bought our tickets and entered the park. At first there was some confusion.
The tickets were 50,000 dong each, the entrance was still three kilometers from the site and we were not allowed to ride our bikes there. The park rangers finally volunteered the information that our ticket included a Jeep ride to the site. We piled into an American Jeep (Willys circa 1940) and bounced down the road. I had high expectations for our visit. Our guidebook compared the Cham sites of Vietnam to Borobudur in Indonesia. Leaving the Jeep we met the only other tourists we'd cross this day. They left hastily in a pool of sweat without returning our greetings. In the sweltering heat of the midday I was bound to be disappointed no matter what we would find.
The first bit was a collapsed compound of temples and walls made of brick. It was hard to imagine the former splendor from what remained. In two partially restored rooms in the compound there were a few replicas of carvings left from the facings of the stupas and temples. Wandering around the site we found a few other JAPOR (Just Another Pile Of Rocks) masquerading as points of interest. I have to admit that I was little reticent to explore the surrounding hills. Our guidebook warned us that the Viet Cong had used My Son as a base of operations and that the countryside had been heavily mined.
It further cautioned that grazing cows sometimes stumble upon UXO's (Unexploded Ordinance) and explode. We stepped gingerly along the poorly marked paths between the sites in fear of meeting a cow's fate and becoming hamburger. Most disparaging was to learn that we Americans were largely responsible for the poor condition of the ruins because we bombed the area heavily during the war. We left the site and rode back to the entrance on an ancient Russian bus in the company of some of the Park staff, whose chief responsibilities seemed to be grunting at us and lying about. The ride back to the river seemed even longer and hotter than the ride out.
We stopped in the town for a bowl of noodles and something cold to drink. Some villagers were celebrating some occasion at the restaurant by drinking copious amounts of rice wine and beer, which they happily shared with us. After lunch we piled back into the boat, said goodbye to terra firma and headed back for Hoi An. We found just as many un-navigable spots on the return as we found on the way there, much to the frustration of our crew. Regardless of their trials they always grinned at us as they slogged through the mud and sand freeing the boat countless times.
We passed bigger boats trying to go upriver whose crews were literally under the boats trying to hoist them over low spots in the stream. Some of the boats were tethered together to form floating villages complete with floating markets and other businesses. The setting sun's light played on the scenery giving us more photo opportunities then we had film. When we finally arrived back in Hoi An it was well after our meeting time with Bu who had promised Andy his new under shorts. We ran into Bu, a little flustered that we'd missed our rendezvous. He'd been to the hotel and looked for us around town thinking we'd run off without collecting and paying for Andy's green silk shorts.
Andy promised to stop by for a fitting the next day and Bu was relieved.