-^-for posterity-^-

when mud is pressed down and wet it is brown ice. i drove on brown ice today and had an accident. there was no one else involved in the accident except someone i was carrying on the back of the motorbike.

we drove along slowly on the outer edge of an island in the middle of the river. the road was only a footpath that was still very wet from earlier rain. we drove very slowly amazed at the beauty. the river and the clouds and the wind. then, out of no where, we lost our center of gravity. we slid down an embankment. we slid towards the river and i couldn't stop. i would grab something and the person behind me would push and the bike would pull and the mud continued to give way. we stopped. i escaped with no burns and minor bruises. the bike was muddy. my friend was muddy. the mud was fine.

i was shaking but we drove on. we drove on and on and on. we were trying to reach the end of the island before darkness came. we were going to eat.

on one of the roads i got a flat tire. the road was covered in large rocks and we bounced up and down and all of the sudden the bike was flub-dub-dubbing along. we stopped to fix it.

it was now dark and a family had gathered in a small room next to a small house on stilts. a man fixed my bike and we chatted with the family. there were eight people there, all living in teh same house. the youngest boy of the oldest man was the mechanic. he was 24 and looked 18. he was married to a girl who was holding a baby and kept asking us to hold it. the baby was a year old, or so. the oldest man asked me how much money i would buy the baby for. i really didn't know how to answer that question. i ignored it. the girls came with water and washed our pants and feet. the mechanic kept making wise-cracks and fixed the back tube. they fix the tube like this:

the bring the bike into the garage and move everything to make space. they remove the tube from inside of the tire without taking the tire off of the frame. they slide the tube around and around placing parts of it in a bucket of muddy water to look for holes. they find the hole. a man begins to light a fire in a small, metal tin. he lights it and pours more and more oil in making the fire hotter. the mechanic cleans the tube and prepares a patch. he places the patch on the tire and positions it on top of some sort of a press. the fire is placed on top of the tube and the patch and the press is tightened. they leave the fire on the tube for a few minutes. by this point the man asks me again how much i would buy his grandson for. i skirt around the question. they let the tube cool and try it again in the water. they place it back inside the tire, put the tire back on the rim and fill it with air.

i decided to say i woudl buy the baby for one million dollars. the man looked excited, shocked. he asked how much that was in dong and i said it was about 1,550,000,000 dong. he smiled broadly. i told him i didn't have the money but would maybe return someday. i paid 10,000 for the tire to be fixed. i don't think i'll go back for the baby.