-^-for posterity-^-

the fourth day of the year of the monkey.

at the dawn of the new year, many people have their fortune told. i was not venturing out to have mine read to me, but a friend of a friend happened to be a semi-famous teller of the future. in my last hour or so in can tho, we had coffee and he scribbled notes and told me what would happen in my life.

he was a skinny, tallish man with a plaid shirt and short hair. he had a serious look on his face, a look that came with some sort of importance. explaining people’s fate would do that to someone, i imagined. he sat with his legs crossed tightly. he looked at me only when he was giving me my judgement.

the first thing he asked me was what year i was born. i told him, i was a ‘canh than’. i scribbled something on the back of a piece of paper. he drew a couple of lines. he then told me to choose one object, the first object i really noticed. the first object i could see was a bunch of flowers about ten feet behind him. i knew the flowers, they’re called ‘hoa vanh tho’, or flowers that are meant to mean long life. i figured if i was having my fortune told, such a decision must be interpreted as being a good one.

he mumbled something and drew some more lines. the next 10 minutes was full of anxious tension. all of the waiting and scribbling was making me seriously nervous. what if he told me i was going to die in the coming year. what would my future hold and how accurate would it be? i couldn’t help but half believing him.

he slid back from his paper slightly and mumbled, ‘this is bad.’

my slight superstition turned into full blown cult-like belief. my stomach churned, it honesty took a couple of flips. my future was bad and all of his scribbling said so.

he turned to me and told me what would happen. he said that i will be faced with two decisions. i will have to choose whether to stay in vietnam or go back to america. i will want to make a decision but whatever decision i choose will be wrong. what i have to do is accept whatever decision is made for me by someone else. i will always choose wrongly. i already decided to stay on until the end of the next year, a decision that was made months ago. i stopped believing him. it was all too vague.

he looked back at his piece of paper and searched it for answers. he gasped. he saw something. it turned out that i would actually have to go back to america in exactly 40 days. something horrible would happen in america and i would have to return. it would all be beyond my control, once again. also, when i returned to america, i would have to be careful when i am in a car, a plane or on a motorcycle. he saw something horrible that could happen to me when i was traveling somewhere. he saw everything.

there was then some discussion about exactly what 40 days meant and when we started counting and if it meant i would be back in 40 days or if i would leave in 40 days. we were not sure.

his phone rang while he was talking. he didn’t see it coming.

he then decided to tell me what i did this morning. he said i wanted to buy something for someone else and i was going to do it. the conversation shifted to what i did this morning. i got up at 930, met the rector of the university and had breakfast. i didn’t pay for anything but, one of my friends noted, i did mention the fact that i wanted to learn chinese chess and that i would have to buy a board to learn. that was disputed because i wouldn’t be giving it to anyone.

he told me i would life until i was 73 or 74. he wasn’t sure.

he also said i would not find love here and i would find love when i returned to america.

we stood up, i said thanks, and we left. he stumbled on the top step as we reached our motorbikes, maybe he didn’t see it, or maybe it was fate. i thought about what i would be doing in 40 days.