Xin Chào.

[Rough translation: Good morning Vietnam]

I'm ill. But it's my own stupid fault.

I'm paying the price for a moment of indiscretion.

I'd been enjoying the pleasures of Saigon for just three days when, stupidly, I jumped at an easy opportunity and - without taking any precautions - quickly found myself stripped off, diving right in and getting my nob wet.

And everything else wet, too.

Yes, I've caught a bad cold from Saigon's municipal swimming pool. I was 10 laps in when it occurred to me I couldn't taste any chlorine. The pool was packed with men, women and children. When I spat out water there were bits in it. "I'll pay for this later," I grimly concluded at the time.

Sure enough the next day I'm feeling achy and weak. I walk out on the street and, snuffling, gingerly climb on the back of a motorbike taxi. Might as well continue the sightseeing.

Motorbikes

Countryside

From the back of a motorbike Saigon rushes by at cheek-flapping speed and in full technicolor. And you fear for your life at every intersection.

Saigon (or Ho Chi Minh City as it's officially been called since 1976) is the largest city in Vietnam and the streets are teeming with motorbikes. There are so many motorbikes there's no room for any cars. You see entire families riding on one motorbike (I counted one dad, one mother, and four kids clinging onto one). You see businessmen riding motorbikes. You see builders carrying tools and materials to construct entire houses riding motorbikes. And, best of all, you see heartbreakingly beautiful women riding motorbikes.

Motorbikes keep Vietnam moving.

The vast majority of bikes are small little Honda runabouts. Or at least, they look like Hondas. I learn that a 100cc Honda Dream costs about $2000 (US) and, as long you put oil in it occasionally, it will last 20 years. It's a fantastic machine. However, a few years ago the Chinese started exporting huge numbers of counterfeit Honda knock-offs. They're good for around 500 miles before disintegrating on the side of the road. But they look exactly like the Japanese bikes and cost just $800. "Fantastic! We'll take 'em!" said the Vietnamese people at the time, and they continue to buy the knock-offs over the originals - despite them proving to be a false economy.

Many students of the Vietnamese psyche (I met a few in bars) speculate that if the Vietnamese can only figure out which motorbike they should be buying, then Vietnam won't remain a third-world country for very long.

The free market will decide.

Try to buy a larger motorbike, however, and you'll get a quick reminder that for all Saigon's bustling commercialism Vietnam is - officially - a communist state. Any motorbike over 120cc is considered a "luxury item" and has to be registered with local Party officials. The purchaser finds himself buried under red tape, taxed a hefty fee and - get this - obliged to occasionally escort the limos of Party dignitaries and appear in local parades. You don't see many motorbikes over 120cc.

War is not the answer

It's hot and sticky and after an hour of rattling around on the back of a bike I'm feeling terrible.

My plight is quickly put into sharp perspective, however, during a visit to the Museum of American War Crimes. It's a museum of the Vietnamese American war - from the Vietnamese perspective, of course.

What horror, what horror, what horror.

Worst are the reports of atrocities committed by ordinary American men forced into being soldiers.

And the constant question barking in my brain "WHY were the Americans there?"

It makes no sense at all. We can never let it happen again. I don't know what else to say about it.

I get a motorbike back to my hotel and go to bed.

Sick

For two days and nights I'm sweating and shivering. All I can do is shuffle within 50 yards of my hotel, foraging for food. From my handy "Traveller's Health Guide" I diagnose that I have cholera, malaria, typhoid, galloping gonorrhea, and - I'm reasonably sure - The Bubonic Plague.

On day three I feel slightly more human - it seems my life has been spared. My hypochondria subsides a little. I've just got a bloody cold and it's a pain in the ass. And the nose.

Boats

Your sneezing correspondent spends a couple more days exploring Saigon from the back of a motorbike. I check out the parks and the markets (full of discount plumbing equipment and knock-off Vietnam War relics). I watch World Cup games with the staff in the hotel lobby. I enjoy being tallest person on the dance floor at Saigon's biggest nightclub with two vacationing Australian brothel owners. They were characters. One evening the New Zealand navy are in town. I'm still a little sick, however, and both evenings I have to bow out early. (Actually I'm glad - a night out with that lot would have killed me).

By friday I'm feeling well enough for the six-hour minibus ride to Can Tho, the main city in the Mekong Delta in the far southwest corner of Vietnam. Here I'm to meet up with Adrian, my old roommate from San Francisco.

Up to his knees in it

Adrian's studying for a Masters degree in Tropical Ecosystems and Beard Growing. For his two-month field placement he's up to his knees in the paddy fields of the Mekong Delta measuring acid levels. Helping to find out what effect switching from rice to shrimp production has had on the environment. I can't go squelch with him in "the field" because I don't have permission from the local Party officials to be there. So our paths will cross during his weekend break in Can Tho. I catch up with him at his apartment at Can Tho University.

It's great to see the old scumbag. My first familiar face since seeing Sarah in New Zealand two months ago.

It's dinner time so we jump in a Xe Loi (pronounced "Saloy") - a motorbike-with-trailer taxi. We tell our driver we want to go to the "Nam Bo" restaurant on the "Hai Ba Trung", but he doesn't understand our (probably crap) prononunciations. He's a grinning 50 year old fellow with no teeth and a leather hat. Quite clearly as mad as a brush. His Saloy is the most rickety, ramshackle contraption I've yet seen in Vietnam - and that's up against some pretty stiff competition.

Adrian takes charge. In the traditional manner of Englishmen abroad he repeats the name and address, but this time in a louder voice. Our driver repeats something completely different and nods enthusiastically. Adrian repeats the name of the restaurant again. Our driver nods and grins and, again, says something completely different.

Misunderstanding continues and continues until - finally - Adrian believes that our driver knows where we're going.

The driver kick starts his ancient old motorbike and we're off. But who knows where. Eventually our driver pulls up in the car park of the Golf Club with a triumphant grin on his face. "NO NO NO" Adrian yells at him. [Those who know Adrian can maybe imagine how funny this scene is]. "We don't want to be at the BLOODY GOLF CLUB we want to be at the NAM-BO RES-TAU-RANT". Our driver simply carries on grinning and nodding...

For two days Adrian and I have fun catching up, playing the occasional game of badminton (as you do - the Vietnamese are mad for it) and relaxing in the local cafe, watching the footy and drinking iced coffee with condensed milk (the Vietnamese put huge amounts of sugar in all their beverages. All the adults have Victorian teeth). He's tired and I'm still ill so it's all very chilled. I do, however, get one more great Adrian memory to add to my collection:

It's 12.20am and - in Can Tho as in all Vietnam - all the bars and clubs have shut. (Communist state, don't forget). We're back outside Adrian's apartment at the University campus. We've had a few but we aren't drunk enough for Adrian's satisfaction. He needs more alcohol. Suddenly inspiration strikes him - he says he knows where he can get some beer. He marches off down the road. I tag along behind him.

"They're open!" he yells back at me over his shoulder. "I can see the lights on!"

I don't know if he's heading for a bar, a club, a shop, or what.

Eventually I catch up to find him banging on some big metal gates. It's only the city brewery. Clearly it's shut for the night. There's no one around. The only "light" that is on is an enormous advertising hoarding shaped like a beer bottle. This doesn't deter Adrian.

Eventually a night-watchman appears at the gates - he's just woken up - to find out what all the fuss is about. It's the middle of the night, and Adrian Bliss is hammering on the door of the brewery demanding booze.

Ignorant Englishman

Rice

I take a train up the coast to Nha Trang. The 10 hour train ride's not as scenic as I'd hoped for, but we do get glimpses of the South China Sea beyond the paddy fields. It's mostly couples that I see working the land. A husband and wife eking out a living on their small plot.

I'm the only white person on the train. The two women sat opposite me take pity and make sure all the vendors give me a taste of the foodstuffs paraded through the carriage. The vendors all jump on the moment the train pulls up at a station, then sell their wares quickly before being chased off by the guards. A girl comes over to talk with me. She works in Saigon but travels back to the countryside each weekend to see her family. She gets off at her stop, waves goodbye, and then comes running back to give me a bunch of grapes. "A souvenir!" she says.

The good people travelling in Coach 10 on the 10.30am S6 Express from Ho Chi Minh City to Nha Trang look after me very well.

But I don't have much fun in Nha Trang. It's a seaside resort town, and it seems that all the Vietnamese people I get to talk with are trying to sell me something. (Or two of something, for just a dollar more).

It takes a lot of patience to offer an open heart to everyone who speaks to you, knowing that - in all likelihood - the approach will lead to another sales pitch. Too often I find myself putting up a barrier to the people around me. And what kind of travelling is that?

It hits me that travelling in a country where you don't speak the language is tough.

[Well, duh, Neil.]

I have one warm interaction with a bloke who rents me a motorbike for a day. His kids are running around at his feet as we work out the whole deal using just sign language and eye contact. A complication is that I want to return the bike at 11pm before catching my train. I give him $3 (US) for a day's rental. He doesn't ask for any kind of ID or deposit from me. I ride off into the countryside and explore for a day - as I trundle down country lanes everyone stops and waves! I bring back the bike and my man drops me at the station. My favorite person in Nha Trang, and we didn't speak a word.

It's time for me to go home.

And, in the end

For the journey back to Saigon I book myself a sleeper and travel through the night. I grab the rest of my bags from the hotel and catch a taxi to the airport. I catch a flight to Bangkok, venture into town just long enough to buy some noodles and a knock-off pair of jeans, then board the midnight flight to London.

I wake up to see green fields beneath me. We circle London a couple of times before landing at Heathrow.

I'm back in England. And that's the end of my travels for now.

- Neil