"Vinh is for sure not a winner"

There were five of us leaving the hostel in the small minibus that picked us up about one hour late. Jared, Mohan, Paul and I were going to Vinh, about 8 hours by bus, and Chris, an Englishman going to Hue, about 4 hours further south. We got on a sleeper bus, so there were some kind of beds in the bus. One row of bunk beds along the windows, and one in the middle, creating two ales for the staff to walk around in, and for the passengers who did not get the sleeper tickets to sit in. The beds were of course too short for me, but not too bad, and the Vietnamese girl in between Paul and me for sure had a laugh. Right after we got on the bus, Pedro, the Chilean guy from the Ha Long Bay trip, got on the same bus as us. He was going to Hue. But after a little while, he was asked to go in the next bus, so he had to get out. This is perfectly normal when traveling by bus in South East Asia. There are no numbered seats, so it is every man for himself.

The first stop was at a restaurant with several buses outside. We went in to have some food, and there I met another friend. Jiby, also from the Ha Long trip. All long distance buses stop in places like this one, a restaurant, but without walls. We usually order some fried noodles or fried rice.

Around 2 in the morning we arrived in Vinh. We got out of the bus, made sure we had everything and started looking around. The bus had dropped us off outside a hotel, and from what we had seen from the bus on the way in, the rest of the city was dead.

The hotel was small, but it did have a sign outside in English, saying that they sell tickets to Lao. We had no choice than to go inside and figure out when the bus was leaving. They said 5:30 am. And we were very happy. We could stay up a couple hours, save money on accommodation and get out of Vinh. We got the price down with about 25%, but still 80% higher than the real price at the bus station We really wanted the tickets, and since they spoke English, we paid for the convenience and bought the tickets. That was after taking a walk to look for better prices, and another one to find the bus station. We did not want to buy a ticket here, and then come to the bus station only to find out that the tickets were not valid. The people working in the hotel, a middle aged couple, were in the end not very helpful, as we had woken them up three times in an hour. They did at last get us a taxi to the bus station, and the man, who spoke no English, accompanied us on his moped. He led us to the bus, and waited there for a long while. The driver was sleeping inside the bus, and we were waiting outside. We brushed our teeth on the parking lot, I got my jacket out to use as a pillow on the bus, and we were ready to leave. Then the complications started piling up.

The bus driver, who did not speak any English communicated that the bus would not leave before 10 PM, by typing "22h" on his cell phone. We spent a lot of time trying to figure out what he really meant, and much of it we spent passing my notebook and a pen back and fourth. I figured I should ask the police men what was up, and ran over to the entrance of the bus station. There was an officer who did speak a little English, but he did not care to come with me. He said that the bus would leave at 6am, that it did every day, and that it was the only bus going to Lao.

After a little longer trying to communicate with the driver, the officer came over and started translating a little. The first excuse was that the bus was delayed because of the spring festival, the next that the bus was broken and needed repairs, but he was very persistent in telling us that the bus would leave "today". When he looked at our ticket, he said that it was just a piece of paper, and not a real ticket. This started to worry us, but after the officer talking to the driver again, we got to know that it would be valid if the receptionist from our hotel could come and tell them she got the money. About two minutes later she randomly showed up on her moped. She was sorry for the inconvenience, and despite this not being her fault, she offered us a free room in her hotel, and to help us get on the bus again in the evening.

There was really not much more we could do, and we went to get some sleep. The room we got had three beds, but a bunch of comforters that Paul slept on. The standard of the hotel was really bad, but we did not care all that much. At least there were fewer rats in the room than on the street. Outside, they were countless. Inside we only saw one.

We of course knew that the story about the bus being broken was just bulls***, but we guessed wrong when it came to their reason for lying. We thought that the real reason for not leaving yet was because there were so few people that had bought tickets. We only saw two others trying to get on the bus, and they would probably not drive with only six passengers. As we started to get up form bed around 1:30 PM, we landed on that there was a 50 percent chance that we would get out of Vinh that evening.