| Muller | Hitchhiking Vietnam
Page 18 |
Our next stop was the home of Gulik, the Speeding Bullet, the man who had sold me my overpriced bicycle. If I was going to tackle the forbidding Highlands, it made sense to do it on something better than a forty pound, one-speed school bike. I carefully instructed Tam, my guide, to tell Gulik that he had cheated me, that we both knew it, and that I wanted him to take the bike back at its purchase price.
It took Tam twenty minutes of solemn conversation to translate my single, pointed sentence. Gulik listened carefully, sent me an appraising glance and then scratched his chin.
"What did you tell him?" I asked.
"I said you had to leave the country immediately with visa problems and asked him if he would pity you and help you to sell the bike," Tam replied without blinking.
Gulik tugged on Tam's sleeve. "Fifteen dollars," he said in Vietnamese. Four weeks earlier it had been worth fifty-five.
I shrugged and gritted my teeth, and watched Tam hand over the bike with many protestations of gratitude. The system clearly worked. It was up to me to become a part of it, or drown.
