12 June 2006 – Monday – 22:21
This is very strange! How could I possibly connect to internet without paying money? I just inserted the wireless card and it connected my computer to internet. I sent e-mail and I received e-mails. It is like a dream. I don’t need to go to crowded internet cafes any more. Somehow, I got lucky…
Today started very quickly. I woke up at 6 as usual, took hot shower and went to downstairs. I left my laundry in the office and picked my passport from the desk. In front of the building, motorbikes already started their buzzing and beeping orchestra. For me, this is the sound of a city which is waking up from a deep sleep. One man saw me and asked me where I am going. I told him the name of the market I need to go for the school bus. Even though he did not understand where I am going, he told me to ride behind him. I did but before that I asked the price. He said 10,000 don which is about 25 Baht. On the road, he stopped and asked a man to talk with me. I told where I want to go to that guy. He told the driver where I want to go and the driver smiled. He took me to the market place. I was planning to wait for the school bus there. I entered the big shopping bazaar and walked through for a while, looking for something to eat. There were so many people around but they were eating some kind of soup or rice puddings. Since I could not be sure with the ingredients of their food, I sat on a little chair and drank only coffee which was too sweet and a little bit thick.
I did not wait for the bus for which I later regretted. I took another motorbike to go to school. The driver said that it would cost 30,000 dong which is about 80 Baht. I said ok since taxis go there for 150 Baht. My idea was to go to school as soon as possible. On the motorbike, I had the scariest journey of my life. There is no traffic rule on the roads. Every single vehicle moves at the same time, they all honk and they all move. My driver did not stop one time during the whole trip. Even the red light could not stop him. He constantly drove until we got to school. Once we got to school, I said to myself “never again”.
It is interesting that this entire chaotic scene does not bother local people. Nobody seems unhappy with this chaotic environment. They more or less seem to endorse the idea(?!) that it is normal and life is going on as usual. I am the one who makes the trouble because I had not adapted to the environment yet. Since I come from relatively modern and ordered place (Bangkok), I am scared by this situation. Actually, for them there must be an order in this chaos otherwise they will not get used to it. Definitely, it is true that human being is the most adaptive animal. We adapt to any kind of environment much faster than any other living organism. I am sure, if we put a western standard on a road one morning, they will get confused and they will find it nonsense. Although this rule may seem us as a “standard”, it may seem “unnecessary” to local people. This is because we want to see the world with the colors we got used to. David Hume might be right! All the laws of nature are nothing more than psychological conditioning. We wait thunder just after lightening because we have seen it since our childhood. In fact, there is no real necessity for one following the other one. At least, this necessity can not be called logical, therefore universal. What we want to see is exactly what we have seen before. This only, of course, is not enough to make our inferences universal.
Actually, on the same motorbike, I tried to see this order. Everyone moves at the same time and no accident occurs. This means it works somehow. I am sure the death rate caused by motorbike accidents in Vietnam is much higher than many Western countries but this is nothing more than statistical data. There is something more important than this: The speed of life. Those who survive in this traffic are going on their life as usual. Otherwise, it would be impossible to keep these two dialectical forces: Speed of life versus danger of driving. There is an equilibrium point (exactly like demand-supply curves) and it keeps the life valuable to live for.
interesting.
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