My Next Door Neighbor

Saigon, my place of birth and hometown, is an unforgettable city which I will cherish and remember forever. The sight of tricycles leisurely rolling along had a relaxing effect on my mind. Besides these tricycles there were a variety of different vehicles ranging from bicycles and motorcycles to passenger or cargo motor tricycles. The mention of Saigon calls to mind the images of cargo and passenger tricycles.

I still dream and think of Saigon when I was still a young pupil happily going to school. This was where I learned how to walk into the world, my initial steps in life leaving a lasting impression on me. I learned how to read and write, building a strong foundation for the future. Those precious childhood memories are still remembered with fondness. Steadily as time passed I experienced and gained an ever increasing number of happy memories. The beautiful image of cute long dresses known as “áo dài”, their sides fluttering apart with each movement to appear as blooming white flowers on the streets of Phan Thanh Giản and Bà Quyện Thanh Quan.

How could I ever forget one particular neighborhood in Saigon? This was my home and also home to many cherished and hardworking neighbors. My home faced Tran Quoc Toan Street, a bustling street which was always incredibly packed with heavy traffic. This was very convenient for those people who knew how to repair the various vehicles passing by.

My next door neighbor Hai was a kind and gentle man. He was a longtime mechanic with well over a decade of experience and knowledge. He knew and was fully capable of repairing any vehicle both light and heavy duty such as motorcycles to big trucks that drove by. Since 1975 two and three wheeled vehicles, almost all of which did not use gasoline but were human powered such as bicycles and tricycles, became the dominant method of transportation for the people of Saigon. Those vehicles no longer needed gas because they were replaced by the blood, sweat, and tears of their drivers laboring under the blistering sun. Because of the recent regime change people and society as a whole were struck by poverty and struggled to make ends meet. As a result of this the vast majority of society either had no money to spare on gasoline or had no access to it and so went without it by resorting to human powered vehicles. The regime change altered people’s living conditions for the worse. People had to adapt to the new reality of the situation. An example of this was the new travel restrictions. Permits were needed in order to move from one area to another and to stay there overnight required another permit. There were countless more such changes and restrictions which increasingly worsened living conditions and lowered the standard of living. People strove to make a living day to day and just tried to survive.

The years after the Fall of Saigon, life had become much harsher. I imagined the nights as being significantly longer than the day, with all hope sucked out of the bright sunlit day and despair filling the night turning it into an unending nightmare. Life became increasingly more difficult to live. Feet became worn out, backs bent under the heavily increased physical workload required now that human powered devices and vehicles were an absolute necessity. This life of toil wore people’s health down because they did not have enough food to meet their daily nutritional requirements.

Bạch Liên

Dec 2^nd, 2015

Page 191 - 194 in the book

Pulau Bidong State of Mind