Hanging With Hawkers (Nha Trang, Vietnam)

So we got to the beach yesterday and have just had a nice break from sight seeing. Nha Trang is quite beautiful and we've got a great view of the ocean from our hotel window. I wish we could stay here longer.

Anyway today we just sat on the beach doing a bunch of nothing! Well we chatted with other these other travellers that we keep following from city to city, but they're always a couple of days ahead of us. Throughout the day we keep getting approached by hawkers to buy either cigarettes, snacks, postcards, necklaces, silk paintings, t-shirts, etc, etc, etc. We normally don't buy many things because we simply don't need them. As I've said, we can't help out every single person in need, unfortunatley.

Today I think that I was able to help out in a different sort of way though. There was this one lady who had here tray of items she was trying to sell to me and all of a sudden she ducked down and said "Police!". I quickly realized that these hawkers are all subject to some kind of rent or bribery to actually solicit on the beaches. Poor women, she seemed so frightened. I kept my back to the policeman and hid her tray with my body and she gave me a look and scurried away. I then took my backpack and put it over top her tray which still didn't really disguise it. Then I noticed the cop was coming a little closer to us so I took this padded mat that goes on top of the wooden sun bathing chairs we were sitting on and covered my whole backpack and tray. I then put my legs over top of that and lay down, trying to look as though I was reclining my feet. I looked quite silly actually, but it worked, five minutes later the lady came back and thanked me for my help. She didn't continue to try and sell me anything.

I also made five new friends today, 3 young boys and 2 young girls. All of them don't go to school, instead they walk up and down the beach all day and try to sell postcards. After sunset, they then roam the streets and continue to try and sell postcards until about 8 or 9pm. I followed in the footsteps of a Canadian girl we met today, she bought them all a bag of snacks from a different hawker and we all shared them. Later on, I bought the girls a drink and in return they taught me how to count to ten in Vietnamese. Good deal I think. After that, it wasn't much of asking each other for anything, just hanging out, played some backgammon, etc.

The Canadian girl (Tu) actually tried to give one of the boys some money because she'd already boughten some postcards previously. The boy (Voung) didn't accept it and put it back in her hand. What honor. It amazes me and continues to amaze me each day I'm in Asia, these people are so poor, yet they have so much dignity and caring for each other.

Another example, the other day we were at this food stall and this young boy was begging for food. An older Aussi couple behind us kept offering him watermelon and at first he was shy in taking it, but ended up eating a couple pieces. We then gave him a piece of our chicken and he was grateful and walked off. About 10 minutes later he came back to the watermelon and had some more and the couple told he him could have the rest. He seemed quite content eating away and he looked at me and Jeremy and then offered us his last piece of watermelon. The young boy has almost nothing and yet he still has it in him to share his only food.

The life of a hawker I think is really sad, especially for the kids because they aren't getting any form of education really. Its just a big cycle of poverty because when they grow up how will they survive? That same day that we saw the watermelon boy, we walked passed this very elderly lady sqatting on the side of the street with a little coal fire making some kind of bread or pita type thing. Later on in the evening we were just sitting on the street people watching, the same lady came up to us and was trying to sell the bread that she had just slaved over. I don't know how much they were going for, but I can't imagine that they'd be worth very much. I'd like to say that I bought some from her, but the answer was 'no thanks'. We then watched her and her hunched over body slowly walk away to the next people, in order for them to either ignore her or say 'no thanks'. And again, and again...