I'm keeping my fingers crossed - I have sent a lovely podcast from the BBC to my friends in Vietnam. It was about a couple of teenaged Vietnamese who became famous singers before and during the Vietnam war. The boy played the drums and he was so small he had to stand up to play them. They ended up entertaining American troops and learning all the songs from Elvis and others. Then they got into rock and roll and the boy grew his hair. The communists had banned long hair so his mother had to pay a bribe every month to get him a permit to keep his long hair. All they wanted to do was sing and make people happy. They now live in Texas. I often send Vietnam related items to my friends but sometimes they aren't able to open them on their computers so I suppose big brother is watching - just as he does everywhere else.
The two youngsters came from a big family and they were asked if they got along with the rest of their siblings. I'm glad they said they didn't always. I used to travel from Doncaster to York every day with Bill, who was in his 50s. He said that he never ever had a fight or argument with his siblings. I didn't argue but I found it unbelievable - I always had a hard time being good friends, especially with the brothers close in age. The girls were fine - I don't think I've ever fallen out with any of my sisters. Maybe it's because their temperament was more like my Mother's - taking a long time to get really angry and remembering everything. The boys are more like Dad; his temper was up and down like a helicopter whereas Mother's took off like a jumbo jet.
Fortunately, for us, when Dad was around, he'd make a growling sound if things weren't working according to plan, and that was a signal for us to disappear. We had a television long before other people because brother Brian worked in a shop that sold and fixed televisions that were out on rental. We'd get televisions in our home that had been repaired. We even had coloured tv at one point - it was a plastic kind of screen that fitted onto the television and things ended up being coloured - pale pinks, greens etc. I was fascinated with ritual and, on Sundays, there was often a very ritualistic service from a church. Dad was a diehard Communist and hated the church, its wealth and what it stood for. Watching one of these programmes was a great way to wind him up.
It was Val's last few hours in Phnom Penh so I arranged to meet her at a nearby coffee shop and to then bring her here for lunch. Her hotel was less than ten minutes walk away so I told her to turn her back to the river, walk to the main road, turn right and she'd find the coffee shop. To be polite and clever I had the bright idea to set off to meet her. It was a good thing as the pavement was under construction and cars were parked all over the place. I waited and no Val. I went up the street she should have been on but no Val. I then realised I didn't have my phone so I raced back home. With all the traffic noise I found out she couldn't hear her phone ringing. Finally, I got hold of her - she was lost. I seem to have this thing about losing guests! I go by street numbers but she kept telling me where she was in relation to certain shop names. I hadn't a clue where she was - and she was leaving for the UK in a few hours.
I learned her street number and I told her not to move. I marched up the road, phone to my ear, telling her where I was. "I see you," she said. I'd told her to walk to the main road, which to me is a four lane road. To her, as a tourist, a main road was a road with lots of traffic on it so she turned onto the first busy road she came across. She asked people for help and they kindly checked on Google but they sent her off in the wrong direction. I found this before - Asians don't like admitting they don't know - they pretend they know and so you end up even more lost. We had lunch and spent most of the time talking about travel experiences, being robbed, getting lost - all those things that make a holiday worthwhile. When it was time for her to leave I decided to take her back to her hotel as I didn't want to lose her again. I never know if I'm being disrespectful when I go back to my place and find it empty and the only person I have to look after is myself.
I was enjoying my solitude when Vuth phoned - would I help him put together a letter of support for Ratha who had just been rejected by the Australian embassy for a visa to visit the country. One of the big problems, in my mind, is the fact that the applications for visas are generally done online and so the person making the decisions can only go by what's on the paper. Ratha's just started a land brokerage company and he keeps all his money on hand so he can make quick transactions. If he'd gone in person to the embassy the staff would have seen a one hundred percent confident young man, holding two of the latest models of Samsung and Apple phones, with a very large diamond ring on his finger and wearing Clark's shoes. His wife is the manager for a big Australian English language centre and her dad has recently retired as Director of Health for another province. Unfortunately, for Ratha, he's better at talking than writing and so none of this came across in his application. It was my job to sit down for an hour or so to put together a letter explaining all of this. I've had experience with other people applying for visas so I don't hold out much hope they'll change their mind. One friend from India applied for a Canadian visa and was rejected - her money was not refunded. She went to Jamaica to attend a conference and thought she'd try again; she even got a letter of support from the Governor General - she was rejected and lost her money again. She was finally granted permission when she applied to Washington and had letters of support from various Canadian MPs and dignitaries. I wrote to the Foreign Office and the woman who wrote back said that keeping the applicant's money was a way of lowering the Canadian deficit. She left me gobsmacked!
