Welcome Home

[Part 4]
My parents and I were on the flight back to Saigon. The plan: Daphne would meet us on her bike at their hotel, we would go to Bee Saigon and have some yummy fish for dinner, buy a tour to Cu Chi Tunnels for the next day, when my parents would be flying out late. Of course, you know where this is going. No writer would give out the plot in the beginning if it wasn't going to completely change before the end.
I had to pick up a new visa after we landed because my school had given me a single entry one last time, which is fine because they said they'd reimburse me for this one, too. Standing in line[a much longer wait than Hanoi for some reason] I turn on my phone, down to one bar, and call Daphne. Busy. One more person closer, I call again. Busy. One more person closer...
She picks up. Tears are on her voice. She tells me she had an accident. She tells me she has to get stitches on her chin. She tells me her friend Yen is coming to get her. She doesn't know what hospital yet. I'm almost speechless. All this and I'm technically not in the country yet. All this and I still don't have my luggage, still haven't gone through customs, still an hour away on taxi. All this and there's only one bar left on my cellphone.
In the mean time, I'm letting people pass me in line one at a time. With nothing else to really say, Daphne said she'd call me back and tell me what hospital to meet her at when Yen got there. Finally, I get to the counter, fill out the application and wait. Wait for what seems likes ages. Back when I first arrived in Vietnam, to Hanoi, I didn't even get to finish filling out my app before they handed me back my passport. Finally, they call my name and I get my passport. I walk over to customs where there's no longer a line, but get stuck there when the officers computer freezes just before finishing. The computer wakes back up and I get my red stamp. Daphne calls again, telling me that Yen wants to take her to a local hospital in D. 5. I tell her that if she's getting stitches she should go to an international hospital instead, suggesting FV in D.7 where I went, post-Cambodia. But that was too far out, so instead I gave their clinic in D.1 a call to see if they would do stitches. But the illiterate nurse that answered the phone said I should make an appointment for the next day. That was no good. Meanwhile, Daphne's still at home, waiting for Yen, and we're still in the airport, my parents asking me 10 questions a minute that I don't have the answers to.
We head for the taxi stand, where there are no reputable taxis to greet us. The first one we do see, is taken by some cripple girl in a wheel chair. Just didn't seem right to go up to her, talking about an emergency need to cut in line. We finally got a ride, heading first to their hotel and then to the yet undecided hospital. Daphne calls as we are exiting the airport and says that they picked Colombia Health Clinic in D.1. Sounds fine, until I get another call on the way. Colombia didn't have any doctors on staff[?] and they had to go to another hospital now, SOS International. So I drop off the parents at their hotel, circle the location of Bee Saigon on a map, switch phones with them to avoid running out and being stranded, and head over to SOS.
Scene: Me, walking into the small operating room, with a full camper bag on my back and an even heavier backpack on my chest. The doctors, wide eyed, 'you can't bring those into a sterile room!' So the bags get ditched in the hall and there I am, finally, at Daphne's side. As she lays on the operating table, she looks up at me and points to her chin. A sleek, clean cut opens like a mouth as she tilts her head up towards me. A cosmetic stitch was sewn from the inside, so in the end we didn't know how many she had. Her knee and foot were badly scraped as well, so the nurse had to use the antiseptic and bandage it up.
Price of everything: $330. Daphne's school was about to help her get insurance, but just a bit too late. The nurse says that the dressing needs to be changed everyday, the price of which would be $22. Poor Daphne's spirit is crushed. She had just began to feel more comfortable driving her bike. The accident itself took place only a block from the apartment while she was on her way home. Some guy in the wrong lane scraped her passing by and she hit the brakes. But the rear brake was weak and needed to be tuned, so all the stopping power went to the front wheel and she flew over her bike. The sharpness of her jaw had acted as a knife, the gravel road the cutting block, cutting open her chin from the inside. People around were helpful, and gave her cotton swabs to hold to her chin. One off duty cop drove her and her bike back to the apartment. He told her to call family. But she didn't have any to call, and I was in the clouds.
Not having insurance made the whole thing an expensive enough affair as it was. It didn't help that we were in the most overpriced hospital in town, or that Daphne had to call off work for two days[much more annoying to do when you have three different jobs to call]. The nurse there was very friendly. She provided us with some free bandages and the address of another, more reasonably priced clinic. I helped Daphne to a taxi, finally heading home. On the way I call my parents to give them an update and check in on them. They're at Bee Saigon, but instead of ordering fish, which was why I sent them there, my mom had ordered a beef dish. A decision she would come to regret. I told them that should order a tour for the Cu Chi tunnels for just the two of them, and that we'd meet up after they got back to have dinner before they left.
The next day my parents didn't go on the tour. My mom had food poisoning. On the way to SOS for a dressing change, I dropped off my keys for them so that they could check out of the hotel and hang out at our place to get some relaxation. We then go to get the dressing change which should have cost the $22 that was advertised the night before, but instead we were given a bill for $80. $80 to put on three new bandages. We told them the price quoted and refused to pay anything but. They then lowered the price to $50, we still said no but with a final price of $35 we consented, reluctantly. In Vietnam, even the hospital bills can be bargained I guess. From then on we went only to Victoria Clinic, the one recommended by the nurse from the night before, which was cleaner and only charged $15 to change dressing. I also picked up antiseptic and more bandages and did most of the cleaning and dressings myself. Keeping her knee from getting an infection was a daily affair.
We came back home and spent the rest of the afternoon resting with my parents, drinking tea and looking through pictures from the trip. Daphne took a couple of naps here and there. We went to a Chinese place nearby for dinner and late at night we said goodbye to the folks as they grabbed a taxi for the airport. We were planning to go see Avatar just then, but as we were about to leave it started to rain so we took a literal rain check for the next day.

Healing
Two days after the accident, Daphne was back at work teaching yoga. Three days after the accident, she's back on her motorbike[though we do go and get the brakes fixed]. A week later, we remove the stitches[only $15 at Victoria]. Now, her chin has healed really well, still a pink scar visible but on the underside of her chin and still healing. Her knee and foot are healed up too, no more bandages. We did try to go see Avatar the next day, but the theatre was sold out, for the next two weeks, so we had to buy a ticket in advance for the next available time which was three days ago[there's only one screen in Saigon playing Avatar in 3D and the whole city wants to go]. Daphne's still nervous every time she rides her bike, sadly getting over that will only take time but she's making good progress and is pretty good driver. Next weekend we plan on taking a trip to the Mekong Delta for Tet. Hopefully, it will be much less eventful then this last trip.