Vietnam: Q&A

Here's a rundown of every conversation I've had with someone I'd just been introduced to for the last like six months:

Person: So, what do you do?
me: I work nights
P: and during the day?
me: Nothing, really. . . . Well, I'm planning this trip.
P: Oh yeah? Where to?
me: Vietnam.
P: Oh, wow! That's so cool! Why Vietnam?
me: . . . It's kind of a long story . . .
[occasionally I launch in to a long story that I'm sick of telling]
P: Oh. Um, interesting.

I have a self-catalyzing tangential way of telling stories. A story often reminds of another side-story, explanation, point of interest, preface, or caveat, which in turn has its own side-stories, explanations, points of interest, prefaces, and caveats. It's kind of like a nuclear reaction. By the time the smoke clears, it's fairly rare that I've even remember what I started out to try to say, when speaking.

Anyway, without intent to bore people I've just met with my disorganized ramblings, I sort of brush off questions with brusque replies. That being said, let me explain from the top: Why Vietnam?

The Email
I've had the same email address, giles.cooper@gmail.com for, as I write this, exactly six years and ten days. Google Mail's spam filters are the best I've ever seen. They regularly filter out the vast majority of junk mail, and almost never send good emails to the junk directory. I mean, it's not like I don't ever get junk mail in my inbox, it's just super-rare. Like this one time two or three years ago, I got an email from someone from a travel agency complaining about some American IT guy blowing up computers at the Australian Chamber of Commerce in Vietnam. I skipped over it without a further though.

Then a few months later, I got another isolated random email, containing just a rave flyer (click for full-size):

I was thinking, wow, that's pretty cool. I guess I got on some mailing list for working at The Red Door or something. Cool art, exotic locale. Too bad it's on a Saturday; I have to work that night. Also, Vietnam is the exact opposite side of the world from Portsmouth (by longitude). I somedays can't even get it together to put pants on and leave my house. I tossed it in the back of my mind and carried on about my day. I mean, seriously, Vietnam? That's really far away. Also I think there was a war there or something. Anyway, I archived the email and didn't think much more about it. That is, other than a lingering desire to get out of this stifling festerpool of a crapopolis that is Portsmouth, New Hampshire. And I say that in the most affectionate way possible.

Another month or two later I logged in to check my email to find a barrage of emails asking me for help securing lodging at a four-star hotel in hanoi for several DJs and electronic music acts like Girl Talk, Ratatat, and The Handsome Furs. At this point I began to realize that perhaps there was some kind of email mix-up. I checked back in the conversation threads and found that there is apparently a New Zealander, Giles Cooper who has this gig, Club for Art and Music Appreciation which has a yearly Hanoi International Music Festival. Apparently people were forgetting his email address had a number in it or something and were sending emails to me. I forwarded him all the emails and let him know.

Which Got Me Thinking

How all that became me deciding to go, I'm not sure. I guess it's just time. That restless mid-20's see-something-before-you're-too-old instinct, I suppose. I like to joke that I'm planning a Talented Mr. Ripley scenario. But, seriously. I think it started with a masochistic urge to ride my bike farther than I had ever imagined, till I was sick and tired and starving and in a place where I could not communicate with anyone. Vietnam seems a good a place as any.

I've read a ton about Vietnam. I've learned how to say tôi không hiểu tiếng việt. Kind of. People are eager to impart wisdom such as "they like Americans" and "don't dig up any metal things you see sticking out of the ground in the middle of the jungle" and "bring some spare tubes for your bike." Hmph. My only real concern about physical danger in Asia is getting tagged by a car or motorbike in traffic. I've got a helmet and a first aid kit though, and I understand how the traffic food chain works in developing nations.

So there you have it.

Any questions?

Holidaze

I still have persistent coughs and headaches from whatever made me sick there last week, so I am going about in a bit of a haze. That's not a drastic difference from my regular operating state though, so, yeah.

It is now just one month until I go to Vietnam. I haven't been biking much lately, so I am a little nervous about what, exactly, I am doing here. I guess part of the reason I am going is to thrash myself a bit. In other words, to put myself out there with a task that might be impossible and without failure as an option. Suppose I am unable to push myself the third consecutive day of cycling 150+ kilometers? I've done that much in one day, before--once or twice. It's really just a matter of persistence, I think. Get on the bike and slug it out until you reach your destination or you pass out from exhaustion.

Of course preparation is part of it. I am definitely going to be bringing a large supply of whatever sport drink powder. Maybe someone reading this can recommend a specific one. I've had good experiences with Accelerade, but then again I've also had great experiences with Coca-Cola. In a brief Google search just now I found one from Hammer called "Perpetuem" which has a nice ring to it, too. Given that, I don't expect to be taking out the 'passing out' option.

So I guess I'll survive the endurance cycling aspect of this trip. I still need to work out the exact specifics of my itinerary, but basically I'll be flying in to Hanoi, then making my way down to Hue (it's pronounced something like "hwey") where I'll spend Tet, which is similar to Chinese New Year. After that, I'm going to push on a little farther to Hoi An, maybe get a suit tailored. After that I'll take a train back to Hanoi, a plane back home. Travelling during Tet can be difficult; everyone travels home, so booking accommodation in advance is a must. I am picturing a scenario where I go from inn to inn, finding that they are all full, and ending up stumbling dead-tired in to some barn and passing out in a manger.

So, yeah. I find myself launching headlong in to the unknown.

Gear: Delta Airzound bicycle horn

I have not heard much pleasant said about Vietnam's traffic patterns and driving. However, I can't say much for the drivers around here in the United States, either. Several times, I've been very nearly hit by people that were talking on their cell phones and drinking a coffee with one hand while eating a slice of pizza and beating their children in the back seat with the other. People just aren't looking at what they are doing. That's the primary problem with cars. They are little rooms that people hang out in. And with vehicle safety the way it is these days, as long as you're wearing a seatbelt, you're pretty much going to walk away from any traffic accident with only scratches. There isn't much incentive to know what's going on outside your little world. And anyway, bicycles and the people on them are just an impediment to the soccer practice or rabid consumerism or wherever it is you are driving your minivan full of brats.

Enter the Delta Airzound bike horn. As much as I loved my old Honka-Hoota, it was purely for amusement purposes--it did not have the stopping power of nearly 120 decibels. If you have ever stood on the end of the runway as a jumbo jet took off, that is what 120 decibels sounds like. I have used this horn to success on my bicycle many times. People insistently merge in to me, or try to cut me off, or are just generally unaware of what is going on outside of their cockpit. A simple blast from the Airzound informs them, WRONG!, like the buzzing of a gameshow's incorrect answer. It's louder than a car's horn and much more shrill. It gives me pleasure (and a small amount of guilt, but mostly pleasure) to see someone jerk their steering wheel to the side, with a "holy crap!" of bestartlement as they are awoken from their daze by the shrill blast of aural justice. The speed limit is 15 dude. This lane is mine. I am passing you. Get over it.

Anyway, here's how it works. There's a bottle of compressed air which attaches via a tube to the handlebar-mounted horn. I have my bottle in a third, under-the-down tube cage, but it comes with a velcro thing so you can strap it on wherever without having to use up a bottle cage. The air is compressed, so you press a button on the handlebar part and it unleashes 120dB of bicycle justice, as long as there is air in the bottle. There's also a little volume knob, if 120 is 'too much justice' but I always keep it on full blast. Once the air runs out, you can refill it using any bike pump. I keep forgetting the 'maximum recommended pressure' to refill it but I keep upping whatever number I thought it was last time by five or ten "just to be sure." Anyway, the higher the pressure, the louder the horn, so bring it on.

Anyway, having a good bicycle horn is, I believe, going to be pretty key in Vietnam. The usage of the horn is going to be completely different. Here, I wait until something bad is about to happen to use it, or I use it for your typical American 'revenge honk', as to dutifully inform the traffical offender that they are an asshole. If Hanoi is anything like Santo Domingo, then they proper horn usage will be a fairly constant strobing effect. Just fire it off as you dive in to an intersection, because you know no one is looking. The horn's meaning is "I am coming through, and I'm not stopping." This falls in line with the food chain. The right-of-way is ordered directly by total weight. Pedestrians yield to bicycles yield to motorbikes yield to cars yield to buses yield to trucks yield to tanks yield to American B-52's. (What, too soon?) This is contrasted to in the United States, where I self-righteously claim the full extent of my equal right to the road.

Well, we'll see. It should be interesting. Getting used to the traffic patterns of Vietnam will be an experience, for sure. The least I can hope for is that my horn will be read as "I don't know what I am doing. Please don't kill me."

Touring Equipment: Arkel T-42 Panniers

Okay. I got the bike, I got the best bike rack. The next logical step for a bicycle touring setup is the bags, which are called panniers when they are on a bicycle, for whatever reason. My approach to buying cycling equipment is to do research on my own, online, then go to the local bike shop to buy. This is as opposed to the obnoxious habit that some people have, which is to spend the bike shop sales guys' time with questions, then buy equipment online. With that in mind, I scoured the internet for best option for panniers, and everything came back to the same Canadian manufacturer, Arkel. It happened that Bicycle Bob's was one of their vendors, so I went there to order them.

They had quite a few options, but I ended up going with the T-42's. The Arkel T-42 is so-called because the pair has a total capacity of 42 liters, or 42 litres for my Commonwealth readers. That's not to say that you can put five gallons of water in each bag. Also, some nerds might point out that 42 liters of water would weigh about 84 pounds, which is more than the 60-pound capacity old man mountain bicycle rack which they will attached to. The T-42's are billed as being for "weekend touring", while my trip is for an entire month. The next larger pannier, though, had a thing to carry a tent, and a detachable fanny pack. I'm not camping, and if you're thinking I'll get caught dead wearing a fanny pack, you are gravely mistaken.

Here's what the pair of panniers looks like empty and off the bike. The Arkel site shows them individually, over-stuffed, and off the bicycle. As you can see from the picture here, these saddle bags have reflectors on the side and rear. That isn't photoshopped or anything, that's just from the camera's flash! They also have a few cool features that make them great. Without getting too much in to the website's copy which you can read for yourself, they have good features like ease-of-access zippers and really sturdy tear-proof fabric.

A couple people have asked me about front panniers. No thank you. I am entirely uninterested in having weird awkward weight on my front wheel. So far I've used my bags for groceries a few times, and having like 30 pounds sitting underneath my center of balance is weird enough. I can't imagine having to swing more weight around every time I wanted to make a turn. Forty-two liters of capacity will be more than enough to carry the few things I'll be bringing.

Touring Equipment: Old Man Mountain RedRock Rear Rack

So I was thinking about exactly what equipment I'm going to need for a bicycle touring adventure through southeast Asia. Adventure. I don't really like that word. It sounds ~fun~. I am not doing this for fun, I'm doing it for the physical brutality that my body will endure cycling a hundred miles or more a day, and the mental duress and loneliness of being in the farthest place possible from home, in a country where no one even speaks the same language. It's just something that a man in his mid-20's needs to do, to break out of . . . whatever. We're here to talk about equipment, not the philosophy of a quarter-life crisis.

So, the first thing I guess I need is a bicycle. I've got that, my Fuchikoma. I guess the next thing is a rack. I did a bit of comparison shopping, read a whole lot of touring sites, and I came up with with the Old Man Mountain RedRock rear rack. I guess you're supposed to try to say that ten times fast, or something.

There's a picture of it that I got off the site. I can't be bothered to show it on the bike at this exact moment but I'll show you before I go. This is the most highly recommended rear rack that I've found, and every time I show it off to seasoned touring veterans they whistle with appreciation. My theory on matters in which I don't know what the hell I am doing, is to exhaustively research before I dive in. In other words, it is better to spend 10 days online reading forums and sites and spend $50 on a rack, then to spend 10 minutes, spend who-knows how-much, and get some piece of crap that screams "newbie".

On the other hand, please don't mistake me for someone who knows what they are doing.

So the deal with this rack is that is has all the specific attachments that my bike was built for, in other words it bolts to the frame which was designed to take a rack. Other racks connect to the rear skewer and/or brake bolty-things. I guess this one can too, depending on how you set it up. Whatever, it was a good fit. The Old Man Mountain RedRock is specced to hold up to sixty pounds, which is the highest of any of their racks. Also the copy on their website said, "When someone tells us they're headed around the world, this is what we reach for", which was pretty much all I needed to hear.

Anyway, I've got a bike and a rack. Up next (Wednesday): Panniers! (also knows as "bags")

Return of the Jedi

Ah. Ah ha. Yes. Cycling.

Citing a lack of funding, I have retired from racing. Maintaining equipment and paying for registrations and licensing and all that is not worth it for me, ITTET. Anyway my focus and interest in racing faded. Maybe it was the two forced weeks off the bike while out of the country. Maybe it was the distraction of the last eight months. Maybe it was the group rides in the fall got ridiculous--ignorant and aggressive police backing up ignorant and aggressive drivers made it not worthwhile to ride in groups. Further, the same cast of characters would show up and totally miss the point of a particular ride. Anyway, those are my excuses. Also my race bike got damaged in an car-versus-Giles accident.

I don't think that anyone who doesn't ride with me has noticed that I am not 'really' riding. I still have my Fuchikoma which I ride every day to work and on errands and all that crap. At least twice a week, someone wants to talk to me about bikes, or ask me about what bicycle to buy, or show me their bike. Twice this month people have inquired about my blog stickers which are still on every sign post within a ten-mile radius.

Well, whatever. Once again, distractions aside, here I am. The "well I don't really write or ride any more" thing was getting kind of boring. See, that's what I do, I get bored and change my mind.

So I think I've told everyone about this, but let me publicly announce now that I am going on a month-long bicycle tour of Vietnam, in February. In the coming months, on the blog I'll be writing about the process of preparing for the trip, equipment, all that stuff. Enjoy.

Touring Bicycle: Long Haul Trucker

Rohan is a great bike. Fast, light, carbon, all that. But he doesn't do it all. He's a he now, by the way. He's like a Porsche--very nice and can effectively do most of the things you need to do. But still, if you're going to drive across the country, you're probably better off with something else. Something more comfortable, and more rugged.

I don't go around buying bikes willy-nilly. I don't have the capital for that sort of thing. I hem and haw at the prospect of buying anything quite a bit. Or, it might be taken as hemming and hawing, I call it deliberation. I'll exhaustively research the options. If I can't find the perfection option--I won't do it. With this in mind, I inquired at the various bike shops about touring bike options. I had decided that I wanted a touring bicycle, because it's part of my Master Plan. So I took in a lot of anecdotal evidence from friendly mechanics and riders, as well as the internet, before making a few bids on eBay which didn't pan out.

Eventually I settled on the Surly Long Haul Trucker (2009) in Olive Green. The other color option was "truckachino" which could have as easily been called "canine santorum" because it was really that ugly.

Anyway, according to the Surly website, the only [decent] official Surly dealer in the Seacoast area just happened to be at Wheel Power Bicycle in Exeter NH. This is good news, because they are known for their friendly, reliable, and prompt service. So I put in an order for a 58cm Surly Long Haul Trucker, and there you have it. It's nice. It looks nice. I haven't taken it on a major (50+ mile) ride yet, but I'll let you know as soon as I do.

Check out this picture of the bicycle's front end. Those chrome spacers and stem look pretty cool. I kept the chrome look going with stainless steel bottle cages, too. In the bottom right you can see the SL-BS77 Shimano Dura-Ace bar-end shifter. These are supposed to be uber-reliable. Since the brakes and the shifters are seperate units, there's fewer things that can go wrong, which is good when you are 8,700 miles from home. And even then it's "easy" to fix.

Here's a shot from behind. The Tektro Oryx cantilever brakes are easier to clean and maintain than caliper brakes. These cantilever brakes have a good reach, so there's room for fat tires, a fender, et cetera. The tires are 700x37c Continental Travel Contact, which are pretty heavy duty. They roll easily over gravel and some sand, and I guess are really puncture resistant.

Anyway, there you have it. Now I have a bike that's not for racing. I have not named this bicycle yet. I am leaning towards Uchikoma right now, after the now-disassembled Tachikoma. The uchikomans were the ghostless AI tanks that replaced the tachikomans after they were destroyed, so the name will do, until it tells me its name.

uchikoma