In Vietnam, as in many countries, bottled water was an inexpensive insurance policy against stomach upsets, and is easily bought from wherever you happen to be. While on a diving ‘side-trip’ to Nha Trang I bought two bottles of water, only one of which was used. The other, un-opened, I left behind in my hotel room having no wish to carry it aboard the plane to Saigon. I’d checked out of the hotel and was climbing into the car taking me to the airport, when a porter came running into the lobby proudly waving a bottle of water above his head and shouting at the top of his voice, “Mr David! Mr. David! You forget your water”. Hotel staff and guests stopped what they were doing to witness the drama. I smacked my forehead in feigned forgetfulness, “Ah! So I did. Thank you.”. Tipping him, I took delivery of the bottle.

During the ten minute drive to the airfield I managed to sneak it under the driver’s seat where, I hoped, it would remain until I was aboard the plane and on my way.  Four days later I received a phone call in my room at The Rex Hotel in Saigon. The guide/interpreter who had ridden in the car with me to Nha Trang airport was at reception and asking to meet with me.  As I entered the lobby he ran over, holding aloft the bottle of water and telling anybody who cared to listen that he and the driver had driven half-way around Vietnam to deliver it after I had absent-mindedly left it in their car.

“Oh, Gawd.”, I thought, as the whole scene dissolved into black-and-white. “It’s become a re-run of, ‘The Curse Of The Mummy’s Hand'”. The bloody bottle was following me. I thanked him half-heartedly, tipped him and, taking possession of the bottle – again – returned to my room. Ripping the cap from the bottle I poured the contents into the toilet bowl and flushed it – twice – before hiding the now empty, and hopefully useless, bottle beneath a pile of papers in the rubbish bin.

Several months later, I received a ‘phone call from the Sydney office of the travel company that I’d used – run by a former Vietnam veteran – saying that they’d received a parcel from Vietnam addressed for my attention. Telling them that if it ticked to put it in a bucket of water, I waited a few days before collecting the parcel. On opening it in their offices, I discovered …. (See pic.)

(It subsequently transpired that the Travel Agent – on a fact-finding trip to Vietnam and finding himself with time on his hands –  recalled the story that I’d recounted on my post-trip debrief and decided to add to the story and, not having my address to hand, arranged for the parcel to be posted to me care of his office.) 

It did help reinforce the fact that water’s not that cheap … and deserving of more care than we presently give it.

—ENDS—