Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Baby Jesus could get the ostrich to poop.

Oh the pressure!

So many people responded to my last post that now I feel like I ought to deliver some wonderful juicy piece of trashy gossip for you all - but all I've got is this:

 This is what happens when you call an ostrich an emu to its face.

As Martin says in the video below, nice ostrich - but they need to do something about the top of the fence.


Ostrich really do look like big drag queen dinosaurs.  This guy has nearly sliced his own jugular on that chicken wire.

And also, I give you this: 
 This video is especially for my brothers,
who didn't really believe me when I told them
I drove a motorbike up a blustery mountainside on Xmas day.  

We went to Con Dao Island. For those following along at home: Con Dao is a little speck off the Southeast Coast of Vietnam.  It's about a 45 minute flight from Ho Chi Minh city and populated mostly with stray dogs and foreigners learning to ride motorcycles.  The government there have spent a decent bit on roading - all the better to teach the tays on.  The roads are weird though, because there is what appears to be a whole set of city blocks -grid type thing- with no buildings between them.  Just the grid of streets.  For the tays to practice intersections at, I suppose.

At one intersection I got stared down by a traffic cop across the way.  I grinned my biggest grin and stayed put until he'd passed me.  I could tell he was thinking that he could probably get 20 bucks out of me for having no license - but that he'd need to speak English first, and maybe that was a bridge too far.  This time.

I was more worried about starting with him watching.  You know how when you're learning how to ride a bike you tend to be a bit bit wobbly until you get some speed up.  Turns out it's true for motorcycles too.

Other wobbly moments include going around corners, being pointed at by laughing children, and when your $2 helmet flies off your head in a gust of wind while driving (terrified) along a rocky clifftop precipice, mildly strangling you. (Now I know why Vietnamese people never do the straps up on their helmets.)

Luckily I had Mr Martin sitting on the back the whole time - there to stick his foot out when I tried to do a U-turn, or plop my helmet back on my head in case of galemergency. And pay attention to this bit, Mothers: NOBODY GOT HURT.

Not even a stray dog.


Call it a Christmas miracle!

3 comments:

  1. Does the ostrich poop for you guys? Maybe I need to fix it. IT SHOULD BE A POOPING OSTRICH!

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  2. The ostrich poop is on the ground! Think we will have to seriously worry about your driving a car next time you come home, now that you have driven a motor bike in Vietnam....

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  3. Well that's nice. Don't worry - I'll be OK on the roads in NZ - I know how to use my horn properly now.

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