• Home
• About CanCan
• Contact
• PR Submissions

Fun With Parking

Last night I had the pleasure of going on a “mom’s night out” with one of my mommy friends here in Vientiane, Laos. We went out to a Creperie, because I told the other mom to pick a “chick place” that she likes but that would make her husband roll his eyes if she suggested it for a family meal. She chose well.

I actually ate before I went out because I’m cheap like that, and that way I could be satisfied by ordering the cheapest thing on the menu. But it wasn’t really the food that we were excited about; it was just nice to have time for a real grown-up conversation without having to break in mid-sentence in order to sprint away and prevent a toddler from diving down some stairs or something.

We talked for about two hours, and we left the restaurant with just enough time for me to get home and be of use in putting the children to sleep.

But when I got to my car, a grim scene greeted me:

Some LOSER and parked at a diagonal leaving me with very little room to back out.

My friend, who is obviously a bit more outgoing than I am, went in to two neighboring buildings and first asked a large group of Hmong men if they could PUSH the SUV out of my way.

They said no, but they did all gather around to see what I would decide to do.

I rolled my driver’s side window down so that I could stick my head out and hopefully not crunch into the car behind me or to my left.

The random men who had convened for the spectacle were smoking some really stinky cheap cigarettes and also shouting tips and directions at me in a language that I didn’t understand.

One tall, thin man with a cigarette stuck to his upper lip kept slapping me on the arm and and telling me to turn the wheel this way and that; when I would start to move a little bit he would say, “HOY! HOYYYY!!!”

So then I would put on the break because the, “HOYYY HOYYYY!” sounded pretty urgent, and I don’t speak Hmong but I thought maybe it meant, “STOP!!! FOR THE LOVE OF PETE!!!”

After this exchange repeated itself like 15 times, and the slapping on the arm and everything, I realized that “HOY!!!!” was some kind of encouragement like, “Yeah! Keep going, you got it!” But it was delivered with such enthusiasm that I was afraid of impending doom, of a bumper crunching related nature.

I was feeling pretty hopeless and turned the car off for a while. “Hoy” and his friends relaxed and smoked some more, sitting on the parking barrier facing the hood of my car.

My mommy friend decided to go to another random restaurant and ask if the car owner was in there. They weren’t, but one waitress thought, “Hey, maybe that group of Hmong guys can push it out of the way!”

We were like, “Yeah we thought of that.”

Anyway, I collected my wits, and gave it a second try, and finally Hoy and I managed to complete a WAY more than 3-point maneuver, and I was free!

I waved my thanks to Hoy and happily drove home.

Thanks, Hoy.

It’s hard to explain when I asked WHY I enjoy traveling in Asia so much. It’s little things like this; how a minor inconvenience can turn into something of an adventure.

I try to enjoy these things; to live in the moment and not be frustrated by “wasted time” or things not happening when and how I think they should.

That is what Asia has taught me.

That is what I love about being a stranger in a strange land.

*Don’t you think stories like this would be more awesome if I won a Flip Video? Yeah. Me too.*

Submit Article: Digg | Google Bookmarks | Add to Technorati Favorites | kirtsy | Stumble It! | Del.icio.us

Comments