Many people in my country –Vietnam - travel from city to city by bus. I did not have experience but I heard a lot in the media that there is much violence on the buses which pick up customers along the roads. For example, during their trip, they could be forced to have meals at the stores with very unreasonable high prices, and there was one person died because he resisted that force and was beaten. So everyone received the advice that it was safer for them to catch the bus in the bus station.
“Vietnam bus in highlands”
bowelcancer.org
The story below, “A trip”, reflected a dark part in Vietnam today. Actually, this is not my own story. The author’s name is Me Thanh Thuan. He wrote this story to join in the online “The window of the soul” contest. I translated it from Vietnamese. It made me impressed because it put me into a hard situation to figure out a solution.
“I stepped up the bus under the sun of noon. On the bus, there are still many vacancies. I sat at the same side with a ten year old boy – I guess. The boy looked innocent and active.
Because the bus just had a few customers, the driver did not want to run the bus. He drove two or three rounds along the Binh Phuoc corner. Finally, the bus ran after having one more customer – a woman about fifty. This woman also sat at the side with the boy and me. The boy began to speak to the woman: “Where are you going to?”
“I’m going to Buon Me Thuot. How about you?” said the woman after looking at the boy. Hearing what the woman answered, I realized and intended to tell the woman that this trip would not go to Buon Me Thuot, but Bu Dang. But at that moment, I saw the violent eye of the driver’s mate staring at all of us. So I kept silent, planed to whisper the truth to the woman after that guy turned his back.
While I was still thinking, the boy sitting with me informed the woman immediately with all his surprise and unbiased attitude: “You caught the wrong bus, this just go to Bu Dang”. The woman did not show her surprise yet, the driver’s mate struck blows at the boy’s ear and heaped abuses on him. The little boy could not understand what he did wrong, just cried because of the pain.
I felt scared and wondered what would happen to me if I made a slip of the tongue to tell the truth as the boy. I did not compose myself yet before the cruel attitude of that guy with the boy, the woman with her jangling voice asked with annoying insistence to be given money back so that she could go down and catch another trip. She did not take notice of the crying boy for his red and painful ear.
Very bad curses were uttered easily between the woman and the driver’s mate in their spat. People after silent moments for surprise began having whispers and comments. They supported neither the poor boy nor the woman who was superfluous to argue.
After all of that, I had some words of consolation and explained the reason why he was beat to the boy. He felt very sad, because in his mind, he acted for the good meaning, why he was beat. All my words seem unreasonable in the innocent eyes of a ten year old boy.
The image of the boy with his innocent eyes cleaning his tears, and the image of the hasty woman leaving from the bus before the ferocious of the driver without saying a word to the boy (who helped her) obsessed me for a long time. During the rest of the trip, I was in a divided mind and asked myself that I was really wise or not and what the boy could learn from such a lesson.
Certainly, when he grows up, maybe he will learn the relevant lesson through this trip from all of us: the inherent character of swindle and hooligan from the driver’s mate; the selfishness from the woman who was care with money instead of gratitude; from all the customers, including me, a youth, the callousness and impotence.”
