I'd been lucky so far. The extent of my health woes had been limited to food poisoning and a minor head injury up Everest, the bamboo swing impact to the ribs in Laos, and my unfortunate leap into a puddle of steaming sewage to escape a rat in Chiang Mai. I'd even survived India pretty much unscathed. It of course couldn't last and suddenly it all went very wrong in Sapa, North Vietnam. Moving on from Halong Bay, I was at least able to enjoy a couple of days in the pleasant green mountainous surroundings up north and pottered off on my own for some short treks to avoid all the tourists. I also had enough time to make another new friend, Ho Chi Minh himself, who took me to one side in his restaurant and plied me with his home brewed plum wine before taking 2 excrutiating hours to destroy me piece by piece at chess.
The next day I woke up to what was about to be the most painful, depressing and soul destroying week I can ever remember. I couldn't move, every muscle and limb was in agony, and I was permanently dizzy. I spent the next 2 days in bed wondering if this Tropical Mega Flu might actually be malaria and was currently in the process of killing me. My head was burning up with fever whilst my hands and feet were numb with cold. Any movement caused considerable pain, and trying to sit up caused more dizziness to the point of vomiting. After 2 failed attempts to walk down the street without stumbling to the floor, it wasn't looking good. I was in the mountains, a day from Hanoi, with something obviously very wrong, and no such thing as a doctor anywhere to be found. The friendly folk in my guest house were getting more and more concerned and eventually sent for "The Medicine Lady". The kind little dear spent an afternoon rubbing hot ginger wine all over my body in an attempt to cure me. It didn't work, and I got worse...
My only option was to drag myself back to hospital in Hanoi, and so began the most unpleasant of journeys. The bus ride back out of the mountains should have been scenic and pleasant, but keeping my eyes closed and repeating "don't throw up, don't throw up" over and over again to myself, I didn't see a great deal. The bus ride survived, I was still only halfway back. Worried locals guided, pushed and helped me along the streets whilst giving me eucalyptus oil until I reached the station in Lao Cai. I staggered in at 9pm exhausted, thinking only of the sleeper carriage that awaited me. The perfect time then to get THROWN OFF ANOTHER F#$%?&G TRAIN! Some sort of all too familiar ticketing blunder during peak tourist season left me once again staring from the platform as my fully booked train disappeared into the night. I could do no more. I couldn't walk any further, I couldn't lift my bags, and I could only muster "very sick, Hanoi" to the guard. Fortunately, fearing a medical emergency on his platform, the little hero pulled a few strings and got me on the next train later that night and I finally dragged myself back into a Hanoi guest house at 6am the next morning to promptly fall asleep on their reception floor for 2 hours until Alex the friendly Spaniard re-appeared and helped me to a room.
Hanoi hospital could neither confirm or deny anything and diagnosed me with "some sort of tropical virus". They gave me enough medicine to fill a large cabinet and told me not to leave the city for 3 days. No risk of that as I spent the next 5 days in bed experiencing Fever Day, Vomiting Day, Total Body Pain Day, Dizzy Day and Migraine Day. The list went on and after ticking just about every symptom off the list, I finally turned the corner and began the (very...) long road back to reasonable health.
Once able to survive the heat again, I needed to make up time fast. A whirlwind day in Hanoi finished with an entertaining water puppet show and began with my favourite activity - visiting the embalmed body of Ho Chi Minh. It was quite an experience looking at the body of one of the 20th century's most well known political figures, but rather worryingly, despite being dead for 40 years, the old chap looked a lot healthier than I did...
It was time to hit the road again, and despite being far from healthy, I got back on a bus to head south.
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