I went to the hospital here in Nha Trang today and, contrary to popular opinion and the hopes of people all around the world, am not about not die. Just yet.
I have been somewhat ill - let me be a little precise, please swallow your food and leave the table if you are eating (a room with a comfy chair in close proximity to a bathroom would be ideal); I have been unendingly, unnervingly and VERY explosively supplying the toilets of Southern Asia with a substance too coarse even for me to detail, but it has not been pretty nor audibly pleasing to anyone less than 30 feet from ground zero, and the shades of colour seemingly available to my colon would put a Dulux swatch chart to shame. This has been the state of play for almost 5 months now.

Call me stupid (many do), but I didn't get it sorted out immediately, mainly for fear of paying hugely inflated overseas medical costs that I simply could not have argued with (something to do with the title there, you'll have to wait a paragraph or two for me to get to the point.. ;) ) and as such this was about the one and only time in my life I will ever honestly sink to me knees and thank Him; the good lord Chuck Norris; for the NHS, even if only for you folks back home.
Then I cursed him a little (forgive me Chuck, for I have sinned...) for not roundhouse-kicking the poison out of my belly - but I'm sure he could, of course He could, he's just busy answering all the other, more deserving prayers I'm sure. I have Faith in The Norris. My bumper sticker is a high-kicking bearded stickman.

The other reason I'd not sanitised my intestines yet was that I didn't trust foreign doctors - nothing wrong with that, I only trust ONE doctor who is my GP and a wonderful credit to her practice (the others there are all charmless, creepy old men who probably just wanted to be gynaecologists...) but I really didn't fancy foreign hospitals either, what with the daily gruesome motorcycle crashes brought in from every town and city, and the risk of diseases that my poor little Western immune system would just crumble into dust at the first taste thereof.

Even still, 5 months is a long time to feel constantly ill, often be unable to go out with all the other young things and party, and to be daily expelling the Devil's leftovers from one's backside up to a dozen times a day but strangely, I didn't even sort it out after a couple of weeks nor even after the first, second, third etc. months. I left it until now.

But here's a funny story.

Turns out that in return for $11.50 US - a mere £6 Pounds and 75pence - I can cure myself of this evil in 5 days, consuming no more than 36 different medications (not joke), none of which - and this is the very best part - none of them actually taste that bad.
The old colonial experience in Africa has indeed been cured from the bowels of history; please invent your own bowel curing joke here for there are just too many for me to pick one.

Anyway I should be right as rain (god I miss the English rain, I really do. But hey - monsoon begins here in a week or two!) by Monday at the latest, either that or I'm gonna go back to the hospital and put a gurney somewhere private and personal enough for a proper diagnosis ;)

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But the point here, as you can guess from the title is English. The language, that is, not the constant state of being rained on or the apparent inability to flavour food of any kind, in any way at all, as American and French people keep reminding me.

No I have a small beef with the people of SouthEast Asia. Only a small one, and only a certain minority group (they seem to be taking over the very streets, mind you) and that is, yes, our old friends the taxi drivers. Now over here they are moto riders - a licensed (very occasioanally you see one who might have seen a license anyway, once, as a sort of a passing glance) motorbike who gives you a pillion ride to wherever you want to go, then laughs at you when you start haggling over price.
Now, one thing about India and Thailand and Laos is that they understand haggling - you can never push it too far with taxi drivers of course, they are a seperate breed - but you can always knock the asking price down a bit if it's about fair, and if you know you're being overcharged you can have some often entertaining banter and get it down even lower than the right rate if they seem to like you. Basically they are just trying it on - and the Indians, I have to say, are much nicer about it all and more inclined to be fair in the first place than anywhere else I've been.

Cambodia just never quite got it - neither has Vietnam from the very little I have seen so far, just hasn't got it at all. You know the rough price but they give you something 4 times that (!!) as an opener, then either a) you joke and give them one tenth figure of that back with a smile, b) ask the rough proper figure and stick to your guns, or c) walk away.
But these guys have a d) they knock off about a quarter of their first offering, making you only a sucker by a factor of 3 if you accept it, then when you walk off they just laugh, and laugh, and laugh.
There are always groups of them too, you only ever get a fair price, or something approaching it, with a lone taxi/moto man.
Remember this if you come to Vietnam or Cambodia: THEY GROUP TOGETHER TO GANG UP ON YOU, all they do is reinforce the price, say "that's fair price" or laugh and look at each other, or say "well I charge you (X amount + 20%) you want" or any other number of tricks.

The sad thing is, these guys can afford to laugh away a bunch of people like me and Greg every day because all they need is one or two tan-less guys straight from the border or the airport, and they don't have to even go to work tomorrow.

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The thing that really annoys me, and it really annoys me, though is how they hail you - you think you hail taxis, but they've got other ideas.
I started this little piece off feeling pretty funny, but now it's got me a bit pissed off and I have less mirthsome material for you just until I finish. Do not worry, it shall not take too much of your time :)

And anyway, I just wrote another piece all about something really dear to me heart at the same time, and want to get this finished and both of them posted, so: I have a basic little list of how I think we all feel in the UK, and even something about the Americans, when it comes to these guys;

You are walking along a street in a tourist town, you expect people to offer you stuff: yes, yes, no thank you, no a stuffed alligator really isn't my thing, no I don't like dog meat in batter thanks, oh that's nice did you grow it yourself? yes, yes that's just great, yes I have seen children before yours are just lovely, no, yes, no we're not going into this bar mate they had THREE dogs yesterday, oh great some rotten fruit how nice, no I'm fine for cheap shirts right now but thank you, yours do look cheaper than most, oh sir I think you have a leg missing no I'm sorry this doesn't mean you can have my wallet, etc. etc.

None of which involved taxis, the sharper-eyed among you may have noticed.
This is because they form a constant background chatter - like the radiation left over from the big bang they needed to explain those cosmic theories but infinitely more pervasive and annoying. Regular radiation of the "dear god my arm's become a leatherette settee" would be better.

Tell me if you think this is about right for you, it's just bang on the nose for me, when it comes to thing strangers shout at you from across the street (they can spot a tourist at three hundred and fifty paces and smell foreign sweat on a beach, I am told):

"oi!" is very rude, from a stranger, if not anyone.
"hey!" is rude - unless someone wants to help.
"hey excuse me" isn't hard to learn but I have NEVER heard it from the moto guys :(

"hey!" is cool to americans however, to and from total strangers it will receive a warm response; the culture in most places State-side is far friendlier and more open than ours, so this is common - as is asking questions of strangers without an "excuse me" or an "sorry, but could I possibly..." but I like it once you get that they ALL do it - it's direct and saves time, and there is always a thanks at the end.

"you!" is extremely rude to call to a stranger though. Extremely.
They want to rip you off - and are basically saying: "You! You!! Give me your money!!!"

I'd give them a size 10 up the arsehole...

"hey you!" is less offensive by about the same fraction as I'd give them if it came to my court testimony sending them to prison, but unless they wanna actually help...

"You! Tourist!" is second to worst of what I have had thrown at me so far, it is derogatory and unseemly and overtly greedy and, well just how very terribly beastly of them!
However...

Some of them, the ones who, for example, do not know that Greg is Thai kickboxer and accomplished stickfighter and generally not a good guy to make angry (he sometimes turns green and his shorts go purple), or that I, reserved and enlightened and benign as I am (*giggles*) still contain within me a source of rage that, if provoked, might just make people's eyes bleed from across the room, well one of these clever sods might come right up to you and say:

"You!! You!! Where your hotel? Your hotel which one?!! You take my taxi now!" and then - this is the thing - grabs your arm in a grip of brass and drags you INTO the fucking road and across to his moto or tuk-tuk or whatever.
You understand, I was simply walking into the town looking for dinner. He wanted to drive me back where I came from - completely unsolicited - inevitably try and charge me a fortune for it, but to start with he'd have like a little risking of my life by pulling me into moving traffic to get to his goddamned contraption.

I saw in a flash of reserved, benign enlightenment that my obvious solution was to knock his fucking teeth out, drag his unconscious body over to a side street, strip him of his wallet and empty him into the nearest full sewer - adding to the overall mass of effluent, but removing about 60 kilograms of it from the street where good, decent people have to live.
But that damn English reserve overtook my swelling muscles and verdant lustre, and I said no, and then I fucking said "sorry."

If I see him again I'm gonna ask him politely, but repeatedly, until he has to go home and then I'll stand by his house still gently calling: "Hey. Hey you. Where's your hotel buddy? Huh? Huh? Got a hotel huh buddy? Huh? Want me to take you there? Huh? Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. Until he comes down out of the window with a nice big enthusiastic leap.

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I have ranted on - I'm sorry. Basically my position on this whole language barrier thing is pretty obvious, polite and elementary.

I don't accost locals, unless asking directions or if I need serious help (like "where is the nearest establishment dedicated to the purveyance of alcohol and/or methylated spirits" ;) ) and I always learn the words for `hello` and `thank you` before I get into the country, let alone into the first street or town.
The exception for where I do not accost people - bars and restaurants obviously are full of people who speak no English but if you can't point to stuff and pay then you shouldn't be let out of your house without a crash hemet, let alone given a passport) - are hotels. Hotel staff are trained in enough basic english for your guest needs, they are always very polite if they can't get what you mean when you try to gesticulate the need for a parcel to be signed for at their hotel, some more towels in the room, the price and timescale of laundry possibilities (if any) and perhaps whether there is somewhere you could exercise your pet manatee, but I only ever try that last one for fun late at night when I come in drunk.

Whatever though: The Golden Rule of Travelling: Always learn the local words for "thank you" use it often, and mean it.
A little wai (hands together-head bow, show of respect all around Asia) never hurts either.