| INSIGHT | COLUMNS & GUIDANCE The Mitzvah Messenger by Sandy Swanson Third in a series Deported from Vietnam, alone on a plane back to Hong Kong with only Spirit and Marshall's tzedaka money tucked close to my heart, I had some decisions to make. ******** I used to be a nurse. I should know what shock looks like. But it wasn't until I sat gawking out the window at the South China Sea between Vietnam and Hong Kong that I really understood shock. Cold hands, cold feet, the pitter-patter of my heart in my mouth (which was bone dry), and the sure knowledge that my bowels could, at any moment, lose all integrity. Classic symptoms. So, I started to breathe. And with each breath reality began to replace terror. I was unharmed. The Vietnamese officials had been firm, but not mean. Who knew what combination of events, synchronicity, personalities and weather had put me in this moment. There was no reason to take any of it personally. Breathe. I was capable and intelligent. While I had trusted Dr. Ty to take care of all the arrangements and of me personally, I now needed to assume full responsibility for myself and my choices. Breathe. I had choices. My work at the moment was to acknowledge them, not to be a victim at the mercy of the Fates. I had an opportunity to truly decide which direction to go --East or West. What did it mean to me to go in each direction? What did it mean for me? I could always go West, and so I decided to try to do whatever was needed to continue East. That decided, I settled back to enjoy my breakfast, my mom's voice inside my head making me giggle out loud. "Eat whenever you can -- you never know when you'll get a chance to eat again." When we touched down, I went to the Cathay Pacific information desk and solicited the help of a gracious young woman. I told her my story, and she immediately called the Vietnamese embassy in Hong Kong. In her perfect British English and musical Chinese, she said, "Here is the address and phone number of the embassy. They said to come this afternoon. They will help you. Good Luck, Madame." Kindness. It was like a balm. I gathered my bags and took my place at Immigration once again. After being awake for 30 hours and with my adrenaline off the charts, I babbled something about how this was the very first stamp in my very first passport. The agent looked at me over the tops of his glasses, a patient smile softening his deadpan expression, then stamped my book with a flourish. In a smooth voice somewhere between Gregory Peck and Sean Connery, he said, "Welcome to Hong Kong, Madame." I sailed through customs, exchanged some money and asked about a hotel close to the airport. The clerk made a reservation for me with a hotel connected to the airport. And so I trundled myself down that walk-way, travel-grimy, exhausted, bleeding (I'd run over my foot with my luggage cart), but nearly delirious with relief. The concierge and his bellboys swept me into a lovely room and called a cab while I "refreshed myself." A little while later, sitting in the back of the cab, I found myself once again looking out a window. I gazed at the soaring mountains rising up out of the water -- lush, verdant thrusts of rock, trickling with waterfalls -- and joy leapt like a fish into my throat. I was in China! Greeting me were cloud-haloed mountains depicted in every watercolor and ink drawing ever created. The sunlight filtered through the glass and warmed my skin like it warmed the bay. I was part of this place. Okay, so I might have been hallucinating a little bit by that point. But the euphoria continued as the cabbie dropped me in front of the little office building downtown. Confidently, I mimed my intentions to the desk clerk and rode the rattling elevator to the fourth floor. And opening a door at the end of the hall, I stepped into the embassy. One small room with a glass partition between the officials and the outside, the embassy boasted a few chairs to wait in, a large desk to fill out paperwork, and one faded travel poster of Hanoi. It looked more like a place to get your driver's license renewed. But the crisp olive green uniforms with their red epaulets reminded me that appearances should not be taken for granted. I greeted the officer in my best and most polite Vietnamese, then explained my situation. His immediate frown mirrored too much the Tan Son Nhat officers' expressions, and my confidence dipped. He shook his head, flipped through the empty pages of my passport, grimaced at me, shook his head some more. Another officer entered through a side door, and I appealed to him. "Oh, yes," he said in perfect, British English. "I spoke to the Cathay Pacific agent. I can help you." He looked at my passport a moment, then said. "We can have your new visa ready by 5:00 tomorrow afternoon. You will need to have a photograph taken and brought back to us. The cost for immediate processing is $700." My knees wobbled. Seven hundred dollars was all money I had, including Marshall's tzedaka. Was I to go to Vietnam with only a $5 bill in my purse? Was I crazy? The agent watched me blanche and said quickly, "Seven hundred Hong Kong dollars. That's $100 US." An hour later, I stood again on the street, the fee paid, photographs taken and submitted. The next order of business was to arrange my flight back to Saigon, call my husband to see if he could borrow money from my parents, and call Dr. Ty at his sister's in Thu Dau Mot to let the family know I was all right and on my way to them. I stood in the humid heat, thinking, with a constant flow of people pressed around me. Above me, laundry flapped in the gusts of wind from the bay. In the street, ducks and chickens dodged bicycles and taxis. The smell of pickles and roasting meat mixed with tinny music from the teahouse next door. Young Chinese punkers with pink and orange hair chatted on their cell phones. A grandfather in a suitcoat two sizes too big allowed his tiny grand daughter to lead him by the hand while he juggled his cane and a plastic shopping bag. One young business man walked past with what I came to call the Asian Haircut -- longer on top and razor-sculpted underneath, making that thick, black hair a work of art. All this beauty, all this life -- and I would have missed it if my visa had been in order in Vietnam. I took another breath and walked down the street with them. Next: Vietnam Redux Sandy Swanson is a ministerial guide at Lake Harriet Spiritual Community, a certified Reiki practitioner and sound healer, and a student of the Mysteries. She offers: spiritual guidance; classes on healing, sound and meditation; and rituals to connect with Nature and open to the Divine. Sandy can be reached at (651) 436-1965 or sswanson@visi.com. Copyright © 2001 Sandy Swanson |
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