Asian Remedies

'One dollar madam, one dollar, please madam, buy picture', the lady in the Vietnamese hat shouted as I ran off the floating restaurant, avoiding to throw up in front of her. 'No, thank you' I managed to say. I felt so sick, I just steered right towards the wall to sit down and be within safe distance ofthe garden where I could hide my sickness.

Stu, Rebecca and Christine finally came out of the restaurant, so I got up to go towards them, but my body suddenly felt drained of energy. 'Oh, I think I'm going to faint, or be sick,no, faint AND be sick, right here right now', I thoughtto myself. 'One dollar, madam, one dollar, sir, please buy picture', I heard from far off . Suddenly I felt the colour vanish from my face, my lips, I managed to just sit down and the lady in the Vietnamese hat came rushing towards me, changing her tone completely. 'Sit, sit, sit!' she ordred, 'oh, oh, oooooooooohhhhhh'. Another Vietnamese hat came running towards me, then a boy, both panicking. The boy came up withan nlighing idea, it semed: 'Wait, oh, wait here', he ran off towards his boat, I imagined to get a sick bag.
I was about to be sick, right there, right then, in front of all these people watching me from above me. The boy came back, holding a small bottle with green liquid in his hands: 'Very good, very good, American!' he proclaimed, proudly. Well, if it's American, it must be good... (surprising you trust them, given your history).
The first woman in the Vietnamese hat took the bottle and rubbed some of the liquid under my nose. Another woman appeared, took the bottle and rubbed it on my chest, shouting something in Vietnamese. The boy interrupted: 'Temples, on temples' and put the stuff onto my temples, while the first one was still rubbing my chest, harder now, as if to affirm her authority. I couldn't move, my chest was all red from the rubbing , I still felt weak, but a little further away from fainting than before. Yet another woman arrived, proclaimed that one must rub it where it hurts, lifted up my T-Shirt (thank god I'm not the shy type) and rubbd it as hard as she could onto my tummy, so hard, I thought I was going to be sick again, she was pushing it all up, erggghh, I wobbled, looked right and left for support. Suddenly, the first woman changed her strategy, seeing that the colour in my face was draining again, and started pinching me between my eyes. One rubbing my tummy, one rubbing my chest, the other one piching the thin skin between my eyes...you can't say that the Vietnamese are not helpful when it comes to ill people. Finally, I heard Stuart saying in a friendly, but confused way: 'Ehm, thank you, she, she'll be okay, thank you, Oh my god, thank you,yes, I think she'll be fine now.' I tried to get up, held Stuart's arm, walking off with a following behind me.

Believe me, I was back to my senses, my chest was all red and ached from the rubbing and the skin between my eyes was red and swollen for days afterwards. If ever I worried about the hair growing there, I needn't anymore...