As we finished our dinner last night our driver, Quang (pronounced Quaan), who until this moment had barely said a word to us, came over to our table.
He was full of surprises! He was drunk, having enjoyed the rice whiskey from his host ‘John’ and he could speak pigeon English.
“Your family now, you come with me to Karaoke.. come on.. jus one song .. then you go bed.. come on..”
We protested and tried to excuse ourselves as we were obviously concerned our driver was drunk!
But together with Huan we crossed the road from the hotel to enter a karaoke bar.
Whatever you think you know about karaoke forget!
We were led up three flights of stairs to a private karaoke room complete with its own sound system.
The walls were all cladded in timber that were varnished, a screen on the wall presented the words to Stevie Wonder’s, I love you, whilst Quan held his gold microphone and sung to us!
At the point someone entered the room with a tray of beer, we left having expressed our concern to Huan. He assured us that Quan would not drink anymore and that the beer was only charged for if drunk.
By this morning thank goodness Quan was sober and rested.
As we drove slowly down the mountain roads we relaxed in the knowledge that we were in safe hands!
