We visited several poor rural villages North and South. This article is a selection of some personal impressions that touched my heart, while visiting medical facilities there.

I should start by explaining my experience 4 years ago travelling by bus near the Hallow beach. We were 23 passengers and our bus collided head on with a big truck. Eight people died on the spot and I was thrown out of the bus unconscious into the road. When I recovered my senses I found myself lying in a pool of blood. The skin of my neck tore off and I still remember that I felt there was nothing doing any more. An ambulance brought me to a nearby former field hospital and performed a surgical operation without anesthesia to join the skin of my neck and head, in an operations room that lacked most basic medical facilities. I have to give thanks to have been able to bear the pain of the operation without anesthesia because the center of my nerves had become insensible. Thinking back that was a real miracle. After the operation I felt that there was something hanging from my neck. It was an unclean 1 liter pet bottle. Its purpose was to let the blood flow in through a tube so that it will not stop flowing. Then, after discussing the matter with the doctor an ambulance brought me to a big hospital in Hanoi.

I arrived there in the middle of the night, 8 hours after the accident. I was lying by stretcher in the middle of an empty big room till noon of next day when I finally had a medical check. Doctor number 1 performed the medical check with the result that everything was OK and I should leave the hospital in about 4 days. They also performed a suture operation in my neck and head. I was much blessed by an air conditioned private room but the old sheets of my bed were stained with blood and ants were crawling around the room. There was no button to call the nurses and patients had to go out to eat their meals.

On the day to leave the hospital, just 4 days after hospitalization and waiting to go to the airport I contacted the insurance company. Just 5 minutes after my phone call a group of western doctors appeared and I became like their hostage. With almost no notice I had an X-Ray and CT scan. The results were that I had a cervical vertebrae and the skull broken and due to the continuous bleeding they transported me urgently, by a charter plane, to Bangkok. Up till then, the doctors had strongly advised me "move," "run" and now they told me to have a complete rest without moving my head at all. It was totally an opposite advice.

Since I was a foreigner I felt I had been quite blessed. During our tour this time, we could see several hospitals and realized that, since there was a lack of beds 2 or 3 patients would have to use the same bed. On the other hand, medical facilities and tools were much lacking and surgical operations were difficult to perform. I was shocked at hearing in the General Provincial Hospital Of Cao Bang that the budget allocated by the Province for medical equipment was only about 5 million Yen. In some other places we saw how they were raising medical herbs to produce medicine for the patients, in the backyard and although such efforts are worthy of praise, I wonder how effective are to heal people.

In Cao Bang we were offered delicious meals and in return 4 of us, Matsushima, Hanaoka, Otaka and I presented our hosts a mini concert with Vietnamese and Cao Bang local songs. I also played the Vietnamese musical instrument Dan Bau. It was a very fruitful time to me, because I wanted to express openly my feelings in the land of Vietnam where 4 years ago so many people assisted me after the road accident saving my life. This warm event, transcending nationalities, still remains alive in my heart. I would like to show my deepest appreciation to those that organized this tour. Let's come together again and have a drink of beer or vodka at a stretch!