Lost...nearly

I nearly lost a passenger last week in Vietnam. We got off the bus to catch a ferry, just a small one, the type where the vehicles go in the middle and the people stand around on the balcony area. So I said 'We will be on this ferry for about 10 mins', silly man heard 'We will get on this ferry in 10 mins', so he wanders off to buy some fruit.

I am left standing there wondering why I had 2 tickets left when one of the other pax says 'where is Novel'. I can't write what I said, but I had to bolt back to where we got off the bus and then look for him, meanwhile the bus and the other 9 people are on the ferry. When I found him and told him to hurry up, he couldn't understand the urgency until I started running and then he tried to keep up. Unfortunately the gate was already closed and I stood there fuming at him and said that we would have to wait another 30 mins for the next ferry (a major exaggeration but I was mad at him).

Back on the ferry, the other pax had told the guy not to leave (some major hand signals I think as their Vietnamese isn't good) and some nice guy on the dock realised our predicament and opened a gate for us so we could run to the ferry. We had 2 ferry rides that day...he didn't miss the second one!