4.
								If you are childless, 
								and you visit Vietnam,
								it is best to lie:
								"staying with their aunt;
								killed in a car accident;
								at military school...."
								So we did.
								They found the one about the car accident particularly touching.
								They know suffering.
								They know children
								who die.
								We soon stopped saying it, however,
								despite the bad luck -
								Western intentions
								have never been so thin.