Saudade & Cynefin

By the time I left Phu Quoc island, I was ready to do so. My last stop in Vietnam was Ho Chi Minh City, or Saigon, if you’re trying to not be political. Just like Bangkok (remember Bangkok? Man I missed Thailand by this point. Remember how good Thailand was?), I had heard that HCMC was a terrible huge city and I would hate it and it was dangerous and blah blah blah blah. And just like Bangkok, I kinda actually loved it. A lot.

I landed at the airport, and awkwardly found my way into a Grab Taxi...eventually. I made it to my cute little hostel in the heart of the city, obsessively checked the bed for bugs (this is the norm now), and did NOTHING for the rest of the day, save for watching Netflix and playing a silly game on my ipad. Travel days take a lot of energy.

I spent the next several days just doing city things, walking everywhere and enjoying every perk of a city with no shame: sidewalks!! Street lights!! Shopping malls!! (Pro tip: A place where no one harasses you and you can usually find air conditioning AND food). Also, a STARBUCKS. I went there every single morning with zero concern about the “authentic” experience of Vietnam. Y’all, I literally gave no shits anymore about experiencing all the tourism haunts. The only touristy thing I had on my list for HCMC was the Cu Chi Tunnels, and there was no way in hell I was dealing with figuring out a tour all the way out there so I could spend the day crawling around in the dirt. With the luck I was having, I would have gotten trapped. Or a creepy crawly would climb down my neck. I REALIZE it’s very privileged of me to go somewhere and enjoy the western nature, and ignore the cultural history and significance of the space. But I was at -19 resilience points and YOU weren’t there, so just shut up.

Despite avoiding the historical sites, there were some interesting cultural discoveries to be had here. For instance, apparently at a shopping mall it’s perfectly normal to just shove someone out of your way as you make your way down a rack of clothes. I spent a lot of time wandering around different shopping centers, from fancy to sure-its-real type places. I wandered the streets, enjoying the artwork and graffiti of the city and the playful spirit of the young people. I’m really curious to see how Vietnam changes in a generation or two.

Central Post Office

This kid though...

One day I met up with a friend that I had met in Cambodia, who had recently moved to HCMC to work and live with her boyfriend. I was supposed to meet her in front of this random store, and I was so unbelievably excited to see someone that I knew. Well, “knew”, but still. Any familiar human contact sounded so amazing by that point, that I decided to get dressed up a little bit, so I put on my only clean pair of pants and my lovely little black leather flats. I set off for our evening of fun feeling pretty excited.

And then I walked right through wet concrete.

Now, I’d like to blame at least some of this on someone else. There were no signs to warn me, and there was a total transition zone where you’re just in a gravely area, so you don’t realize what’s happening right away. And the actual wet concrete portion is just large enough that once you’re in it you have to just keep going, but you’ll have to take several steps to get out. So my lovely cute little leather flats got covered in concrete. I wiped them off as best I could with a hanky (thanks hanky!), and just accepted my fate beyond that. Relative to everything else that has happened on this trip, this didn’t even warrant a point loss, because who is even surprised anymore?

[Side note, I was back by this area the next day, and saw evidence that half a dozen other people had clearly made the same mistake as I did, a point which really did bring me some solace. And NO, THE CAUTION TAPE WASN’T THERE BEFORE]

Anyway, my friend finally showed up, and gave me a huge hug.

Plus two points because human contact.

We met at this particular spot by the concrete patch because she wanted to show me the treasures contained within this unassuming building. Every level of this rickety old structure was filled with tiny, adorable, independent shops owned and run by young locals. Lots of cute little clothing shops, some shoes, some decorative household items, just a whole assortment of delightful items to investigate. She bought an amazing little top with tiny sheep on it, and I bought possibly the first dress of my life that truly fit all of my proportions.

After our little shopping adventure, we went to a rooftop bar and had two not-that-great glasses of wine and enjoyed the view. She told me about her new job and all the struggles of working in a country where you don’t speak the local language (important insights that westerners otherwise rarely take the time to consider). I told her about my travel wall and all the epically wonderful and horrifyingly terrible things that had happened in Vietnam. We gave each other advice and encouragement, and our friendship leapt seven levels. The pressure cooker that is geographic and social isolation leaves you forming relationships in new and surprising ways.

As we felt the first two raindrops, we immediately paid and left, knowing that a deluge was likely on its way. We met up with her boyfriend at a nice French restaurant and all ate dinner together. My only knowledge about this guy up to this point was that he had cheated on her, and that they had decided to try again. He seemed nice enough, and we had a good time. I kept my opinions to myself. You should be proud.

After dinner we were only a handful of blocks from my hostel, so they decided to walk me back just to be safe. I have gotten pretty good with my sense of direction while I travel, so I knew exactly where my destination was and made a beeline right for it without looking at any maps, which seemed surprising to them.

Actually, let’s be honest, I’ve always been pretty good with my sense of direction...in the sense that I know where I am in relation to the things I need to find. But if you ask me to go East at blahblah street you will be met with a blank stare.

The rest of my time in HCMC was spent at a leisurely pace, wandering around different shops, and hanging out with my Vietnamese friend (remember, from Hoi An and Danang?). We went and got Poke from another super fun building with lots of little shops in it. We went to Starbucks together (again, no shame) and hung out and chatted about things. We got some meals together and also checked out the night market for approximately 45 seconds before getting overwhelmed and leaving.

We had some pretty interesting conversations during these activities. His perspective was so interesting, as his parents had both fled Vietnam during the war, and he had been born and raised entirely in the US. He is a big dude, well over 6 feet tall and not a string bean. He speaks a little Vietnamese but obviously has an accent. He stands out in his own way, as people can immediately tell that he’s not a native Vietnamese person, despite being 100% Vietnamese in ancestry. And the assumption everyone makes is that his parents were some of the few that were able to leave during the war (as the North invaded the South), that his family does not espouse communism (because of the departure), and that he has money (because of the departure and subsequent return, and also the not-string-bean-ness). There were moments where I think he felt even more uncomfortable or unsafe in certain situations than I did. He was constantly concerned that people would do something to him out of resentment for the above reasons. What a strange and painful way to experience the land from whence your family comes.

His reflections on Vietnamese culture were eye-opening and candid. Now, let’s be fair, both of us have perspectives that are external, and they are simply opinions based on limited interactions. So don’t go thinking you get to repeat these reflections as fact yourself. If you want to have an opinion, go have the experience. The thing that surprised me most is that he mentioned that the mindset there is very much every man for himself. People are not going to go out of their way to try and help you with something, and if it’s you or them in a situation, well good luck. I hadn’t thought about it this way, but did remember one interaction where a cute little old woman walking with a loaded down bicycle had her traditional Vietnamese hat blow off her head. I immediately stopped to scoop it up (it would have taken her forever to get her bike situation settled enough to grab it herself), and when I handed it back to her she seemed so genuinely appreciative and shocked. It seemed odd at the time, but in retrospect I realized that there were a lot of other people nearby and no one else made a move for it at all. Was he right?

He spent about a month staying with his family in the Danang area, and was surprised at how little they seemed concerned with certain things. They witnessed a car accident, and he asked if they should call the police or the emergency medical services, and they looked at him like he was crazy. He asked them about politics and current news topics, and they had nothing to say - they simply never considered any of those things. His aunt sells sandwiches out front of the house for a job, and it’s enough for them to make a living and be relatively wealthy in their community. On the other hand, they couldn’t even fathom that he makes like $11/hour at his college student job, and immediately started suggesting that maybe he could send money back to them. I don’t really have a conclusion here, but all of these things were so interesting to hear from his unique perspective. Of all the places I’ve gone, it’s possible that this is the most different in normative culture and society.

I really wanted to go see a show at the Saigon Opera House, but my friend didn’t want to spend the money. So... I took myself. I wore my new dress, I put in some effort, and I walked myself over to the show. The Opera House was beautiful, and you get a little tour before the show starts, which was fun. They also give you some free warm tea while you sit and wait for the doors to open. Delightful! The show itself was again such a contradiction. It was a cirque du soleil-style production, a storytelling and acrobatic performance about cultural life in Vietnam (emphasis on agriculture). Some of the pieces were stunning and powerful and exciting displays of physical feats, and some of them were weird as crap and terrifying, with horrible music. For example, one piece involved most of the performers creating an enormous “web” on the stage, and one particularly creepy performer hanging in this web upside down in the role of a spider, and ALL SHE DID WAS HISS FOR FIVE MINUTES. Seriously. That was it.

Eventually the time came (FINALLY) for me to head to Indonesia. Can you believe it? Did it feel as long reading it as it did experiencing it? I packed up my bags and headed to the airport. My plan was to get all checked in and then buy my onward ticket from Bali to New Zealand (Indonesia, like some other countries, sometimes asks to see proof of your onward departure). I stood in line to check in for what felt like a hundred years, and finally it was my turn. Annnnd they wouldn’t even let me check in without already having that ticket purchased. I was furious and flustered, and stood off to the side and purchased the ticket, spending more than I had anticipated but just wanting desperately to leave the stupid country. Eventually I made it on the plane, and was off to Bali — with just a wee 21 hour layover in Malaysia.

Final resilience point count: -17

By the time my decon process was over, it was time for my next Vietnam stop: Phu Quoc island. I heard it was this beautiful, gorgeous oasis where I could wile away my days in sunshine and beaches, and I was determined to try to start over. I tried so hard to start the day off in a good mindset, I really did, but I was also just so exhausted.

The Danang airport was jam-packed full of screaming children, and then my flight got delayed, because of course it would. I sent the following string of messages to one poor soul who was silly enough to respond to me:

”My flight is delayed 1.5 hours.
Vietnam is trying to break me.
I’m sitting here with a shoe that STILL smells like cat pee, worried that bed bugs lurk in my bag, already sleepy and I just had to eat Burger King because it was the only option in the airport.
Burger King makes the dumbest burgers by the way.
Who the crap wants pickles and mustard, the bastard children of the condiment world, as not just the default ingredients but the only ones?
I got a double cheeseburger minus those two things and it literally just had cheese left on it.
Also there’s a lady here wearing a skin tight evening dress and high heels.
Who does she think she’s going to see here?
It’s almost midnight.
I just found a sticker in my hair.
Wtf is happening in my life”

Minus two resilience points

When I finally did land in Phu Quoc, I was stopped at the exit so they could confirm my bag tag matched my boarding pass. They were conveniently only stopping the non-asian people, so that was an interesting experience that in a different context would have been very educational to me...but in this context, it was just another blow.

My taxi driver claimed there were no ATMs at the airport, and that she could take me to one, but the process of turning in a circle suggested otherwise, much to her chagrin. The taxi ride itself was just her on her cell phone shrieking about something, and then at the end it was about 50% more expensive than the hostel had estimated for me. I checked into the (best in town) hostel, and immediately found indications of bed bugs. And then I found an actual bed bug. And then asked for a refund because COME ON GIVE ME A BREAK.

Minus another freaking resilience point. Am I having fun yet? Remind me again what an AMAZING opportunity this is, and how LUCKY I am?

They tried to tell me that they get the bugs because of the humidity. That's not how that works, honey. They refunded me all but one night of my stay, and helped me arrange a taxi to a different (more expensive) place down the road. I thought the only silver lining at the time was that I met the only other guest at the hostel, a nice guy from Brazil. We exchanged info before I left (I warned him about the bugs...he didn’t seem to care...ew).

The place I moved to was pretty cute and I had my own room (yay!), but it had an outdoor bathroom. “Oh how cute and rustic!” you might be thinking. NO, you are WRONG. Mosquitos find your exposed skin in an outdoor island bathroom in like 2 seconds flat. Pee at your own risk, and GOOD LUCK taking a [cold water only, by the way] shower. Soooo charming. Those mosquitos also found their way into the room through the rather large gap under the doors, so I got eaten alive while I slept.

Minus one.

Exhausted and hoping for some island happiness, I walked around for a bit, checking things out. There were some beautiful things here -- some random flowers, some graffiti -- but on the whole the island was covered in trash and felt like a ghost town. I was so disappointed. Where’s my island oasis??

I made a long trek to a special burger place in town that is owned by two American guys. I had the most wonderful, ridiculous burger here, and a drink. And then one of the owners sat down to chat with me, identifying right away that I was from the states. We chatted about books and reading and safety traveling and all sorts of things, and it was wonderful! He even sent me an ebook series that he thought I would like.

Plus one! Finally!

I was trying to ride this high out the next day, and planned to meet up with my new Brazilian friend. He was out exploring the island all day, so we met at a fun beachside bar place for a drink and some dinner. Things were all well and good and I was feeling happy that I had a new friend and I finally got the see the beach. And then he ruined it all. Apparently mentioning your boyfriend 47 times isn’t a sufficient indication that you aren’t interested in someone. So we had to have a blunt conversation...again and again because his Brazilian-ness meant that he kept thinking I was just playing hard to get. It was a really strange but interesting experience. We talked about our cultural norms on the topic, and he was really honest about how, where he’s from, a girl telling you no means you need to just try harder, be a man, and take the initiative (I guess being in a relationship is a minor point). And you know what? I had to have a moment of honesty about my own culture. Where I come from, “no” isn’t a complete sentence, which is super frustrating. You can’t turn a guy down and leave it at that. There has to be a reason, and it has to be good enough that someone will accept it. I had flashbacks to an unpleasant night where an older man kept f*&(ing insisting that I dance with him at an engagement party, and the end result was him saying I “had a problem with strong men”, because I said no. This can turn into a rant so I’m going to stop here, but it’s an interesting realization, and a really irritating fact of life.

Minus one again…

Finally the night was over and I crawled into bed, mosquitos dive-bombing my face, deciding that maybe I just needed some pampering, and booked a couple nights in a fancy resort place right on the beach. That should do it, right?

Turns out the nicest resort in town was more of a….ghetto castle. But my bed was comfy! The beach was close by and I saw some beautiful sunsets! I got to skype with some of my beautiful friends! Drain flies hatched in a sudden explosion in my room! Wait…

One night I decided to try and order a fancy meal to make myself feel better, so I ordered a baked salmon dish with veggies. The half of the salmon that was actually cooked was pretty good….

Minus one, or whatever, I don’t even know what anything is worth anymore

Total resilience point count: -19

I was woken up about an hour into bedtime by some people loudly entering the room and setting themselves up in the remaining beds. They were chatting, and I overheard them say the phrase “bed bugs”. My blood ran cold. The girl who took the bunk above mine seemed particularly distraught, and I felt kind of paralyzed by this. I was already in bed, asleep. My stuff had been in the room for like 10 hours at this point. It was dark and night time outside. I hadn’t seen signs of bed bugs, so maybe I could just trust that my room was clean, and these people coming in were as well? Ehhhhhhhhhhhh. I was still worrying over what solution I could come up with when I drifted back to sleep, hoping I could just figure something out in the morning.

I woke up at 3 AM. I know because I checked my phone, the light of which then illuminated my sleeping area. After a moment of annoyed acceptance at the time, my eyes drifted to my shoulder where some movement had caught my eye. There, walking in doofy circles, was a teeny tiny black bug, about the size of an apple seed. As the blur left my sleepy eyes, I had but one thought.

Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuccccccckkkkkkkkkkkkk

Minus 6 resilience points. You don’t know. You weren’t there.

Ladies and gentlemen, my first real live bed bug.

What followed was quite a reasoned and rational response from me, which I'm still marveling over. I ever so gently put my finger by the bug so he crawled on it, delicately touched the wall so he crawled onto that, and then smushed the f*(&ing shit out of him with my hard cell phone case. A lovely little sploosh of blood appeared on the wall, and all I could wonder was whether it was mine or belonged to the girl above me. I sat in my bed searching for more offenders for about an hour, and then sat there trying to pass the time until a reasonable human hour, and finally at 6:00 I packed up all my things and went to sit in the reception area until they woke up.

Photo proof because if I had to experience it so do you. Stop calling my trip glamorous.

The hostel was very apologetic and informed me that they had actually brought someone in to treat the room just a couple days ago, so they were pretty upset that it clearly hadn't worked. They let me check out early, and told me I didn't have to pay for the night I stayed there. I found another spot a 10 minute walk away with my own room, a fridge and freezer, and most importantly a kettle for boiling water. At check-in time I lugged my stuff over, got checked in, and began the slow and arduous process of cleaning all my belongings.

Now, realistically...
-The room was just treated for bugs. Was this bug a one-off? Did it travel on someone else? Was he the last of his kind, desperately trying to regenerate the population like that one movie with Mel Gibson or whoever and the only pregnant woman on earth?
-My belongings were in the room for like 15 hours. What are the odds that in this time period a family of bed bugs crawled into my bags and laid a bunch of eggs? I don't know, I'm not an entomologist. [I am now imagining a bed bug family packing their tiny suitcases and moving into my backpack though. Dad bug is wearing a very foppish hat.]
-It can take a couple of days for you to react to the bite, if at all. I had NO signs of itchy bites so far. To be determined...

So, the chances that I could have gone to the new place and just washed the few things I had in the bed and been just fine are probably pretty good. But we all know perfectly well that's not who I am.

Everything went straight into the shower area. Anything already in a ziplock was wiped down and set aside. Anything that couldn't be boiled went in the freezer. To my glee I discovered they had dryers, not just washers, making my life infinitely easier. All laundry was therefore set aside for a high heat dryer run later. Everything else was slowly boiled throughout the day and set aside to dry. I emptied my bags of every single item, and obsessively checked every seam and crevice for bugs or eggs (after some thorough google educating) with a flashlight. Then I checked the flashlight. I didn’t touch the bed, and only ventured over there once I had a good scrub down myself, which was the last thing on the list to avoid cross-contamination.

So this is what happens when an epidemiologist finds a bed bug.

In other news, it was an opportunity to remember all the really smart things I brought with me, like a giant trash bag where my backpack went (thanks Trey!), and my favorite tea, which I was drinking to maintain my sanity. I walked next door to a great Vietnamese restaurant and got some food to go, but met a really nice girl named Fiona from Australia while I was waiting for my food and had a wonderful conversation. I also caught up on some netflix shows and had a dance party in my room with my headphones in, a feeble attempt to distract myself from the tiny, bug-shaped nightmare.

Eventually the only thing that remained was a thorough check of the seams of my bag. I wasn’t sure if I could fit them in the dryer, and I hadn’t found one sign of any bugs anywhere in my stuff. I was just convincing myself that I was being paranoid when, at the very bottom of the bag, tucked up into an area where two seams meet, I FOUND ONE. A little clear nymph, trying to hide further in the corner. DAMMIT.

So I proceeded to put my bags inside pillowcases and run those through the high heat cycle for twice as long as is suggested to be necessary for eradication. And then, just to be safe, I re-checked every single item as I packed it back up into my bags. All in all, I spent the better part of 3 whole days on this decontamination process. My only solace was that A) at no point did I ever have any bites show up, and B) statistically speaking my odds had to be good that I wouldn’t encounter bed bugs again. RIGHT?

Unfortunately this laborious decon process meant that I didn’t get to explore the city very much, and my main source of adventure was going to different cafes in the neighborhood when I had to eat. There were some cute and delicious ones, though! Like this one that was decorated to make you feel like you were sitting outside a cafe in France, despite the fact that you were in fact inside in Vietnam.

I also walked over to the beach one day, where I got ogled by approximately 43 construction workers, and ran across a very strange scenario where a camera crew was following two girls around the beach while they did incredibly boring things, like pretending to enjoy the beach. It’s still a mystery to me what audience could possibly want to watch something like this badly enough that the project had funding.

Minus like 3 resilience points from this bug decon situation.

Total resilience point count: -14

We woke up in a daze some time mid-morning, long enough to go get some nice breakfast at one of the three (I'm guessing) cafes in Phong Nha. We then had to trek all over the place to find the one ATM in town so K could get more money, since I had been paying for her activities and food for several days at that point. There was an epic rainstorm coming down (monsoon season is no joke), and by the time we got back we were completely soaked in a way that I've never experienced unintentionally.

[side bar, for some reason as a child I loved getting soaked and frozen to the bone, coming inside and putting on fluffy pajamas, sitting on the heat register with a blanket, and passing out into a nap/coma... so I would stand outside in the rain on purpose sometimes. This, along with the smell of dry-erase markers and getting to see babies of any creature, provides a list of my biggest vices as a youth. ... They haven't changed much.]

We fell asleep again for most of the day, and when we woke up that evening we had to decide what to do the next day. K wanted to just leave and move on to the next place because of the rain, despite the fact that we hadn't done any of our desired activities here. I convinced her to stay another day and see if the rain let up so we could go visit the caves, and she agreed eventually. We went to one of the only other cafes in town for dinner, and I was delighted to discover that they had cute post cards there and that you could stamp and mail them right there, so after our meal I stayed behind to send off some notes (you should have gotten them by now, selected readers...). They also had this amazing hand-made journal.

Only some of you understand the relevance of this, but to discover something like this in the middle of Vietnam, at negative resilience points, kind of blew my mind. I bought it because I had to.

Plus one resilience point.

The next day we woke up and discovered that the rain had disappeared, so we hopped on a motorbike and toodled up into the mountains to get to Paradise Cave. The drive itself was absolutely gorgeous, winding through the national park full of green trees and a gushing river and no one around.

When we got there, we had a good bit of hiking to do to get up to the cave, but we saw lots of interesting things along the way and were generally in pretty good spirits about it all. We saw some freshly-laid frog eggs, and a row of worker ants carrying their important treasures. We discussed Asian culture and the things we found interesting (she's half Thai, recall). The cave itself was massive and awesome and very interesting. You can walk super far into it, and at the very very very end of that pathway we discovered heaven. Most tourists didn't have the attention span to make it that far in, the security guard stationed at that point had fallen asleep, and there was a strange lull in the wave of visitors for a few minutes. It was nice and dark and quiet save for the drips and drops of water, and we both instinctively went as quiet as possible, closed our eyes, and enjoyed the perfect utter peacefulness of this space. At long last, no honking cars, no scream-talking people, no terrible smells, just glorious nothingness. Ahhhhhhhhh.

Plus one resilience point.

I honestly don't know how long we stood there enjoying this, but it was probably a solid ten minutes at the least. At some point K said "we have to leave eventually." So we did. And it was sad.

After a good amount of confusion, we wound up getting our super-early-morning ride to Dong Hoi arranged, as well as our train ticket to Danang and then our ride to Hoi An from there (ugh). Morning time came too early as you might expect, and when we arrived at the train station in Dong Hoi we realized no tourists stop there so zero of the announcements or reader boards had any English on them. Thanks to a combination of google translate and the art of pointing, we figured out the right train to get on. I got up to grab some snacks for the journey and grabbed my bag. K said to me "Oh you can leave that with me, I'll watch it." I feel bad now for the look I must have given her, but SURELY she had to realize from whence it came. Surely.

I don't think I mentioned it in earlier blogs, but this train ride was when I discovered that a cat had peed in my WATERPROOF shoes back in Sapa (the only time they had been accessible to a cat). This would be difficult enough to clean back home, but good freaking luck finding any cleaning supplies necessary in Vietnam. Baking soda? Pfft. Pet odor spray? As if.

Minus one resilience point.

The train ride went through some beautiful areas, and we both got some additional nap time in. So, also, did one of the guys who works there...

We arrived in Danang without incident, and our driver was right there to sweep us away to Hoi An, and dropped us at our lovely homestay for the next several days. While we were checking in, K asked where she could get her hair colored. The girl told her she knew someone right across the street who could do it, and they both ran across the street to dye her hair right then and there. This is all well and good except that we didn't have our freaking key yet, so I would have had to sit on the couch for an hour and a half while she had her hair done and styled. WTF. I asked the other girl who worked there if I could get the key so I could lay down and get settled, and she ran across the street to talk to the head girl, who came back and got me settled. Gah.

The next day we took some old, rickety (free!) rental bicycles into the old city to explore. The first thing that happened is that the "parking" area has an "attendant" who charges you a parking fee if you look non-Vietnamese. We didn't think we should have to pay to park our bicycles, so we rode down the street looking for somewhere maybe we could lock them up instead. Not really finding much, we were just going to lock them to each other on the sidewalk away from the market. A seemingly nice woman came up immediately and said "you can leave your bikes here! No charge! We'll look after them!" Duh, this made us suspicious, but then she said "just come look at my shop, just have a look and then no pressure, you can come back later." Well, okay, fine, I guess. So we parked the bikes, still decided to lock them to each other, and went with this lady to what turned out to be a tailoring shop (I had imagined souvenirs) where we were promptly given big books with clothing styles and told we should buy like 5 things to get the best discount and hey could we decide right now what we want so they can get started on it? Ugh. The parking fee for our bicycles would have been like fifty cents, and that is not equivalent to 5 tailored clothing items, so we said no thank you forty-seven times, collected our bicycles, and just gave in and paid the parking fine.

Hoi An is known for its lantern-filled streets, and we wandered around admiring them all afternoon. We popped into random cute shops along the streets, and ate some yummy foods at unique little restaurants. We stopped into a cute little nonprofit spot, and they had free “thoughts of the day” scrolls. Mine said “The most important decision you make is to be in a good mood!”, which would turn out to be massively relevant to my life in the coming days. We got "tickets" to the city, which gives you entry to a handful of local historical and cultural sites. We went to see a traditional music and dance performance as our first one of these sites, and it was very interesting. Some of the music and dance pieces were peaceful and elegant and lovely, and some of them seemed like shrill squawking of a cat who has just had its tail stepped on, and aggressive, weird dancing. Again, this is a nice example of the dichotomy that represents Vietnam for me.

I found this doorway that I was obsessed with (the color! Ah!), and we had a little mini photo session there. The end result is one photo that looks sort of elegant:

And two dozen that more accurately represent who I am as a person:

I could tell at a certain point that K was getting easily flustered by the heat/people/culture/noise, so I suggested that we stop into a cafe for awhile. I had purchased some post cards, so I got those out and ordered an egg coffee, a Vietnamese treat I wanted to try. And it was disgusting, but I tried it. The post cards were much nicer. K really wanted cake for some reason, and they didn’t have it at that one cafe, so she went somewhere else for awhile and then we met back up, which was just fine with me.

We stayed out late to see the night market, and admired all the pretty lanterns when they lit up at night. What we didn't admire, however, were the massive throngs of tourists that appeared out of nowhere to clog up the streets. We lasted about 10 minutes in the night market before we couldn't take it anymore, and started the process of heading home.

At one point along the walk I spotted some pretty lanterns on the side of a building that no one was paying any attention to, and had an idea for a photo op. I explained my thought, and K took the following photo.

Almost immediately a couple stopped and tried to take the same photo. K wanted one as well, so we took a slightly different one of her, and by the time we were set to walk away, there was a LINE of people waiting to take the same photo with these random lanterns that no one cared about before. This gets me thinking about the psychology of photo taking by tourists, really. It seems like people are obsessed with taking photos, whether it's for Instagram (ugh) or just so they don't miss one single thing. But how many people take the time to go through those photos later? How many people ever even look back at vacation photos anymore? When is the last time you got photos printed and put them in a scrapbook or photo album, and then got that out later to look at them? It's like we're more obsessed than ever with TAKING them, but less likely than ever to actually make the time to LOOK at them again. And what's with this extreme FOMO (fear of missing out) driving the need to take every picture you see someone else taking? Like if you don't take every single angle possible it's like you didn't even go there? The invention of digital storage has completely changed the way we capture memories, in both good and bad ways. I don't have answers, but I've just been thinking about it a lot.

Moving on.

We went and picked up our bikes from the "parking" lot. A creepy old guy walked up in the dark and just stood right behind us, not saying a word. By this point we were both pretty tired of people, so we just said "WHAT DO YOU WANT" and he said "did you pay?" And we said "YES, GO AWAY". Luckily he did.

On the bike ride back to our homestay we were venting about our frustrations, especially with the fact that Vietnamese honk their horns at everything for every purpose, and in this odd moment of catharsis, started yelling the words "BEEP BEEP BEEP" as we rode down the roads, along with ringing our little bicycle bells at every single thing we passed. By the time we got back we were laughing hysterically, and to be honest it all really felt a lot better, all those frustrations with Vietnam in general and with the obnoxious parts of the day. Everything seemed okay.

The next morning we both went to get breakfast with a friend I had met on Facebook, who was a nice young guy whose parents are Vietnamese and who was visiting the country to learn more about where he is from. K didn’t say a word at breakfast, despite my attempts to include her. After we got done eating she said she was going home, so I just hung out with my friend and his cousin for awhile. After that I went to a cute cafe and got a smoothie with a heart-shaped ice cube and some tiny muffins, and did some writing and relaxing. What I didn’t know was that while K was at the homestay, she started binge watching Netflix, not eating anything, and not talking to anyone. When I got home that night she wasn’t chatty, but I assumed she didn’t feel well and just left it alone.

The next day I woke up and K was gone, having decided to go off and have her own day. Of course this is totally fine, but she took the key to our room (and thus the power) with her. Luckily I’m pretty good at getting ready in the dark. I made the super intelligent decision to get a hair cut in Vietnam, which has turned out to be relatively regrettable, but it took some bulk out of my frizzy mane, and I’m just assuming by the time I get home my regular haircut lady can fix it.

I explored all around town, using up the rest of my tickets for the city sights. I saw the Quan Cong Temple, which was built in 1653 and dedicated to its namesake, who was a highly esteemed Chinese General who was Vietnamized (apparently that’s a word) to be the symbol of loyalty, sincerity, integrity and justice. The space was pretty small, but nice and peaceful.

Next was the Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva pagoda, which has existed since 1653 or earlier. This is a religious center of Hoi An citizens from many different cultural backgrounds, and is very important to the town.

Next was Phuoc Kien Hoi Quan, which is an Assembly Hall. This space had some of the loveliest color palettes and architectural and design details!

My next stop of the day was Tan Ky, a family house you can visit despite the fact that the family still lives there. This house has belonged to this family for several generations, and has seen all sorts of experiences over the years, including terrible floods. One of the walls has previous flood levels marked, and you can see the river responsible just out the door. I met a nice couple here from England, and the woman offered to take a photo for me. It was nice of her to do that, but I’m not sure how much I will treasure this particular photo in the future...

Last but not least was the Quang Trieu Assembly Hall. Made of wood and stone, this assembly hall was constructed with a combination of Cantonese and Hoi An building style.

My last stop of the night was a water puppet show! Since we didn’t make the time for this in Hanoi, I figured I had to do it here. Every area of Vietnam has their own style of puppet/water puppet shows, so it was kind of fun to see this one. Basically it’s a series of short stories/local parables told via water puppets, music, and a storyteller. It was so cute! But man it’s really hard to photograph. It’s so impressive how much movement the puppet masters can evoke from the little puppets, especially given that they aren’t really watching what they’re doing.

When I got home late that night I realized that K had basically only gone to breakfast, and then went home and watched Netflix all day. By this point I was ready to move on, as she had stayed with me for a week longer than expected, and I didn’t even begin to know how to handle whatever was going on with her. The next morning I paid my half of everything, forced her to talk to me to make sure she knew I was leaving and to let me know if she needed anything, and then I left.

Minus one resilience point for that emotional drain

On the ride back to Danang I was looking for things to be happy about, or at least things to laugh about. I was excited to be done with that drama, not excited about being alone again, and just kind of generally over Vietnam despite having two weeks left there.

I did find a few things to laugh about. The very lovely guy who drove me to Danang had a tattoo on his forearm of a key, and then the words “The success key.” Just in case you were wondering if there was an English equivalent to the Chinese symbol tattoo. I Want it That Way also came on the hit jams on the radio during out ride, which I found amusing. I checked into my hostel - the best rated on in town - and headed off to get a chocolate mint milkshake with my new Vietnamese friend who happened to be in Danang. The drink was delicious, and then we hopped on the back of motorbikes to go see the dragon bridge. At a certain time on Sundays, the dragon bridge breathes fire and water (alternating). I wasn't sure how interesting it would be, but I thought it was awesome! We were right underneath it so I got some great photos. You get completely drenched by the water, unfortunately, and you feel like you are getting sprinkled with sparks from the fire bit. They all gave me a ride on their little motorbikes the rest of the way back to my hostel so I didn’t have to ride home alone in a taxi in the dark, and I waved goodbye, falling into my bed feeling pretty content and hopeful that things were looking back up.

Idiot.

Total resilience point count: -5