Getting lost in Hanoi

Taking a shower.  One really has to wonder whether it’s even worth the hassle.  I take 5 minutes getting what I need from the locker and storing away what I don’t need.  Then (and assuming that none of the other 8 in this shared dorm room are using the one shower) I cram into it’s cozy unlockable stall.  There’s no racks or hooks to put my clothes on so on the floor they go and I just have to hope that I direct the water flow so that it DOESN’T spray all over my already semi-damp dirty clothes.  So far on all attempts I have failed miserably and everything I have worn and intend to wear has got a good spraying.  Not that it matters mind as it only takes another ten minutes and I’m already glistening with sweat.  The word ‘glistening’ conjures up a far nicer image than ‘sweating like a pig’.  So, I glisten.  I glisten like a diamond.  Not that I’m complaining mind, I love Hanoi.  I really should buy the T-shirt.

The flight was uneventful.  That’s how I like my flights.  Leaving the airport at Bangkok for my changeover the humid heat really brought back memories and although I thought I missed it I’m now not sure I do.  Hanoi is not what I expected although that’s not to say it’s bad.  It’s not like Cambodia where everyone is pushy to sell and in nearly all instances an apologetic ‘no’ in the only language I know is enough for them to move on with a smile.  Further to that it took half a day before someone offered me the green stuff and a little over a day before being offered a dodgy massage.  I don’t think there was a ten minute interval in Cambodia where I wasn’t offered both.  That said I suppose I don’t recall ever being offered opium before.  ….so I bought a kilo and sent it home*.      

Crossing the road is an adventure and if I only had a second to describe this city I would have to say it’s a maze.  I’m lost multiple times everyday and I’m starting to realize just how much I’ve come to rely on technology over the simple map.  It’s crammed, a swarming hive of motorcycles that travel so close they could almost pass for being one very unusual looking machine.  It’s dusty, hot, humid, dirty and very noisy but so far I’m loving it…. and am being incredibly envious of some of the locals who are walking around in jeans and aren’t breaking a sweat. 

Tomorrow I’m moving hostel to the newer and better equipped ‘sister’ lodge that also shares the same name as this one, ‘Hanoi Backpackers Hostel’.  The new one supposedly has power points in the lockers which although might sound weird it’s nice to be able to charge something up while you’re out getting lost.  The down side for me is that everyone in there looks to be the  crew that just got off the plane from Bali.  It has a big party vibe but it’s bigger, cleaner and also has an offsite and secure parking area… may come in handy.   It appears to be in a bigger ‘tourist’ area with an obligatory ‘Reggae Bar’ and a place across the road that sells mixed drinks by the bucket and advertises that it only closes when the last patron can no longer stand.   It does however seem to have more food stalls a greater variety of stores and streets to explore.   

Things are cheaper than I thought for a large city.   Currently my daily expenses including my accommodation would not exceed $25.   

Chicken and mushroom soup, noodles with seasonal vegetables and... I think it was beef.  $3.50  Loving street stalls.

I have no plans to leave Hanoi just yet although the tourist trap that is Ha Long bay does call.

*sarcasm. Recognize

Setting Forth

Well, my first blog entry.  How does one even start a blog?  Who’s even going to read this?  How should I write it?  Is it aimed towards an audience who’s only going to skim through it and not take the time to digest my literary genius… or those who savour my every word because I am the Shakespeare of modern times?  Ok, it’s a new title and it probably won’t stick but that is completely besides the point. 

In 2009 I travelled to Cambodia and Laos with a good friend of mine.  If that trip was a highlight of my life then renting a small 100cc step through motorcycle in Laos for a three day ride to the Vietnamese border and back was the best three days of my life.  That might seem a tad dramatic… and I’m relatively young so I won’t say it’ll necessarily stay that way (I say that as to not upset any yet unborn offspring who may one day stumble across this blog) but those three days were a deathbed memory.  The hum of those little motorbikes, riding over corrugated roads for kilometres, crossing rivers, mountains, rice paddies, avoiding the kamikaze tourist buses, the monsoon rains and battling a thousand mosquitos’s in a tropical heat.  There was nothing those little bikes couldn’t do.  One of them also took on a bus on a blind corner and miraculously won! 

I came back from that trip determined to do it again on a grander scale and after a false start in 2010 when my proposed travel partner pulled out last minute I never thought I’d do it.  Oh, I told everyone about my plans… I bored you all to death with my ideas but deep down inside I’m not sure even I was convinced that I would follow through on my dream.  As my proposed travel dates loomed I started reading some travel books.  I started reading the diary of the young Ernesto (Che) Guevera riding through ‘the America’s’ and then I discovered a new book called ‘Lost on Earth’ written by an Australian guy named Steve Crombie who for nearly two years traversed the length of the American continent on a motorbike… the book started with the words ‘…for anyone who is planning or taking a journey – whether it be across your own country or around the planet.  Don’t waste a second’.  The words didn’t mean a lot to me at the beginning but as I kept on reading the book it started gaining a greater significance.  It was this book that gave me the kick I needed and to push my dream into reality.

I sit here with Steves book at my side as I write this first entry and I’ve just flipped to its last page.  Ironically I’ve only just now realized that completely un-intentionally the words his book ends with is the very name of this blog.  To think how long I tossed over the choice of those words.  New Horizons, A horizon, Pursue a horizon, Chasing the sunset…  All I needed to do was look at the back page of ‘Lost on Earth’.  It’s a little uncanny… and now I feel like the idea wasn’t mine.  *shakes fist*

I begin as just me.  I wanted to do this trip with a travel partner… someone else to share the experience with but sometimes that’s just not possible.  People play safe and unlike a small few it seems not everyone likes the idea of being pushed out of their comfort zones.  Life’s full of regrets so I guess it’s finding the route that you’ll regret the least and I think at this stage of my life this is mine.   It’s obviously different for others but in the twilight years it’ll be the experiences we turn down and missed out on that we’ll regret the most.  We only live once, a gift from God and I think he’d like us to enjoy some of his creation.  So completely solo I begin this trip… simply because this ensures it happens.  Nobody to ride ahead for help when I get a flat tyre, nobody to get me water when I’m staring into a squat toilet with gastro… it’s all rather exciting, daunting and downright liberating.

This coming Sunday I fly from Melbourne, Australia to Hanoi, Vietnam .  Here the adventure begins and with no return flight booked I hope to discover Vietnam, Laos… and where ever this road takes me.  I don’t think it’s really sunk in yet.  Maybe I should pack my bags.

As a friend of mine wisely quoted on my final day of my employment “What do we leave behind when we cross each frontier? Each moment seems split in two; melancholy for what was left behind and the excitement of entering a new land” – Che Guevera

Peace.