Depart Mental

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

I don't like leaving places. Even when I am leaving home to go on a journey, I get very emotional.

I have a lovely friend who insists on dropping me off and picking me up at the airport when I undertake these journeys, and more grateful I could not be. However, I don't think that she knows that tears well up in my eyes as I grab the baggage from her trunk and head off in to the unknown.

By the same token, I get very emotional when I leave a country. It is unlikely that I shall ever pass this way again and inevitably the place and the beautiful faces of all the people that I have met there race through my mind as I silently say goodbye. This was the case in Ghana and it is the case in Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia. Saying goodbye is very hard to do when you know that you shall never walk this ground again.

Such is the inherent nature of travel. On the upside an amazing new place awaits while you are on the journey, but eventually the next place is going back home.

Nonetheless, home is a pretty damn good place.

As I walk through customs I see two beautiful friends awaiting me, and all of a sudden it doesn't matter that my luggage is in Washington, D.C., promising to catch up with me.

In an instant I become aware that I haven't had a meaningful conversation in more than a month.

As we head to the car I light a smoke and look at my two friends, grateful to be home, but perplexed by the meaning of my journey.

Yeah, I saw a lot of things, but I have no idea what it means.

It is going to take some time to understand.

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The Temple Of Literature

Image via Wikipedia

Today was my last day in Hanoi. Taking my cue from the Lonely Planet guide, I decide to head out to the Temple Of Literature. Built around 1070, the temple is dedicated to Confucius.

I grab a moto from the Old Quarter, put on my helmet, hop aboard and close my eyes for the death ride across town.

As we arrive, I pull out some money to pay the driver, plus a generous tip for not killing me along the way. As I am paying him a small crowd suddenly envelopes us. It seems that I have dropped a small amount of money (at most $3) and one person has lunged forward to step on the wayward bill, acting as if he is just hanging around. Another man explains to me what has happened, and I thank him and the others who have gathered for their honesty.

I turn to the culprit and tell him to move while assessing the situation. Obviously, there is a lot of downside here, with the only upside being that I get my $1-$3 back. Clearly not worth it. I turn to the man and suggest he do something physically impossible involving one of his relatives. I then tell him he is a fine human being and wish him luck in his life. I then pull $10 out of my wallet and give it to the guy who first defended me.

As I shake his hand and walk away, a minor scuffle develops behind me over my misplaced lucre. Sometimes it takes one jerk to make us realise how lovely everyone else is.

Once inside I am again mesmerized by the timelessness of another place. Names of graduates are inscribed in stone dating back through the centuries. Sometimes when I am in places like this my mind boggles as I try and picture the people who walked on this same ground through the ages. I feel a lightning bolt rip through me and the ground pushing up at my feet as I shake my head in wonder.

Indeed, there is more to life than money.

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Halong Bay, Vietnam

Image by permanently scatterbrained via Flickr

Today I went to Halong Bay, the final checkmark on my must see list. Halong Bay is a Unesco World Heritage Site, a series of limestone cliffs that jut incomprehensibly out of the ocean.

Located about four hours from Hanoi, this miraculous locale rivals anything that Canada has to offer in terms of sublime natural beauty, a blessing bestowed upon us by nature that is difficult to convey.

In addition, Halong Bay also has cathedral like caves. Sadly, the batteries on my camera died, so no cave pictures available. D'oh!

Just when I think that my jaw could not drop any further, reality unveils another level. I am deeply humbled and grateful to be here in this time and place. I've uploaded a bunch of pics that you can view here.

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The Joy Of Getting Lost

"Not knowing where you're going is the best way to get somewhere you've never been" -J. Peterman

It happened in Bangkok. It happened in Saigon. And now it is happening in Hanoi. I'm learning to live with it.

I am not particularly directionally challenged, but the labyrinthian nature of these cities makes it very easy to lose oneself. However, once I admit to myself that I am hopelessly lost, it is easy to embrace. Lost is lost, and there are no degrees of being lost. You are either lost or you ain't.

The Old Quarter of Hanoi is the perfect place to get lost. Lord knows I try and remember the way back, but after about the fourth turn, I'm done. I do take some solace that I have yet to take a taxi or moto in this city without the driver having to seek directions from a third party. Its not just me.

On the upside, my nightly ritual of getting lost has led me to finding two places listed in the Lonely Planet that I wanted to get to. Tonights serendipitous find was Mr. Minh's Jazz Bar.

Mr Minh is the capo de capo of jazz in Vietnam, a virtuoso sax player who decided to open a bar to keep the fledgling Hanoi jazz scene alive. Tonight I was hopelessly lost yet again when I stumbled upon the red neon of Mr. Minh's establishment. Suddenly, I don't give a good godamn where my hotel is. (like the remote, its around here somewhere) I saunter in, delighted.

For the next two hours, I am treated to the finest jazz that Indochina has to offer. My advice to you is Get Lost! And my deepest gratitude to Mr. Minh and his band for sharing their prodigious gifts with me.

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The City Of The Soaring Dragon

Image by judithbluepool via Flickr

I make my way to my hotel in the hope that I can get a room, despite the fact that I am nine hours early. It is around 4:30 am and the hotel is disturbingly dark. I peer in through the door to see a mattress laid out on the floor of the lobby, containing two sleeping bodies. I knock on the door, feeling guilty for disturbing the staff.

I can't help but laugh at the conflagration of my own stupidity that has led to this moment. I originally booked this hotel from a net cafe where the computer date was one day early. Foolishly I believed the computer, as losing track of the day has been common on this journey. That was mistake number one. Mistake number two was misreading the train sked and thinking the train was arriving in Hanoi 12 hours later than it actually did.

In this case, these two wrongs actually did make a right. The big mistake was in fixing my mistake. If I had left well enough alone, all would have worked out perfectly. However once I realised that I had the wrong date, I emailed the hotel to change my reservation for the following day, which they kindly did. All of this leads me to darkening their door unexpectedly early.

Having roused them from their slumber, they sleepily let me in. I show them the code from my internet booking, and after much shuffling of paper I am informed that there is no room available. They offer me a computer and a chair. I gladly accept, and they go back to the mattress on the lobby floor.

I laugh in wonderment that someone as stupid as myself managed to get this far. Around 6:30 am someone checks out, and they offer me an uncleaned room so I can at least get some sleep. I lay a blanket over the bed and crash, thankful for the opportunity.

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Watching The Game

Image via Wikipedia

So after a fruitless search for a contact lens case to replace the one I left behind in Phnom Penh, I throw in the towel and find a small watering hole filled with locals. The place is jammed and I am squeezed into a chair by a wall, using a tiny footstool as my table.

I am the only non Vietnamese person in the joint, which suits me just fine. You don't find places like this from the window of the tour bus. The reason the place is packed is due to a Thailand-Vietnam soccer match, part of an Asian tournament. Of course I am cheering for Vietnam, given my burgeoning respect for the people here and my secret crush on the city of Saigon. Plus the waitresses are devastatingly charming.

Thailand scores in the second half to take a 1-0 lead, and the energy in the bar sinks like a hot air baloon with a very large leak. In the final seconds of regulation Vietnam is awarded a penalty kick, which is successfully executed. The place explodes in bedlam, and I find myself joining the crowd on its feet in celebration. I am glowing with happiness, not for myself, but as an expression of delight at the exuberance around me.

The game ends in a draw, but it feels like a victory. I stumble out into the Saigon night, greeted by a parade of cars and scooters honking and waving flags. For a brief instance I feel like I am back in Toronto during the World Cup.

It may be hard to see sometimes, but there is so much more in this world that bring us together when compared with the few things that keep us apart. I guess its all about perspective.

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Bright Lights, Big City

Image by postaletrice via Flickr

After a few days of self imposed convalesence in Phnom Penh, I am feeling well enough to travel, but not necessarily well. I catch a late morning bus headed into Vietnam, destination Saigon.

It is about a six hour trip, including the border crossing. After clearing the frontier Saigon should only be a few hours down the road. As the bus drones on into the late afternoon, I begin to doze off, wishing I had a Snickers bar.

Suddenly I wake up and the scene around me causes my eyes to bulge out of my head. I must admit that I had not really done a lot of research on Saigon, which is why I was utterly unprepared for the scene that I awoke to.

It is rush hour, and as we navigate our way through the major urban intersections, it is apparent that the scooter/motorbike rules here. At each red light they idle eight across and thirty deep in all directions.

Saigon makes Bangkok feel small and easily out bustles New York. As for quaint little Toronto, you're very cute,  but fuhgetaboutit.

I have developed a system for crossing the clogged streets here, which I call the Pray n' Go. The fact that there will never be a clear path means that you must conquer the crossing a few feet at a time, trying not to be rattled by the traffic as it swirls around you in all directions. During one such crossing in particularly heavy traffic I was becoming very flustered at my inability to get across when I heard a friendly voice say hi to me. It was a man with his wife and young daughter. He held out his hand to me and motioned for me to take it. He led me across the street and gave me one of my sweetest memories of the trip. Those are the kind of people you run into in Vietnam.

Saigon is a truly magnificent gem, and why anyone would bother with tourist addled Bangkok and all its false nicety when they could be here is beyond comprehension. Viva Saigon!

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