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| The stunning view from my room in Cat Ba |
I'm in my room writing this post, the sun is shining on my bed and from my window I see the ocean and small boats passing by the rocks of Lan Ha Bay. The only thing I keep on thinking is how blessed I am. I must have done really good things in my life to deserve all this. I have spent almost one month in Vietnam and if I think about all the amazing places I have seen, all the kilometers I have made and all the fantastic people I have met I feel tears popping up in my eyes. This has been one of the most amazing times of my life. I have never felt my energy so high and I have never experienced so many good vibrations with so many different kinds of people. People that quickly came and went out my life but that certainly left something to me. Traveling is all about the people we meet and the conversations we have, if it wasn't for certain people I met on my way I would not even have visited some places I saw. What a beauty, I love life so incredibly much, and I'm so in love with my life. I always was. This is a time full of happiness, I have had some downs in the past two months but nothing compared to how happy I have been and still am. I am learning so much about others and myself and this process fascinates me and gives me motivation to keep on going. For the time being this is what I will do, I will keep on going, I will listen to myself and I will make myself happy. For me joy also comes from the fact that I am in warm countries now. This is another thing I always knew but became clearer to me during this time, I need to spend my life in warm places by the seaside. This is my main goal now and I will work to get there with all the resources I have. And I also think that for the time being I'm not made to stay in one single place, I'd rather move around and adapt again and again and again until I get tired of it.
SO, WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU HAVE SPENT OVER 2 MONTHS IN SOUTH EAST ASIA??
1. You see rats on the road - and restaurant menus - and it's totally fine. You see cockroachs, frogs and even scorpions in rooms, buses or wherever it may be and it's still totally fine: you just get rid of them or in the worse case scenario you eat them! ;o)
2. You spend 17 hours on a bus and you are fresh like a rose and ready to explore your new destination as soon as you arrive. I have to say I love night buses, they are just so comfy to me.
3. You get used to squat to go to the toilet. Sometimes what they call toilet is a random hole in the middle of a market covered only by a flying piece of fabric all around. And smelly, very smelly. Once they offered me a bucket that they would empty God knows where...that was too much and I just kept it.
4. Your hair are always a mess. You still may get manicure and pedicure though as it's so cheap (I do!)
5. Your skin is full of bites, cuts and small scars but you don't mind as they all remind you of an amazing day you had. Your skin is pretty tan too, which is nice :o)
6. You take local buses, boats and trains and you are the only non local in there. You love it and you know they will help you and bring you to your destination if something goes wrong anyways.
7. You know that in SEA everything can be arranged and/or fixed at pretty much any time. It's great!
8. You bargain. Always.
9. You arrive in a new city and you jump behind the first motorbike you see with your backpack and everything. You are not even scared of the crazy traffic anymore and you totally trust the guy. He will bring you where you are supposed to go.
10. You only eat street food. You love it and you know you won't get sick by it. You just
wanna try everything!
11. You talk to people. And you meet people. All.the.time. Never felt alone so far, ever. Random converstations with locals are the best.
12. The concept of clean you had back home changes and you adapt. Which in a way is better, much better.
13. You realize that Asians work where they live and live where they work. So the restaurant may well be the family home and they welcome you to their walls with the biggest smiles. Some offer you cigarettes, water etc...just nice touches that make you wanna go back there (even if you do not smoke, like me). Sometimes the same place will be a restaurant, a scooter rental shop, a laundry shop and an agency at the same time: very practical :o)
14. In Asia everything is "same same but different"
15. You try to speak your worse Vietnamese and people are just so happy.
16. If you bump into a wedding, you will be invited to sit and drink their shots. Stiff, very stiff alchool.
17. If you are small as I am, girls will want to try your flip flops, hat, dress etc...just because you are "vietnamese size, so nice!"
When it happened I was amused :o)
18. You get used to the fact that people are loud. And you kind of start to like local music and ask them to put it on once more.
19. You are always aware of what's going on around you.
20. If it happens that you don't feel so good, you just don't care, you keep on going, doing stuff and being happy.
21. The first time you try vietnamese coffee you'll most likely hate it. And then you'll become addicted to it!
22. You get used to any smells, good and bad :o)
23. Your sarong adapts as you do to different situations and becomes your scarf, towel, blanket, skirt...etc...etc...etc...
24. You drink lots of fresh fruit juices/shakes. In my case like never in my life, fruit here is just too good!
25. You only feel like eating with chopsticks and if they offer you a fork you almost get offended ;o)
26. You learn that we don't need all those things we pretend back home and that less is more, really.
27. You start to have a very relaxed style of life as life in Asia is just so simple, relaxed, slow and it feels so good here.
Interesting people I've met in Vietnam:
A British guy who is going to be traveling for a couple of years, he's doing the tour of the world only over land, using any kind of transportations but planes.
Another British guy who spent a month in a monastery in China training in Kung fu together with the monks. He didn't have any electricity nor internet, only ate vegetarian food and spent most of his time meditating and training.
A French couple in their 50s who quit everything back home and decided to backpack through Asia to find the perfect place for their retirement. I've spent some time with them and I felt so lucky to have the chance to do so: cultivated, open minded, kind, inspiring people they are.
A group of Italians on holidays :o) With them was fun! I laughed with tears in my eyes, felt good.
A guy from Napoli traveling as well for some months, coming from a very difficult situation but with such a positive attitude at the same time. We traveled together to a couple of cities, was nice to speak my dialect again, nothing feels as good as to speak Neapolitan!
A German girl who was my roommate for a couple of nights. Never talked so much about boys like with her, funny to see how we all struggle with them ;o)
A super hippie Italian lady in her 50s with more crazy stories than I can possibly remember.
And you've forgotten what it's like to flush toilet paper.
ReplyDeleteTrue, use the bin, please :)
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