I showed up to Hanoi early on Monday morning and have had nonstop fun ever since. Aside from being kidnapped (my imagination gets a little crazy sometimes), my biggest fear going into this was that I wouldn’t make friends and would feel lonely. Obviously I understand conceptually how to make friends at a hostel, but I was worried that everyone would be with their own friends and I would end up isolated.

I’m happy to say that from the moment I set foot in my first hostel I have been alone for maybe a total of two hours. I unpacked my things and got settled in my room with eight complete strangers, then went down to the hostel bar to grab a beer. Turns out, making friends really is as easy as “hey, can I join you guys?”. Some people are more inclusive and open than others, but no one ever says no.

On Monday I walked around Hanoi a bit with my friend Ina and tried a local beverage called egg coffee – literally, it’s coffee with condensed sweetened milk and raw egg whipped into it. It was surprisingly delicious. We came back and hung out at the hostel bar some more, where we amassed a very fun group of English, Scottish, Italian, and Dutch backpackers.

I left the next morning for the Halong Bay and Castaways Island tour, which is really just a booze cruise with a private island. “Private Island” sounds luxe right? No. The dorm beds didn’t have pillows or sheets (just a mosquito net) so I had to sleep under my towel, the electricity didn’t come on until 5pm and shut off at 6am, and you can’t flush anything down the toilets. Awesome? Yes. Fancy? Definitely not. While on the boat and island, there are only a couple rules: 1) you can’t drink out of your left hand, and if caught doing so, you must drink your whole drink, and 2) you can’t say the words “ten” or “mine”…if you do, you have to do ten pushups. (I ended up doing 40ish pushups in about two hours, which is more than I’ve done in my entire life I think.) During the tour I went kayaking into Halong Bay’s caves and also high-speed tubing, which was wildly awesome. I lucked out with my group – it was small (22 of us) and mostly women, but every single person was nice and fun to be around.

Hungover as shit, we made our way back to Hanoi. Let me tell you, there is nothing worse than being hungover and dehydrated while on a 95 degree boat that smells like fish for four hours. But, we survived both that part of the trip and the following four hour bus ride. I checked into my hostel and met back up with Jenna and Alex, two Scottish friends that I’d become close with on the Halong Bay tour. We walked around Hanoi for a bit and they showed me one of the best views in the area, a 5th story restaurant/bar called City View which overlooks the Hoan Kiem Lake and bustling city area. Right outside the building is a famous Vietnamese intersection known for being ridiculously busy, even by Vietnamese standards, which is saying something since traffic in Vietnam is insane due to all of the motorbikes. If you try to wait for traffic to stop, you’ll never cross because it never does, so you just walk through while all your instincts are freaking out because a bunch of cars and motorbikes are flying at you from all directions. As long as you just walked at a steady pace and don’t try to slow down or speed up, the drivers will go around you. I said goodbye to Jenna and Alex then went to bed so I could get some much needed sleep.

Today I was going to leave for the Buffalo Run (a seven day trip down the coast to Hoi An), but we needed to find at least one more person to go with us, so we pushed it back another day. I finally had some time to explore Hanoi, so I went around to the other side of the lake and also to some famous sites, like the Cathedral.

So far, all I can say about my trip is that is has started out on a great foot and I am incredibly excited for what’s to come. Here are a few general observations from my experiences in Vietnam thus far:
1. Backpackers are an awesome breed of people that really complement where I am in life right now; they’re lighthearted, adventurous, outgoing, and I’m learning so much just from talking with them about who-knows-what.
2. A lot of backpackers come with intentions to stay X number of weeks, and end up staying for months longer. I don’t think I will do this, but it’s very intriguing to see how common this is.
3. There are very few Americans compared to other nationalities. I suspect this has something to do with the distance (geographically and culturally) between the US and Southeast Asia, but mostly I think it’s because Americans just don’t travel or “holiday” the way that the rest of the world does. Gap years (a term for taking time off between high school and college, or college and the real world) aren’t a thing in America, professionals don’t have nearly as much paid time off, and deciding to take time off for travel, no matter how well rationalized, is commonly considered a strike against you in the eyes of future employers. This makes me sad.
4. Everyone speaks great English. Obviously this is probably a skewed sample since they’re travelers who clearly have a passion for other cultures, but given how few Americans are proficient in a second language, I’ve been shocked by how many people – backpackers and Vietnamese locals alike – speak great English.
5. My historical knowledge of the world is shit compared to Europeans’. They know something about every country and everything about their own. It’s mind-boggling.
6. There are many more solo female backpackers than I expected. I don’t personally know many females who have backpacked alone, especially Southeast Asia, but there are so many here! It’s very reassuring.
7. I’ve developed some weird hybrid accent and vocabulary from spending so much time with non-Americans. I’ve started saying “ehm” instead of “um”, “bill” instead of “check”, “trousers” instead of “pants”, and “uni” instead of “college”. Also, my use of profanity has changed greatly – saying “she was pissed last night” really means that someone was drunk, not mad; casual use of the word c*nt (the stars are for you Mom, since I know you hate the word)…like literally, the word is thrown around at least five times in every conversation; and phrases like “she knows fuck all” have really brought my communication skills to the next level. Jenna actually had the same thing happen to her, but she began using American words because of me. We both thought it was hilarious.
8. As much as foreigners like to [jokingly] hate on America, a lot of them really want to travel here and actually think we’re an awesome and incredibly patriotic group. Someone told me that he’s never seen any group more proud of a symbol than we are of the American flag. All of this is reminding me that I really should travel my own country more, so I’m thinking I’ll do a nice roadtrip when I’m home. Who’s with me?!

Okay, that is it for now. I’ll update again after the Buffalo Run and Hoi An.