I recently backpacked solo to Vietnam - and I'm still gushing that I pulled it off successfully! I initially tried to document the entire trip as a travelogue - but then I realised that this was as much a journey inward as a journey in a different country. It has taken some time to distill my thoughts and I'm sharing them here more as the "musings of a traveler" and not exactly a travelogue of sights and scenes!
The Noise...The Quiet...The Noise.....
My first day in Hanoi was an abundance of well-meaning noise. I met plenty of fellow solo-travelers on a walking tour. I ended up talking to a lot of people, having "Viet Coffee" and later on met them again in the evening during the "Happy Hour" - a time for some watered down free beer to encourage socializing. Well.. if this was travelling solo, it was merry, to say the least!
But barring exceptions, connections made overnight (and over beer) are tenuous at best. The next morning I was back to discovering Hanoi on my own, with Google Maps and Gojek riders for company. I planned my own schedule and charted my own course through the day.
Contrary to evenings in Hanoi, evenings on the Cat Ba island were rather quiet with almost no one for company. But then there was always something to engage myself in. The sunset in Catba was the best I'd seen in a long while. Sitting there with my journal, having coffee and watching the sun and the sky turn from yellow to orange to deep red was one of the more deep experiences on this trip. I probably wouldn't have enjoyed this moment as much with company.
Travelling solo helps you appreciate company when it's there. And where there is none, you learn to accept and enjoy your own company. Someone once told me "If you can't enjoy your own company, who else will?!"
Of sunsets, coffees and journals
Stories, Perspectives and Possibilities.
On many evenings, I sat mesmerized as my companions for the evening opened up and gave a glimpse of their world. (I did my part of the sharing as well).
A Spanish carpenter had sold his business to make a trip to Asia. His village has 150 people. He sat awestruck as I told him about the 10 million people in Bengaluru. A German woman had lost her baggage in transit and chose to wait in Hanoi as the airline figured how to find it and ship it to her. She seemed to enjoy her stay despite the uncertainty of her baggage. A Spanish couple had named their son Shiva because they loved India! A young couple from the Netherlands were skeptical about travelling to India because of what they'd heard from fellow travelers. A Bulgarian graduate was excited to come to India because he'd heard "crazy good stories" about India. I met Israeli women who were keen to share their experiences from their mandatory service with the army....and an Indian IITian who marked towns in India as Red/Green/Blue depending on his inclination to visit them at some point in time. People teaching English in non-English speaking countries just so they can travel the world.....the list goes on.
And as I listened to these people, I realised that the possibilities of the world are immense. With life plans, relationships, careers and with how you want to experience life. Just being open to a conversation gives us a fleeting glimpse of the world at large. May be, we'll never be able to experience all the dimensions of life (may be we'll never want to). But the fact that these dimensions exist makes us less judgmental and more accepting of the world around us. You'll start reflecting on your values and may be discover that some values you hold may not even matter anymore - or that a value you hold dear may resonate with the rest of the world. For instance, I found that my inclination towards not acquiring too much material wealth and spending money on travel and experiences is a normal outlook amongst budget travelers - but my well-meaning family back here may never be able to connect with this idea.
The Perils of Information Overload
Travelling solo and travelling for a short ten day vacation meant that I had to plan a lot. Even as a person, I enjoy the predictability that planning brings with it. I did quite a bit of research.Where to go, what to visit, how to get there, how the place looks - because I'd be in an unknown country. I wanted to be in total control and make the best use of my time.
While my foresight eliminated major hiccups and I had a smooth trip, there were times when I felt a little underwhelmed. I would visit a certain place and more often that not, the real place would seem slightly less magnificent than in the pictures. Ironically, the places that seemed most interesting were the places that I didn't know much about and hadn't seen a lot of pictures. The Pagoda I felt truly in harmony with and wanted to spend time, was not even on my list to begin with.
May be, if there was little more time, I could've let something serendipitous happen! Or may be if I had little less information!
Adventure Comes Calling!!
Not that the trip was sans adventure. Again, adventure need not mean the adrenaline rush of an activity that heightens your senses. It could be - in my opinion - anything that pushes you out of your comfort zone. As simple as trying to know a new person in a room full of strangers.
In that sense, the trip itself was an adventure because I was travelling solo internationally for the first time (for a vacation).
But yes, there were several moments that deserve mention. Standing next to the railway track in the clumsy yet renowned "Train Street" in Hanoi as the train whizzed past was one. Entering a busy hotel in the non-touristy part of Hanoi that was full of locals and ordering vegetarian food as the locals smirked, was another. On top of the list is hitching a ride with a Vietnamese policeman from the deserted national park area in Cat Ba. But where I exceeded my expectations was when I rode about 50 km on an automatic bike in incessant rain in Ninh Binh. I still don't know what gave me the guts and gumption to do it - having never done it here in India. The latter half of this ride was through a forested area in the darkness of night made more challenging by the rain, wind and chill. I'd have done my more accomplished biker friends proud. At the end of it, I thanked God and destiny. I thanked my presence of mind throughout the ride. But I also thanked my sense of adventure that rose to the occasion in unknown territory!
With the grace of Almighty, I've done two trips in the last three months that opened up a plethora of perspectives. The first one to the Everest Base Camp was a test of physical and mental fortitude. And upon reflection, deeply meditative and self-actualizing. Even after a fortnight of my return, I found the world back home mundane and mechanical. The solo sojourn to Vietnam on the contrary, connected me with the world while also allowing me to spend time with myself, noticing the melange of emotions that each day brought with it between dawn and dusk - from apprehension to joy to accomplishment to anxiety and even disappointment.
The biggest learning though has been that all we need in life is a backpack to carry our world and a space of three feet by six to rest peacefully at night (that was roughly the size of my bed and bunker on these trips). A mind that is open to embrace multiple perspectives and a heart that is simple enough to be amazed by a place and its people!
- 05th January 2023
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