I spent three whole weeks in Hanoi and filled my days with incredible ease. Here are a few of the things I saw and few of the things I did. Ho Hoan Kiem or ‘Lake of the Restored Sword’ and Ngoc Son Temple or ‘Temple of the Jade Mountain’ Hoan Kiem Lake is at the…
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There’s a man standing in Hanoi airport holding a sign with our names written on. It’s the first time I’ve ever been met at the airport by a driver and the ease with which I glide towards the waiting car, am relieved of the weight of my bag, slide into the seat and am whisked…
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There’s an alleyway full of parked motorbikes, all lined up like they’re for sale, and a crouching woman near the entrance selling something deep-fried and therefore unidentifiable; it’s like any other alleyway in Hanoi except that there’s a sign above the archway that says ‘Cine’. It’s chucking it down, heavy, fat rain that bounces off…
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I’m not a practical person, nor am I a particularly logical one. I daydream. I never know the time. I see the world through spectacles tinted in the shade of what is desirable and convenient to me, a sort of lilacy-blue colour usually. I truly believe that I can bend the universe to my will,…
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Getting lost in Chatuchak Market is a rite of passage for new arrivals to Bangkok. It’s only once you’ve felt that panic, that real thud in the chest realisation that you’re lost and dehydrated and if passed out on the spot nobody would come to look for you, you’d just get swept up with the…
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The first time I went to Chatuchak Market it was a hallucinatory experience. I had been in Thailand for less than two days. I was jet-lagged and hung-over, swept along with the crowd, blinded by the sun, sweating and dehydrated, too overwhelmed to commit to a purchase, of anything, even a bottle of water. I’m…
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Coming to Bangkok for the second time is like déjà vu, unsettlingly familiar. I lost a whole day when we arrived. A whole day, half a rotation of the earth, gone. After three flights and almost 24 hours of travelling I collapsed into bed at 1.30am and when I slept, I slept for fourteen hours.…
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One of the main reasons people visit Yogyakarta is to take advantage of its proximity to the ancient Buddhist temple of Borobudur. Everywhere you look, travel agents advertise tours to Borobudur boldly describing it as one of the ‘wonders of the world’. It isn’t, like, and having not seen any of the seven I can’t…
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