worlds colliding, life as a buffet, squat toilet train, settling in

My 4+ days in HK only solidified its place in my heart as the top spot in the world.  It just has everything...I think it's cute when NYer's blab on and on about how New York is the greatest city in the world.  To me it's as if Hong Kong stole NYC's lunch, ate it, then took a dump on New York's chest.  It's that good.  Spent some good time with Nathan, walked around a ton and really just ate.  I found myself in a legit dim sum place as the only white person and got to chase around the carts, bark in Chinese (or attempt to at least) like the others to get what I wanted and bump elbows with my fellow patrons.  Went out for drinks and Indian food one night and then ended up in a BYO ratty hip-hop/techno-pop club dancing until 4am or something.  Woke up naked in an unknown, luxurious apartment with a stunning view of the city.  Ate, what else, ramen, to kill the hangover and then had some of the bomb diggiest cantonese food for dinner/second meal of the day.  Even squeezed in a lovely beach day the following day.

Flew from HKG to Hanoi.  You know, a lot of people say that there's no point or at least that they have no interest in going back to a place for the second time.  And yeah, I can see where they're coming from, but at the same time, you have such a different perspective going back to a place.  Spent a couple days getting lost in the back alleys of that Commi concrete maze, doing really what else, but eating.  Was treated to some awesome hospitality with the family that I stayed with last time and really didn't need to waste anytime doing things that I had already seen.  Just focused on the food.  Spent an afternoon on "beer corner" downing 25 cent cups of homemade beer, people watching and drunkenly philosophizing about life and what I wanted to do in the coming months.

Since I had already taken a night bus from Hanoi to Hue, I opted for the more expensive and less comfortable day train.  The thing is the means of travel you use gives you such a varied lens through which to view your journey.  And it didn't disappoint.  Though it was a honestly incredibly boring 14 hour trip (I got to watch "She's the Man"), the scenery was killer.  During the daylight we were humming along lakes and rivers, slicing through rice paddies and cruising through limestone karsts with only a handful of souls in the surrounding landscape.  It was kinda odd tho that in villages of mud huts, where people who know that after a lifetime of endlessly toiling in the same fields as their past generations and who physically work around the graves of their lost ones, ostentatious 16th-century replica Christian churches rose up in the "town" center.  And yeah, that's a really ugly run-on, so deal with it.  Like, where did these monstrosities come from?  A U.S. church?  USAID?  I don't really know.  But in a country like Vietnam something tells me it's not the government and that this aid money could be spent in better ways.

Anyway, got off the train in Hue and in about 8 seconds I was traveling through an entirely different lens, whipping through traffic on the back of a motorbike.  I almost forgot how fun that was.  Had the driver swing by my friend Thuy's office and successfully surprised him.  Caught up with him and then  checked into my fav lil crack den hotel.  Met up with Thuy again and by the time dinner was over (bun bo hue, so good) I had a job and travel plans for the next 3 months.

heng gap lai!

speed, more speed, walking across, lots of nothing, magners

This'll be brief.  Took the overnight bus from San Ignacio northwards.  Got off in that nothing town I mentioned earlier and Alby (rightfully so) suggested we get back on the bus and keep going to Ensenada.  Ensenada's a cruise ship border town so it's filled with cheap prescription drugs, dirty bars and creepy dudes.  Well when in Rome right.  So we checked in to an hourly motel and hopped on the party train.  Long story short, after an amount of certain stuff that would make Robert Downey Jr. spin, too many beers, a good amount of nudity and going to bed at 5am we woke up not with a hangover, but with an empty, hollow, omg what happened feeling.  I did manage to meet a really cool chick tho...that wasn't a hooker!

Anyway, a few days of recovery and we crossed the border by foot in Tijuana then trained it back to LA.  Kicked it in LA for a couple weeks doing frankly nothing.  Did have a memorable afternoon with Herm though.  And you know, being on the road and seeing stuff and what not as I've been doing, I've come to realize that it's these kinds of little things that you really end up remembering.  People talk about these transcendental, life-altering experiences traveling, but I would tell them to piss off and that life is really made up of events like this - We got stoned (surprise).  Made some lunch together, hung out, then walked down the cliffs on low tide and spent a couple hours hiking around and exploring the tide pools.  Blunted it (surprise).  Then we went into this cave that I had always seen but never been in.  The opening is about the size of a man on his stomach but once you crawl through it opens up to maybe 30ft x 30ft.  Really awesome afternoon with my lil bro.  And something that keeps you grounded in what the human experience is really about.

Hopped up to SF for 5 days, saw Bert and the gang which twas awesome, ate at HOPR (omg so good) and then flew over to HK.  So here I am.  Half drunk on Magner's in SoHo HK being British in Asia and staying with Nathan.  Talk soon once I'm back in Vietnam.