Week 3: Daily Life In Hanoi

Weekly Highs, Lows, and Daily Joys

• Highs: the boom of welcoming “heys” when I walked into family dinner, entrusting my life to Hoa while riding in the dark and rain, the view waking up in Du Gia

• Lows: aches from hard beds and sitting on a motorbike all weekend, an unproductive day spent searching for wifi, challenging group dynamics

• Daily Joy: Ca phe sua ☕️, music 🎶, enjoying the views

The Details

To the folks back home who checked in on me, or are wondering about my health, rest assured I am doing well and back to adventuring as planned. I cannot thank our City Manager enough for helping me figure out what medicine I needed to feel better, and faster, and our Community Leader for support throughout the strange time.

I recovered from Covid earlier than the designated isolation period, and I was able to rejoin the group for a family dinner. These bi-weekly dinners began organically, led by a Remote, Rapha, who simply has a love for cooking. Hosted in our co-working space, Rapha made a wonderful curry that warmed the soul. Even more soul-warming was the welcome back to the group. I walked into dinner and was greeted with a boom of “heys” and “we missed you”. Though it was complete overwhelm, going from isolation to a big family dinner, I felt so loved and appreciative of the community we’ve built in just three weeks.

The same night, one of our Remotes organized a movie night. We watched The Third Wife, a movie set in the 19th century, it follows a 14-year-old girl who becomes the third wife to a landowner in rural northern Vietnam. A heavy but beautiful film, I appreciated that the movie uses woman's experiences as the framework for cultural experiences of females during that time period.

My week continued with new opportunities to connect and go deeper with Remotes. On the eve of a weekly “Bake Off” screening, a few Remotes and I went to a Tron themed bar where cocktails were inspired by Vietnam’s hustle and burning trash on the side of the road. We carried on to Pasteur Brewing Company, a Ho Chi Minh City-based brewery that served up flights of Pomelo IPAs and Jasmine Ambers. Pushing the limits of a Wednesday night, the group continued to yet another bar. After a few weeks of being away from some long-term friendships, I think we all were enjoying the chance to learn about each other in a smaller setting.

Truthfully, it felt like the theme of the week was "connection". Later that we, our Community Leader hosted a “Pecha Kucha” and “Unconference”. Core to the Remote Year experience, these rapid, presentation-style meet-ups are designed to get to know other Remotes and learn new things. It felt really nice to get to know people, their history, what they like to do, and how they describe themselves in 30 seconds. I spent the afternoon working so I could take a long-weekend adventure to Ha Giang, a famous yet off-the-beaten path motorbike loop in a wild, rural and jaw-dropping province of Vietnam.

Check out my post about my motorbike loop experience in Ha Giang!