A love letter to “Greg”, my 50 litre Gregory Jade backpack, who has been my most faithful travel companion over the years. Dear Greg, You’ve taken a hammering over the years. Seen too many dirty floors and dusty trails. Been thrown into many under carriages of hot buses and trains, buried underneath things far largerRead more
Writers block, writers block, writers block. How can I describe the last few days? How can I find the right words to explain how things happened, how people and families have welcomed me into their homes, their lives? How I am feeling my own existence in ways I’ve never felt before? It’s been two weeksRead more
I am sipping a cold beer in a slender glass filled with ice – the Vietnamese way of consuming the local brew. My father used to drink it this way, asked for ice in whatever alcoholic beverage he drank. A travesty to Western beer drinkers, but the only way to drink it here after aRead more
Hanoi is a city to be felt, not explained. It is a city of paradoxes. It is visceral, it is complex, it is elegant, it is ugly. Modern. Historic. Timeless. The Old Quarter, where I am, a tangle of narrow streets lined with store fronts packed inside like sardines, a litany of any and allRead more
Three days before I left for Vietnam, I finally got a hold of Lynn, my father’s close friend from Vietnam who I was raised to know as my aunt. It wasn’t until after his death that I found out that she wasn’t my father’s sister. It’s incredible how complicated it can be to track peopleRead more
The moon is hanging big and low in the sky over the Auckland horizon as I fly into the city. A reddish gold color I often think of when picturing the night sky in the East. Fitting, I think with a smile. Maybe a good sign, too. I try to keep my eyes on itRead more