Day 8: Ho Chi Minh City
I sometimes struggle to decide: does this belong on my blog or in my journal? Yesterday, for instance, shortly after arriving at the Park Hyatt (points life = free stay), I had a really lovely but intense conversation with a woman I’d only just met. It only lasted several minutes, but we went deep—so deep I wonder how much to share.
Vi. That’s what her name tag said. As she checked me in, she asked where I’d been, where I was going. I told her Da Nang, Hoi An. She said she’s never had the chance to go and I felt a pang of guilt. When I said I would go to Seoul next before flying back to New York, she got excited and told me she’d lived in Orange County. She asked if it was very cold in New York and I said only in the winter. She had also lived in Wisconsin and worked at something that sounded like a “fancy” waterpark resort.
I asked what her favorite part of Ho Chi Minh City is, and she gave me some suggestions. She asked if I was traveling alone and I thought: here we go. But she called me a strong woman and said that she likes to go to movies alone. That she needs that time to herself, even though she has a baby, especially so. How old is your baby? I asked and she told me, “Seven.” She had him in Orange County. She’s a single mother. She raised him there for nine months alone before returning to Vietnam to live with her mother. “No, you’re the strong woman!” I said.
As she accompanied me on the elevator and up to my room, she asked me if I have “a baby” and I said no, I wish. She said there’s still time, even after I told her how old I am. She’s thirty-four. “You will have one” she said with such confidence that I wanted to hug her or cry or both. Before she backed out of my room, we bemoaned the lack of marriageable men. “The young ones are too crazy,” she said. “And the ones the same age, all married!” Exactly! I said. Exactly.
After she’d gone, I wondered if I was supposed to tip her, if that’s what she was hoping for. But to offer money after such a heartfelt connection—weird, right? Tipping isn’t customary in Vietnam, so finally I decided: no. She wanted to share her story, nothing more.
Gut fully wrenched, I went out into the city, walking the twenty minutes to Pham Viet Chanh, the small patch of upstart bars and cafes catering to expats in the area near Little Japan (one tiny street full of sushi and ramen shops). I stumbled upon an enclave of digital nomads at Bel, where I stopped for a coffee before walking down to the Kaarem boutique—a brick and mortar store by one of my favorite brands.
The tiny store held less than you can get online, so after a quick browse, I chatted a bit with the woman behind the counter of the minuscule store. Elaine moved here from Crown Heights not that long ago to run the shop for the founders. She grew up in California, and learned Vietnamese as a kid but is relearning now—the language has evolved so much in the past couple of decades.
She told me her favorite part of the city is in District 3. She loves the French Colonial and modernist architecture and she lit up as she told me about it. I asked how she likes living here and she said that even though it’s chaotic, it’s less stressful than in New York, where every day was a struggle to make rent. But she misses the directness of the city. She never liked California because she could never tell if people were saying what they mean.
Later, after a Le Labo-sponsored bath, I went down to the hotel bar to cash in my free drink. They gave me a too-hefty pour of shiraz, so I lingered, writing, and Shazaming the tracks of the surprisingly good DJ, a young Vietnamese woman who danced by taking a few steps in one direction and clapping her hands in front of her face, then turning and going the other.
Woozy but happy, I left the wine unfinished and went back out into the night in search of food. But the chaos Elaine had mentioned was real in District 1. Scooters swarmed in packs, people stood around on congested corners, colored lights flashed, people spoke over intercoms, and even the McDonald’s looked too complicated to handle. So back I went for room service pho and Alchemy of Souls before falling dead asleep.
Bonus: this unhinged letter from the hotel.