Travel Dispatch from Vietnam (circa 2001)

I was sitting in my work cubicle, three years into my my first post-college job, when one of my good friends sent me the email below. I can remember my blood boiling with envy and jealousy as I read it. I don't have a record of my response, however I'm sure it was something to the effect of "just you wait, I'll get my chance to travel and then I'll be the one sending you such messages!"

----- Original Message ----
From: A Friend
To: Dave
Sent: Tuesday, September 17, 2002 11:39:30 AM
Subject: Vietnam.....

hey mr wannabe world traveler!

whats up?

At the moment, I'm held up in an Internet cafe in the middle of Vietnam waiting out a f*cking monsoon storm. Hopefully it will pass in the next 20 minutes but you never know!

Anyway, I have been traveling and thinking about how much you would LOVE S.E. Asia! Everything that backpacking in Europe USED to be, still exists here in S.E. Asia. The backpacking culture is MUCH MORE pronounced and finding reasonable hotels/travelers ghettos and the like is not only feasible, but quite often, the only way around. Today I'm in a little hotel in an alley run but a Vietnamese French woman for 3$!! Food here is supposed to be expensive and I average 2-3 a meal!! And that is at a nice sit down establishment!

Also, there is simply so much to see and do. There is a very well worn backpacker path and it is truly fantastic. You meet people all the time (though it is low season so it's a lot of older couples, at least in North Vietnam) and then bump into them again along " the path."?

From where I am, I will slowly go south and eventually reach Saigon. Then cut through Cambodia to Bangkok which is supposed to be the backpacker epicenter on the planet. Spend a few days there trying to be like Leonardo di Caprio (which apparently, everyone is) then off to the beaches. Trying to time it for a full moon party.

After a few weeks, I will go own through Malaysia into Singapore to more or less come home.

Anyway, bottom line-come here! It's great! Well, you won't find loads of hot women but everything else is fantastic. You still can find places where few tourists visit and travel can be a real challenge (e.g., China, where, if you don't speak the language, you are totally f*cked and have to rely on your wits to get around-of course, I only hear about this since I am Chinese).

Ok, the rain just stopped do I'm off!

k