the next river i visit will be the mekong
So, i just booked my flight to Laos. I was wrestling with how many days to book, which is something i always struggle with when i holiday while employed. On one hand, i want to have long enough on the holiday that i don't feel rushed when i'm there. On the other hand, i don't want to waste my annual leave because if i bundle it all together in one big block then it could potentially be used to construct a more psychologically valuable holiday at a later date. I ended up with 10 days.
I really, really, really fucking hate booking limited-time vacations. I hate return tickets. I resent being forced to make plans in advance, when i don't even know if i'll like the place. And it's all because of work, because if there was no work, i could just go whenever, stay for however long i felt like, then leave. Work so thoroughly destroys every pleasure in life, it makes me depressed.
But i don't want to be depressed because today is a public holiday so i should try make the most of it, even though it's fucking raining again. Still.
You know one thing i hope is that it doesn't rain in Laos. Fuck me.
I saw some pictures of Shenzhen the other day and it made me nostalgic. I started thinking about places i lived which i'd put in my top list of places i enjoyed living. And it's very easy. Shenzhen, Berlin, Melbourne.
Shenzhen was the best place because the weather was usually warm and although there was a rainy season, it wasn't very long. There was excellent public transport, including share bikes. Housing was affordable. Convenience stores selling booze and other necessities 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Great food in every urban village. Lots of greenspace in the urban districts, and peaceful mountains to hike close to town. Cross the border to Hong Kong, you got flights going anywhere in the world. Get on the train, you can go anywhere in China. My choice of nightlife there was the outdoor 燒烤 (BBQ) joints, eating tofu and green beans, drinking cheap beer from big bottles in little glasses, listening to the sound of dice games and laughter and cheesy eurobeat that's terrible to dance to but pleasant to have on in the background. The only bad part was the authoritarian government. And that is a pretty significant bad part. Well, that and the shopping malls and gated communities of Rich China, but those are easier to ignore than the government.
Berlin was also a great place to live, but not because of the weather. The weather was cold and miserable for a large chunk of the year, although never so cold you couldn't commute on foot. Public transport was acceptable, although i spent a lot of time walking because the city wasn't too large and remained reasonably pedestrian-friendly. It was still on the edge of affordable when i lived there, although it is probably less so now. The food utterly fucking sucked, no two ways about it. Only good culinary thing about living in Germany is brötchen and vegan options. But the nightclubs were fantastic, they've probably ruined every other city in the world for me now. Clubbing in the daytime instead of at night. Hearing exactly the music i liked for hours on end, instead of just catching one or two tracks of good music in between a whole set of boring-ass hipster techno and progressive "bangers". Spätis open 24/7 selling beer and kebabs. Punks and drunks and weirdos everywhere. Yes, the city is also overrun by tourists, but like rich people in China, they're easy to avoid.
And then Melbourne, the place my Brisbane friends scoffed at because it has a well-deserved reputation for being snooty and pretentious. Also, the weather sucks by Australian standards. Too cold in winter. Too hot in summer. But mostly too cold. It was barely affordable when i lived there and by all accounts it's completely unaffordable now. But there was fantastic food. Excellent coffee, much better than Shenzhen (obviously) or Berlin (oddly). So much great south-east Asian food. All kinds of Chinese food. Mediterranean food. It was an amazing place to eat, and i owe a lot of my present-day tastes and preferences to stuff i discovered living there. The nightclub scene is solid, if a little trendy. I lived in other places that were similar - especially Toronto has a similarly cosmopolitan feeling - but Toronto doesn't make the cut because of complete housing unaffordability and much worse weather. In both cities the public transport is decent, although not great.
It's clear that i love living in the city. I love 24/7 convenience, and any city that doesn't provide it can barely be called a city in my books. I love public transport and great food and a proper party scene, or, at least, some way for people to go out on their own, have drinks, listen to some tunes, and feel connected with their community without feeling obliged to interact with anyone.
But i do also love greenspace and being able to hike and walk and bike, especially in places that do not require a car to get there. Some spots i lived were much more within striking distance of the countryside - like Kamloops, for example - although they often lack a lot of big city conveniences and pleasures. I did without those things during the pandemic because everybody did, but now? I dunno.
The thing about Taipei is that it doesn't really make the cut because although the food is much better than Berlin, it's nowhere near as diverse as Melbourne or as delicious as Shenzhen. I can't speak for the nightlife because i haven't experienced any. And that's partially because it fucking rains all the time, which kills my motivation to go out. Plus there is fuck all greenspace except along the river, which you can't get to without going multiple blocks across multiple lanes of heavy traffic, with traffic lights that sometimes make pedestrians wait up to 2 minutes to cross. It's not near as nice of a city as others i've lived, although i suppose the main draw is that it's affordable.
I just want the rain to stop.
Perhaps if i just discovered some good places to hang out it could climb up the rankings. But i also wish that there were jobs elsewhere in Taiwan. Alas it's one of those single-city countries where all the good jobs are in the capital, and everywhere else has brain drain. Which is too bad, because from what i remember literally every other city in Taiwan is better than Taipei.
I will go visit the other cities on my next holiday. I do still want to explore this sweet potato of a Pacific island that i now call home.
But for the upcoming holiday i'm going to end up somewhere that in some ways will feel similar - brown river, green mountains, lots of temples - but in other ways will feel very different. I'm flying into Luang Prabang, the main tourist town in Laos. Although from what i understand that's a relative concept, because Laos hasn't been quite as heavily commercialized as Thailand and Vietnam. I am expecting it to be very laid back. Hopefully not as awkwardly stratified between money-having tourists and money-hunting locals as Bocas del Toro in Panama. I just want to relax and blend into the background.
I said on the 2022 reflection meme that i missed my mom. I do miss my mom. I also remember a conversation i had with her, maybe one of the last heart-to-hearts we had when she came to visit me in Berlin. I joked that because i hate working so much, i will never amass enough money to retire in the conventional way, so i plan to one day move to Laos and live out my days in a hut. I'd never been to Laos, never even thought much about it. But it was a placeholder for my fantasy expat retirement. Go somewhere cheap where the weather is good. Live a simple life. Because fuck if i'll ever have enough money to retire in a developed country.
Ironically, my mom died not long after that, and left me enough that i went from zero retirement savings to a quarter million overnight. I'm still not quite sure how to square that with my imagination of what my life would've turned out like before she passed.
Some part of me still feels like i am going to end up a fat, ruddy-faced, silver-haired expat sweating through my Hawaiian shirt in a jungle somewhere. Living like some alcoholic, washed-up CIA agent who doesn't have any real friends left, just trying to find the last little scrap of pleasure in life before his past catches up with him. That's the dream. That was the dream, anyway. Now i don't know any more.
But that old dream is the one i'm going to think about when i land in this little town full of temples and palm trees by the Mekong river. Maybe i should buy a Hawaiian shirt.
I really, really, really fucking hate booking limited-time vacations. I hate return tickets. I resent being forced to make plans in advance, when i don't even know if i'll like the place. And it's all because of work, because if there was no work, i could just go whenever, stay for however long i felt like, then leave. Work so thoroughly destroys every pleasure in life, it makes me depressed.
But i don't want to be depressed because today is a public holiday so i should try make the most of it, even though it's fucking raining again. Still.
You know one thing i hope is that it doesn't rain in Laos. Fuck me.
I saw some pictures of Shenzhen the other day and it made me nostalgic. I started thinking about places i lived which i'd put in my top list of places i enjoyed living. And it's very easy. Shenzhen, Berlin, Melbourne.
Shenzhen was the best place because the weather was usually warm and although there was a rainy season, it wasn't very long. There was excellent public transport, including share bikes. Housing was affordable. Convenience stores selling booze and other necessities 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Great food in every urban village. Lots of greenspace in the urban districts, and peaceful mountains to hike close to town. Cross the border to Hong Kong, you got flights going anywhere in the world. Get on the train, you can go anywhere in China. My choice of nightlife there was the outdoor 燒烤 (BBQ) joints, eating tofu and green beans, drinking cheap beer from big bottles in little glasses, listening to the sound of dice games and laughter and cheesy eurobeat that's terrible to dance to but pleasant to have on in the background. The only bad part was the authoritarian government. And that is a pretty significant bad part. Well, that and the shopping malls and gated communities of Rich China, but those are easier to ignore than the government.
Berlin was also a great place to live, but not because of the weather. The weather was cold and miserable for a large chunk of the year, although never so cold you couldn't commute on foot. Public transport was acceptable, although i spent a lot of time walking because the city wasn't too large and remained reasonably pedestrian-friendly. It was still on the edge of affordable when i lived there, although it is probably less so now. The food utterly fucking sucked, no two ways about it. Only good culinary thing about living in Germany is brötchen and vegan options. But the nightclubs were fantastic, they've probably ruined every other city in the world for me now. Clubbing in the daytime instead of at night. Hearing exactly the music i liked for hours on end, instead of just catching one or two tracks of good music in between a whole set of boring-ass hipster techno and progressive "bangers". Spätis open 24/7 selling beer and kebabs. Punks and drunks and weirdos everywhere. Yes, the city is also overrun by tourists, but like rich people in China, they're easy to avoid.
And then Melbourne, the place my Brisbane friends scoffed at because it has a well-deserved reputation for being snooty and pretentious. Also, the weather sucks by Australian standards. Too cold in winter. Too hot in summer. But mostly too cold. It was barely affordable when i lived there and by all accounts it's completely unaffordable now. But there was fantastic food. Excellent coffee, much better than Shenzhen (obviously) or Berlin (oddly). So much great south-east Asian food. All kinds of Chinese food. Mediterranean food. It was an amazing place to eat, and i owe a lot of my present-day tastes and preferences to stuff i discovered living there. The nightclub scene is solid, if a little trendy. I lived in other places that were similar - especially Toronto has a similarly cosmopolitan feeling - but Toronto doesn't make the cut because of complete housing unaffordability and much worse weather. In both cities the public transport is decent, although not great.
It's clear that i love living in the city. I love 24/7 convenience, and any city that doesn't provide it can barely be called a city in my books. I love public transport and great food and a proper party scene, or, at least, some way for people to go out on their own, have drinks, listen to some tunes, and feel connected with their community without feeling obliged to interact with anyone.
But i do also love greenspace and being able to hike and walk and bike, especially in places that do not require a car to get there. Some spots i lived were much more within striking distance of the countryside - like Kamloops, for example - although they often lack a lot of big city conveniences and pleasures. I did without those things during the pandemic because everybody did, but now? I dunno.
The thing about Taipei is that it doesn't really make the cut because although the food is much better than Berlin, it's nowhere near as diverse as Melbourne or as delicious as Shenzhen. I can't speak for the nightlife because i haven't experienced any. And that's partially because it fucking rains all the time, which kills my motivation to go out. Plus there is fuck all greenspace except along the river, which you can't get to without going multiple blocks across multiple lanes of heavy traffic, with traffic lights that sometimes make pedestrians wait up to 2 minutes to cross. It's not near as nice of a city as others i've lived, although i suppose the main draw is that it's affordable.
I just want the rain to stop.
Perhaps if i just discovered some good places to hang out it could climb up the rankings. But i also wish that there were jobs elsewhere in Taiwan. Alas it's one of those single-city countries where all the good jobs are in the capital, and everywhere else has brain drain. Which is too bad, because from what i remember literally every other city in Taiwan is better than Taipei.
I will go visit the other cities on my next holiday. I do still want to explore this sweet potato of a Pacific island that i now call home.
But for the upcoming holiday i'm going to end up somewhere that in some ways will feel similar - brown river, green mountains, lots of temples - but in other ways will feel very different. I'm flying into Luang Prabang, the main tourist town in Laos. Although from what i understand that's a relative concept, because Laos hasn't been quite as heavily commercialized as Thailand and Vietnam. I am expecting it to be very laid back. Hopefully not as awkwardly stratified between money-having tourists and money-hunting locals as Bocas del Toro in Panama. I just want to relax and blend into the background.
I said on the 2022 reflection meme that i missed my mom. I do miss my mom. I also remember a conversation i had with her, maybe one of the last heart-to-hearts we had when she came to visit me in Berlin. I joked that because i hate working so much, i will never amass enough money to retire in the conventional way, so i plan to one day move to Laos and live out my days in a hut. I'd never been to Laos, never even thought much about it. But it was a placeholder for my fantasy expat retirement. Go somewhere cheap where the weather is good. Live a simple life. Because fuck if i'll ever have enough money to retire in a developed country.
Ironically, my mom died not long after that, and left me enough that i went from zero retirement savings to a quarter million overnight. I'm still not quite sure how to square that with my imagination of what my life would've turned out like before she passed.
Some part of me still feels like i am going to end up a fat, ruddy-faced, silver-haired expat sweating through my Hawaiian shirt in a jungle somewhere. Living like some alcoholic, washed-up CIA agent who doesn't have any real friends left, just trying to find the last little scrap of pleasure in life before his past catches up with him. That's the dream. That was the dream, anyway. Now i don't know any more.
But that old dream is the one i'm going to think about when i land in this little town full of temples and palm trees by the Mekong river. Maybe i should buy a Hawaiian shirt.