After a rough last few days, I slept a few hours and rose bright and early to catch a boat. I floated through Ha Long Bay, an UNESCO World Heritage Site known for the thousands of forested islets that jut out of the emerald sea.
When I think of Vietnam, I think of blistering heat, bugs, and the never-ending scorch of the sun. I was surprised to wake up to weather— sixty degrees and non-stop rain. I thought I woke up in Seattle. I was relieved—after all the stares and attention I drew in the Philippines, I was looking forward to wearing long pants and a coat that would allow me to walk without incurring too much attention.
Walking around the city of Hanoi is an adventure in its own right. I was glad I left early as I had time to watch the locals weave through the dense motorbike traffic that clogged the streets. It’s an art, and it took me about a day before I truly felt confident I wouldn’t get hit by a bike every time I crossed the street. The trick is to keep moving—motorists are anticipating your movement, so you need to move at a steady pace. It’s not the people moving confidently who are at risk—it’s the ones who get nervous and stop halfway. On my first day, I made it a point to wait for a local to begin crossing and followed closely behind.
While the cloudy weather wasn’t conducive to providing the emerald-colored waters I was promised, Ha Long Bay was still worth the trek. As I gazed around on the roof of the boat, limestone islands covered in rainforests jutted astutely out of the water everywhere I looked.
After a successful afternoon of boating through the bay, kayaking through caverns, and hiking through caves, I headed to dinner with three others I had met on the boat – a petite French woman with a cigarette attached to her hand, a music journalist living in Berlin who was traveling Southeast Asia covering the emerging music scene, and a man from Portland currently living and working in Bangkok. We had dinner at a Bun Cha restaurant, one of the best meals I had on this trip. We swapped travel stories, and I told them about my harrowing adventure getting into Vietnam.
Ha Long Bay 
“So when did you finally get into the country?” one of them asked.
“Oh, last night,” I responded.
We all laughed—it does seem crazy that this all happened less than 24 hours ago, but it felt good to be able to joke about it already.
After dinner, we had heard rumors that there were places in Vietnam that had beers for twelve thousand dong, or about fifty cents USD. We wandered through the night market, past food stalls and Oriental trinkets, and down the main street filled with live music and dancers.
I spent the next day wandering the city, which was decorated for the Chinese New Year celebrations that were to begin next week. Since I got into the country late, I only had a day to explore the city, so I made stops at the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum and the beautiful Khuê Văn Các or Temple of Literature, Vietnam’s first university built in 1070 AD.
I was invited to a drag show the following night. My biggest regret in Vietnam (other than my visa mixup) was not being able to attend. I’m fascinated by the emerging LGBT scene here and was interested to know what a drag show was like here. However, I had just booked my overnight train to Da Nang, where I would transfer to the ancient town of Hoi An, my next stop in Vietnam.