Vietnam By Night

There’s something slightly dangerous about agreeing to a “food tasting” with a local Vietnamese person. Not dangerous in the taken-from-a-hostel-never-seen-again sense. More dangerous to your stomach, your feet, and your ability to say no politely while being handed your seventh mystery item on a stick.

Yesterday started innocently enough. “We’ll walk,” they said.

That should have been the first warning.

People in Vietnam don’t “walk” the way Australians walk. Australians stroll twenty metres to a café and call it exercise. Vietnamese people walk like they’re training for an Olympic endurance event while casually chatting and weaving through traffic that looks like organised chaos.

So we walked.

And walked.

And ate.

Little things wrapped in leaves. Things grilled over charcoal. Tiny bowls of soup that somehow tasted better than entire meals back home. Bread rolls that would make Australian bakeries shut their doors in shame. Every second stop came with someone proudly watching us take the first bite like they’d personally invented flavour.

And somehow, despite being absolutely full, we kept eating.

Eventually we ended up by the river where the lantern boats were waiting. Tiny wooden boats glowing with coloured lanterns drifting across the water while tourists tried not to fall in climbing aboard with the grace of injured giraffes.

It was honestly beautiful.

Hoi An at night looks less like a town and more like someone collectively agreed reality needed softer lighting. Lanterns everywhere. Reflections across the water. Music drifting from restaurants. People laughing. Little boats floating past in the dark looking like scenes from a movie.

For about half an hour I forgot about life, bills, social media idiots, and the fact my knees now fucking kill me every time I stand up.

Then naturally we ended up at what was basically the Vietnamese equivalent of a pub because apparently the night still wasn’t over. Cold drinks. Loud conversations. Tiny plastic stools seemingly designed by someone who hates spines.

By the time we finally caught a car back home I was completely exhausted. The kind of tired where your body stops functioning properly and you just stare silently out the window questioning every life choice that led you there.

Worth it though.

Vietnam has this annoying habit of making you feel more alive while simultaneously trying to physically destroy you.