11 Favorite Moments in Southeast Asia

It started snowing here again in Kiev, despite the fact that it’s April and yesterday I was sure we had finally broken upon spring. Nope, today it’s back to hot mulled wine and cold feet. It made me think fondly back on Southeast Asian heat, and I realized that it’s been three whole months since we left Asia.

I thought of that, too, because I’m done writing about Southeast Asia. For a while, at least. You might see a random food post about Vietnam (because even I start drooling when I look back through those pictures) or me waxing philosophical on my complicated feelings for Singapore, but I’m ready to move on. I’ve started drafting posts on Cuba and Kiev is positively fantastic and I can’t wait to tell you all about it.

But those three months in Southeast Asia are incredibly special to me, that time when we decided to go for it, jump off into this nomadic life. And while I was living it, I tried to immortalize my favorite moments in Southeast Asia — because I have a really terrible memory and knew if I didn’t write them down I’d probably forget them forever. But also because this is a fabulous life I’m living and I want to make sure I appreciate it.

So here I have, to share with you, my favorite moments in Southeast Asia. Maybe you’ve had some of them as well. But to me, these moments are what I think of when I remember Southeast Asia.

1. Seeing the Northern Lights on my flight to Tokyo

About three hours into my first flight to Tokyo, I was settling in to try to sleep as best as I could. I had my earplugs in, my face mask on, already starting to doze, when I heard a garbled announcement. Even though I faintly heard the words “aurora borealis,” I didn’t register it until I heard the rapid fire clicks of people unbuckling their seatbelts. I pulled up my eye mask to see everyone looking out the windows, so I pushed my window shade open.

We were flying past the Northern Lights.

They weren’t especially clear or bright and I had to crane my neck back to look at them, but it was definitely them, gentle swaths of pale green haze that change imperceptibly, beguiling you with their uncanny ability to change form. The stars around us were shining particularly bright, sprinkled infinitely in the pitch-black sky. I have always wanted to see the Northern Lights but was unsure how I’d ever work it out. Looking at them floating behind us, I started crying. Like, tears uncontrollably slipping down my face super embarrassing near sobbing ugly crying. They’re magic, they truly are, and seeing Aurora Borealis is perhaps one of the highlights of my life, let alone the trip.

2. Waking up early and walking through Asakusa

I had a fourteen-hour overnight layover in Tokyo. I knew that most of that time would be spent trying to navigate the Tokyo metro as I had to switch airports, but since this was the only time I was going to be in Tokyo for the foreseeable future, I pushed myself to get up early and go for a wander around the neighborhood.

I immediately found myself beguiled. Hearing the singing from inside the Asakusa Shrine. The way the light framed Tokyo Skytree. Knowing how incredibly lucky I was to be experiencing any of this.

3. Eating seafood for the first time

Boyfriend pressured me into eating prawn dumplings. They were ok. They were as good as any other dumpling, which is pretty damn good.

4. Phosphorous algae in the open ocean

It was pitch-black crossing the water from Sibu Island back to mainland Malaysia. We had known this was coming and I was terrified the entire afternoon leading up to our trip, but one of the women at the resort that she had done it the night before and survived and that it had been very cool.

“There was phosphorous algae,” she said. “With the stars above and the algae in our wake, it was beautiful. And these guys know what they’re doing. Don’t worry.”

We’re just crossing an ocean in the middle of the night on a tiny speedboat driven by a guy who was just playing a drinking game with us, our way lit by a flashlight. What’s to worry about?

And it was scary at first. Then I looked out at our wake with the four-foot high flumes, and you could see sparks. Tiny flashes of the phosphorous algae. At first it was just a couple, here and there. But then as we got further away from the island, out into the open sea, we kicked up even more algae. They flew out behind us, making it look like we were skimming over the water so fast we were actually causing sparks. Just a handful, here and there, but enough to make the crossing magical. It almost looked like fairy dust.

And still, that crossing was probably the most terrifying twenty minutes of my life.

5. Riding a motorbike in Bali

I always love hopping on the back of a motorbike while traveling. Having our own transportation always makes me feel more in control of the trip. But also you feel so much more in it – zooming around, weaving in and out of traffic alongside locals on their own motorbikes, driving through streets of real life. Not just the tourist shops and westernized restaurants, but the local eateries and insane houses and the gorgeous views of rice paddies that you didn’t plan and vegetable stands the sell motorbike gas in Absolute vodka bottles.

Boyfriend loves to share this quote from Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance:

“In a car you’re always in a compartment, and because you’re used to it you don’t realize that through that car window everything you see is just more TV. You’re a passive observer and it is all moving by you boringly in a frame.

On a cycle the frame is gone. You’re completely in contact with it all. You’re in the scene, not just watching it anymore, and the sense of presence is overwhelming.”

You don’t have a filter when you’re on a motorbike. You are your own journey. (Which, by the way, is sometimes terrifying.)

6. Exploring Gunung Kawi

I don’t know the significance of Gunung Kawi. I know it’s old. And the views of the rice paddies were jaw-dropping. The towering mountainside reliefs were Indiana Jones-esque. And it was so quiet. Not besieged by dozens of tour groups. I don’t know much about it besides how it made me feel, and it felt like a delightful secret.

7. Waving at the kids in Cambodia

The children in Cambodia completely stole my heart. They were the most amazing bundles of wonder and innocence and sometimes heart-breaking sadness, when you caught glimpses of the poverty. As my friend and I weaved our way through traffic, two white chicks on a motorbike, we gathered a couple of stares from the local children. My favorite time was waving at a little girl who just lost it with giggles, completely tickled by our interaction.

8. Golden hour in Cambodia

9. Sunrise on the night train between Bangkok and Nong Khai

Waking up to Boyfriend poking his head through my bunk’s curtain, then crawling down to sit on his bunk and watch the sunrise over the Thailand countryside while sipping instant train coffee. Thailand is a gilded country anyway, but in that morning light it looked like the land of King Midas.

10. Christmas in Laos

It started at the night market on Christmas Eve, as Boyfriend and I combed the vendors trying to find small gifts for each other. Wrapping our presents in plastic bags (or, as Boyfriend more classily did, packing them all in an adorable elephant pouch from the market) and placing them under our Christmas tree, aka the potted plastic flowers at the hotel.

And then Christmas morning, when usually I’m waking up with my family to a full stocking of annual favorites (gum, toothbrush, floss… there’s a pattern) and brunch already started. Boyfriend woke me up with Frank Sinatra Christmas tunes and a ‘fire’ going on the computer screen, and thoughtful presents (including a handmade cloth ‘watch’ to replace the one whose wristband broke back in Singapore).

11. Cruising in Ha Long Bay

Ha Long Bay is undoubtedly beautiful, otherworldly in spite of (or maybe even because of) the overcast days and mist we experienced. There was something peaceful and secluded about sipping Vietnamese coffee on the ‘sun deck’ of the boat, staring around at the jagged karsts with their desperately clinging trees, talking about where we would establish our pirate cove.

It’s important to research these things.

I’m sure I’ll be back again to Southeast Asia. And then I’ll have another list of favorite moments. Until then, selamat tinggal, tạm biệt, บาย.

Have you been to Southeast Asia? What were some of your favorite moments?