In a karma coma...

Acclimating oneself to a new culture with an open mind means many things to many people. Sometimes, there are those who hang on to the habits of the old, adhering to certain routines they’ve fine-tuned for most their lives. Other times, there are people who are energized at the prospect of the unknown and eager to experience things with the proverbial grain of salt. After a while, the different trends begin to develop and reveal themselves. You see the different people come in with their motives (whatever they may be), and after a while, you're able to categorize them. But fuck, weird shit happens in between. You stand back, take a breath, and take stock at where you’re at; probably a slight bit more jaded than when you came, all the while your street savvy has become surprisingly veteran-like.

As the youngest of this “band of outsiders,” I’m also a babe-in-arms when it comes to the underbelly subculture of dating, socializing, etc. in this town of Saigon (…which is what anyone cares about, really. OK, maybe the food). You see, I’ve been here and back for the past three years but this last permanent move saw me in a relationship for the majority of the time, which has since recently ran its course. I haven’t been out there and taken an in-depth look at what this town has to offer when it comes to the pleasures of the physical. But…that ostensible naïveté is only in comparison to my friends. I know the lexicon, the rituals, the routines, the dos and don’ts, the WTFs, LOLs, and BRBs of this city. There’s been a lot of legwork--and trial-and-error calculations and miscalculations--which has gone into developing the mindset we’re all in concurrently. The narrative in this blog will be the unveiling of our savoir-faire through anecdotes, theories, and our progressive learning curve, as well as acclimation struggles, that may or may not give the interweb world a peak of the ace up our sleeves.

There’s a perennial beauty and allure to this town. As you will see, the beauty lies within the ugliness as well. But hey, a morning of awkwardness is far better than a night of loneliness.


DL