Destination: Vietnam

During the winter break of my senior year, I was fortunate enough to be able to revisit my home country. I traveled from California with my cousin who is an international student from Vietnam. At this point in time, it had been nearly 12 years since I last step foot in the country. This post will talk about what it felt like to return to a country whose culture was deeply rooted in my upbringing.

Some of the pictures I have added are famous Vietnamese dishes. That was the thing that I missed the most about Vietnam. Even though it had been 12 years, I still remember the street vendors in front of my grandmother's house. It was great to be able to go back home and share these meals with my family. My grandparents are too old to fly to America therefore my brothers and I took turns going home to visit them. I was always too busy with college so I couldn't go until this past Winter break. Now that I have started graduate school, I doubt I'll have time to go home again but I hold this trip very near and dear to my memory.

I was fortunate enough to be able to travel throughout Vietnam on my trip. We started in the northern side of the country at Hanoi Airport. My grandparents were in Haiphong so I traveled there for a few days before going south to Saigon. The north was actually cold in December but the south was as hot and humid as ever. After a few days in Saigon, my family traveled to Da Nang, which is located in the middle of Vietnam. My stays during each region was brief because I only had two weeks to spend in the whole country. Despite that, I felt like I was there fore much longer because I got to reconnect with family and discover the modernized version of Vietnam.