An Introduction To The Next Six Months of My Life

Every once in a while, some invisible force grabs us by the hand and directs us towards the unknown. This blog entry, the first of many, is about that magical force which has brought me to Vietnam, and about the perspectives I have and will have gained as a consequence.

I don’t know about you, but I have found that during my life in Canada, I have been very much inclined towards living a semi-normal and un-inspiringly boring lifestyle. That is, by my own personal standards at least. University came and went, four years of routine with occasional part time jobs scattered about, but nothing truly riveting took hold of me.

The straw which broke that stubborn camel’s back came in the truly inspiring form of my best friend and then lover, who, out of a purely adventurous spirit, inspired me to greater things.

As the flow of time tends to direct us in a straight line in which each new moment takes precedent to the next, I find myself here in the present as a consequence of the past. I am here because of the people I have met, of the decisions I have made, and because the entire universe came together at one moment to decide the beginning of all our lives.

Tomorrow will mark the one week point since I have been living in Hanoi, Vietnam. I will be here for the next six months of my life… living. Truly living. Tomorrow, I will be starting my volunteer internship at an NGO (non-governmental organization) called SHAPC (STI, HIV-AIDS Prevention Center) downtown Hanoi. This is my direction for the next six months, the invisible hand of time has brought me here, and I’m not quite sure what it means, or what new directions will follow… all I know is that I am where time has brought me.

I will take the bus for one hour, away from the countryside, along the winding roads, rice fields, and eventually onto the paved roads and into the city center. I will find my away through a maze of unfamiliarity to the office that has been so kind as to take me in as their first official international intern.

I met them today, they were incredibly nice, friendly, and apparently grateful for my presence. I could hardly believe their openness towards having me, a 23 year old Canadian without any professional work experience, into their world. I hope that I can build amazing relationships with these people, help them with their organization, and learn, learn, and learn some more.

There is so much to write about, so many perspectives to gain and expound that this well should never run dry.