Three years after my one and only long haul solo trip, I book a trip to Sydney for five days to see Mumford and Sons. I buy two concert tickets, making it my mission to find a stranger to go with. Here are some of the things I learned on my favorite short haul trip so far.
– Seeing the picture of a landmark as a child and then finally seeing it in person (The Sydney Opera House), and then getting to be inside it to hear your favorite band sing your favorite songs you’ve been listening to for the past ten years is living life on blessed mode.
– If you’re out of practice, it’s hard to talk to strangers in a hostel. So it’s okay if you sit down in front of strangers, plop your laptop down, not say anything, pretend to do work, leave the hostel, go to a coffee shop, and journal for three pages to hype yourself up to go to strangers. It works. Go journal three pages whenever you’re feeling a bit scared.
– Learning French changed my life. I’ll continue to say this till I die. It turns out, everybody in that hostel was from France. Because I’m some American Chinese guy who spoke their language, everybody wanted to be my friend.
– Finally breaking out of my inferiority complex shell, I was a little taken aback to realize that people actually wanted to be my friend. Not only that, the really attractive French girls wanted to talk to me. Me? Are you sure? Except for the snob that was probably from Paris. All the others were from the south.
– Smiling, showing genuine interest, being relaxed, these of course helped to befriend strangers.
– I walked around the CBD on three separate occasions, trying to muster up the courage to ask a stranger to go to the concert with me. I couldn’t speak to anyone. Contrast this to me walking up to strangers in Europe literally asking if I could sleep in their house. It’s okay to go through different seasons. Eventually I realized the best person to go with was Paul, a friend I made in the hostel. Sometimes trying harder doesn’t get you farther.
– Of course there’s a small chance I’ll see these guys again, and that’s okay. Sometimes these little micro friendships that exist in a vacuum are good for your soul. And sometimes you do see them again many years down the line, and it’s still very very good.
– If you talk beyond the surface, especially in a hostel, you will earn all of my trust, and suddenly I care deeply about everything you care for in a nontoxic way. Hearing Liberty share about her little half sister, wow that made me want to be their biggest cheerleaders and supporters. But then suddenly Liberty turned it back to me, and I usually have so much to share, but I didn’t find myself sharing deeply in return. I’m not sure why.
– Being witty, full of personality, taking my joke and building upon it, being a bit piquant, continues to be an incredibly sexy trait.
– Australian coffee tastes really good.
– There are some hilarious animals in Sydney that provide a great contrast to the urban jungle of Hong Kong. Like the bin chicken.
– I got to see cricket played for the first time in my life.
– At the end of the trip, three people sent me off at the metro station. One was tearing up! Are you serious? Is this the influence I can have? Yes. This is the influence anyone can have! if they’re kind, smiley, themselves, not a massive dick, maybe good at french too.
– At the end, I hopped on another plane for nine hours, adding a butt ton of CO2 emissions, (writing this sentence in here for your woke folk), and arrived back in HK rejuvenated. This is the joy and privilege of travel!
– Though it can be really really hard. I will never stop praising the solo trip. And it doesn’t have to be necessarily a "trip". For my next adventure, I’m going "solo" to Baylor to start my master’s degree in film. I never NEVER expected to get a masters degree. You can be sure there will be so many lessons in those 1000 days in Texas. Yeehaw