Thoughts of China...

It always happens that you don't truly appreciate a place until you've left it, until you have a comparison. And so I miss China. It's beauty, now that we are in Vietnam, is all the more enchanting...

So far, the landscapes of Vietnam are not as beautiful as China. This is not a disparaging remark, but an observation. Vietnam is like a wilder, unkempt version of China. The colors of SE Asia are as I remember them: orange dirt, dark green vegetation, a trace of brown everywhere. This, in comparison, to China's palette of a thousand greens and as many shades of ochre and brown. In Vietnam, the land is flat, making the views shallow. In China, with all its mountains, there were always sweeping, expansive views that went on forever... with a foreground, background, and thousands of middle grounds in between. In China, things appeared more orderly and neat -- in a pleasant way, not overly controlled. The landscape is manicured without being fussy. Rice paddies and farming plots are tidy and picturesque in comparison to Vietnam's more ruffian style.

But Vietnam is more tropical, and tropical places always have that overgrown feel... a bit wild, a bit less minded by a human hand. And in the same vein, tropical places have a certain sort of savage spirit -- Vietnam has this, China does not. It calls to an inner part of myself, the reason I became enchanted with SE Asia on my first visit here. In the same way that China is beautiful, Vietnam is intriguing.

I feel a bit spoiled by China's beauty; fearful that I'll not find another landscape that can live up to it. But I've only just started my journey in Vietnam. Time will tell...