The summer of 2015.
It was the first time I travelled alone. First it was to Washington DC for an internship, and later to San Francisco for a conference. It doesn’t sound like much, but for someone who has not done it before, it was quite a liberating experience.
I mean, I went from listening to people (I’m from Asia, ok) telling me that travelling alone as a girl is dangerous, and that hostels are shady and creepy. There IS truth to that, but there is danger in everything, and hotels can be haunted too, so why live too carefully in fear?
Before I get into that, I need to explain why I’m writing this down three years later. I noted everything down in my journals, but now I have an urge to document it in public as a travel writing experiment. I’ve always had a fascination for travel writers. Maybe it’s because I always pick up their books in a secondhand bookshop somewhere quaint, and the books are always spotty with yellow, brittle pages and letters in small print. The book itself already smells like adventure.
Paul Theroux and Bill Bryson were two of my original discoveries. I absolutely loved Theroux’ insane stories from odd places, with each episode dwelling less on the aesthetics of the place and more on the oddities of human behavior. The same goes for Bryson, except that he travels in the not-so-exotic places of the United States and England, but he still manages to make them sound like mysterious places to go.
There is also Elizabeth Gilbert and her Eat, Pray, Love; Cheryl Strayed and her Wild. I prefer the latter, for I believe in the power of nature to silence one’s tiring thoughts. In another travel book I’m reading now by Steve Hely, he observed that lately women travel writers have been dominating the field because “they’ve realized the emotional journey is more important than the physical one.” That’s food for thought.
Anyway, ever since then, I’ve always entertained the idea of dabbling in travel writing. I don’t have as many adventures as they do, but I have the same amount of thoughts swimming through my mind everywhere I go, and they demand to be written down. I guess that’s something every writer has in common.
Back to Summer 2015. Washington DC was amazing — for the first time in my life I met so many young, passionate, ambitious and genuine youth. People who thought the same as I did, and we all were fighting hard for our dreams.
It sounds so naive now as an adult, but we really did have fun. We were the annoying, over eager, frugal interns; we explored new parts of the town, drank cheap beer; attended free events; learned new things (like swing dancing, salsa dancing, Vienna Waltz!); we networked like the doe-eyed kids we were, reaching out to people doing our dream jobs and asking them how they got there. The funny thing was the total strangers WERE willing to help you, talk to you, and assuage your fears. Somehow, in the swampy and humid land of Washington DC, all dreams seemed achievable.
(For example: I emailed a Malaysian writer living in DC out of the blue, expressed my admiration for her work, and asked if we could meet. She was surprised — but said yes, and we met. We talked about journalism, Malaysia, the US. Lend me some interesting perspectives. Hard truths.)
For the last two weeks of the summer, I traveled to San Francisco to attend a journalism conference. My original plan to go straight to town was set aside when my internship boss told me to go to Berkeley; he had an acquaintance there who could host me. I agreed, and off I went with my massive luggage (still not a light packer back then. You learn from mistakes) to the very, very steep town of Berkeley.
I arrived midnight, and my boss’ friend received me to the house. He lived there with his wife, who was expecting a baby. He is a journalist and had published a book about the Middle East; his wife was an aspiring lawyer. I have to admit I wasn’t too good of a conversationalist back then, otherwise we could have had better conversations. I mean, these were incredibly smart people and I had a crush on virtually any cool journalist back then.
But for the next two days, I wandered around Berkeley by myself. I climbed a rock that emerged out of nowhere from the suburbs, I roamed the campus, I walked to this windy shore where they filmed the Kite Runner, I went to a cool little diner to have hearty American food. I went anywhere that I found interesting on Google Maps. I saw the hippies of Berkeley camped out in front of a massive record store; I saw the Smart People of Berkeley in their antique library, where I shamelessly charged my phone. I saw many, many, many Asians in the many, many, many Asian eateries.
The sun was bright, the sky was blue, the clouds were white and fluffy, the ocean was vast. I was beginning to love California (except for some huge highways that were virtually un-crossable.)
Then I went to San Francisco. And wow, if I thought Berkeley is beautiful, SF blew me away. The steep slopes may leave me short of breath, but the view from every little hill was amazing. I could see the turquoise blue ocean below, and all the buildings looked like they were an offshoot of the mountain. There were historical buildings; bizarre designs; cozy secondhand bookstores. Again, I roamed the hills, looking for good vantage points (the conference was only for 3 days, I had time to wander).
I walked from chocolate factories and steep staircases to Mexican cantinas that sold enormous, amazing burritos; I chilled out on the grass surrounded by many people (whom I suspect, were high), alone, reading a book (Old Man and The Sea); I wandered up and down Little Italy. I found a cozy little coffee shop that had a live band playing jazz music in the middle of the day. I parked myself by the bar, ordered myself a beer, and listened to the musicians improvise their hearts out. Next to me were lone men doing the same as me — you don’t need company to enjoy this kind of art.
But honestly the best part about my SF trip was the hostel life. It was my first time living in a hostel, and despite my initial concerns, everything exceeded my expectations. The toilet was CLEAN (very important for me). People were kind and inquisitive, I immediately made friends with other folks who were staying there. Everyone was at a different stage in life, there for a different reason. Some were in between semesters, some were working in the hostel for a free stay, some were staying there for a long period of time as they tried to figure out their lives, some were there for an exchange program.
I vividly remember sitting in the dark corner of our floor on the first night, having a conversation with some new found friends from different corners of the world about life, looking down at the fire escape outside. I felt so youthful and free, like I could do anything.
Then I encountered something that reminded me of why people say it’s harder for female travelers to go at it alone. When I was wandering around one of the piers during sunset, a homeless man began cornering me, demanding I give him money. I kept saying no (I was a poor student back then, and do you know how expensive US Dollars are) and trying to move away, but he grew aggressive. A couple near me noticed my plight, and they slowly edged towards me, standing in between me and him. Then I managed to get away. I nodded thanks at the couple and ran away.
That completely crushed my good mood. Just that evening, I was sitting on another pier, watching the sunset, reading and eating a fresh fish sandwich. A few hours later, I was cursing at mankind. Did he target me because I was a single girl? Maybe not, but I was just railing against the idea that I can’t protect myself as a girl.
Well. I struck up a conversation with my new room mate (we had 6 beds in a room with no doors, just three bunk beds). He was telling me his plans to watch the sunset somewhere tomorrow, and I decided: I’m going to invite myself to his plans because a) I want to watch sunsets b) I don’t want to get harassed. So there we went, and we traveled together for the next two days, chasing sunsets and climbing mountains (things SF is amazing for. Have you SEEN the sunset by the bridge? Unbelievable. The colors look like an vivid oil painting).
He was not the only person I traveled with in SF. There were some other people I met in the hostel and we traveled together for the day if we were heading to the same place. Or we went out together at night. The primary mode of traveling was walking, paying to sit on buses, hopping illegally onto buses, and more walking.
That kind of spontaneity was something I had never experienced before. How can you become friends with a total stranger in less than a few minutes, and then travel together, going on adventures, absorbing sights that leave you breathless? It also taught me that traveling need not follow a schedule all the time. Sometimes, you can leave it to fate. I met some travelers who literally did not have a plan and just … went with the flow. Maybe they’ll stay in SF for two weeks, maybe they’ll bump into someone going to the Death Valley for three days and they’ll just leave with them and then go somewhere else from there. People also come and go in hostels — all that camaraderie and memories built in a few short days end just like that. The transience of everything was both tantalising and sad.
The conference was forgettable compared to all I was experiencing outside of it. I did meet an amazing mentor who later helped me find my way back to Washington DC the next year, and I am forever thankful for that. But I also remember skipping out early on the last formal dinner of the conference so I can hang out with people in the hostel.
I remember reading this in a hostel once “The best journey is measured not in miles, but in the relationships gained.” For that summer of 2015, this quote sums it all up perfectly. I met people who inspired me in Washington DC — they still do, and continued to do so upon my later adventure in DC — and I learned that … I love the spontaneity and independence that comes from traveling alone. I would continue to choose hostels in later parts of my US adventures, and I would continue to meet amazing people at various points of my travels.
On my last day in SF before returning to North Carolina (a wholly DIFFERENT universe, but I’ll save that for another time), I woke up early in the morning and had to lug my massive luggage downstairs. There were two or three flights of steep stairs, and I had to enlist a friend in the hostel to help me (I think he regretted it when he realised how heavy it was. I had a rice cooker in it, for goodness sake. Stupid Nat).
Uneventful, but this was the beginning of many adventures. Side note, I’m very very fortunate to have been able to do all of this, thanks to my amazing parents who supported me. I support the call for companies to pay their interns a good salary. If I did not have that one internship (it was unpaid) and did not travel for this conference, I doubt I would have had the subsequent offers when I graduated. And everyone should have a fair shot at achieving their dreams.
Thank you to all of you whom I met in SF for your friendliness and kindness even though I might’ve just been a blip in your life ;)
Recommended hostel: Pacific Tradewinds Hostel. Otherwise I just visited all the usual tourist hot spots you can Google. Definitely walk the trails around Land’s end, Sutro Baths, China Beach, Baker Beach and watch the sunset there. Grab a bus to Muir woods to see the redwood if you can’t make it to the big national forest up there.
