The long goodbye.

First of all, apologies for the incredibly long hiatus. Life in Vietnam has become infinitely busier and my brain has been infinitely more occupied, making writing much more difficult.

Since the last time I wrote, my life in Saigon has changed massively. I’ve said goodbye to six of my best friends over the course of the last 3 and a half months, hence the title. It’s been slow and ready, a friend a month and then suddenly, in a week, everything feels like it’s shifted.

I’ve been truly very lucky to have had a community and to have known friendship from the night I touched down in Vietnam, and to be honest, months before that when I got chatting to Edi and Chloe online, prior to us moving and completing our TEFL together. I started my early days in Vietnam learning how to teach, spending every day and every night with the same group. It was kind of like Love Island, sharing this odd bubble with this random group, establishing a new life and a new career with them for a month, and then going into the outside world. By the time we graduated, we’d spent more time together than I think I’d spent with any of my friends for the past 3/4 years. I’ll blame that on Covid, then I’ll blame it on study abroad, then I’ll blame it on relocating, then I’ll blame it on Vietnam.

This uniquely quick and close connection has defined my year and 8 months (eek!) in Vietnam. When you move as individuals, seeking an entirely fresh start, you seem to connect at lightning speed. The absence of familiarity and family makes everyone far more open to connection and the beauty of Vietnam, and the lifestyle it’s afforded all of us, is that we’ve spent plenty of time doing nothing together.

My friend Floss and I recently discussed this. I read a New York Times article (‘Why Don’t We Hang Out Anymore?’) at the end of last year, and it shaped the way I considered my friendships here, and at home. Nicolas Ortega writes about the nature of adult friendship, and suggests that true intimacy and joy is found in the mundane. Compared to our childhood and school friends, adult friendships flit to that of coffees, catch-ups and conversation. While that’s all great, we forget to relish in the simple pleasure of serving our inner children and doing very little. My friendships here have felt much more childish, much sillier, but also far more familial because of the nature of our time spent together. We see each other regularly enough that we don’t need to catch up, so we go rollerskating, play games in the park, paint, cook, draw, write and run errands together. David Brooks also wrote about this in his book ‘How to Know a Person’, which actually sparked my motivation to resume writing. He notes that ‘in the midst of play, people relax, become themselves and connect without even trying.’ The foundation of pure friendship and connection comes down to seeing someone not for what they do, what they say, but maybe just what they’re like stripped to the basics, what they’re like when they’re experiencing childish glee.

That’s not to say that catch-up friendships are not necessary or fulfilling, simply that they offer something different. I’m quoting many great things, but in the process of this multitude of goodbyes, I’ve been reminded of F Scott Fitzgerald’s line ‘there’s all kinds of love in the world but never the same love twice.’ It captures how I feel about all the people in my life, from my childhood friends I’ve truly grown up alongside, to my friends throughout high school, college, uni and beyond. My friends in Toulouse occupy a special section of my heart because that was my first glimpse of independence, and for us all (I think!), there was a very curious bond that formed from being locked down in a foreign country in a global pandemic together. We’ll always have Toulouse, and if I want to revisit the nostalgia of that time, I know I can always go back to those friends.

The same applies for Saigon, on a much deeper and more intense level. This is not only because I’ve been in Vietnam 3 times as long as I was ever in France, but due to the ways I’ve grown and changed in the time since I arrived. It’s a cliché, of course it is. But they exist for a reason. I look back on my posts on my finsta from September 2022 and I feel like I was a shell of a person compared to now. Vietnam as a place is completely chaotic and teaching means there is truly never a dull day, but Vietnam has changed me forever. I’d like to attribute some of those changes to my healing and consistently pushing myself out of my comfort zone: I’ve starred in an advert, travelled solo, done a YouTube interview, made on a podcast, taught from 2-17 year olds and am at ease with doing things that scare me.

However, the comfort, joy and found family that’s established itself in the city has kept me surrounded in love and warmth and honesty, and I can’t quite believe I managed to find one best friend, let alone the group I now have. Not naming names, but those who get it, get it. I’ve got friends a decade older, some from 7000 miles away, two who are from the same area as me (keeping it interesting, of course!). The security and silliness I’ve enjoyed over the last year or so have fuelled for me a lifetime, and given me enough laughter and love to reminisce on forever.

I hope I never forget these days, and never forget the fr-amily that kept me afloat on the hard days, made me laugh until I cried, made me nearly pop a blood vessel (Chaz, that’s for you!) and have never wavered in the midst of the turbulence that comes with these hellos and goodbyes.

I suppose this post is a reminder to myself, and hopefully to everyone else, that the ones you love you well will make you cry. Only when they leave though. I can make peace with these goodbyes knowing how lucky I’ve been to be enveloped in love, whether that be that akin to a big sister (Mollie), a little brother (Charlie and I are notorious for sibling fights), a soul sister (Emily), a wife (Edi), a friend to laugh to tears with (Floss), one to name capital cities with (Kez), one who might be as competitive as you (Sam), one to discuss life and love (Carys), and the couple who have held it down for me through it all (Iz and Jigs). Everyone else is still here and chilling, I think, so forgive me if you’ve not been name dropped. And here’s to the friendships that continue to endure, I see you and I appreciate you.

Love you, bye!

Said fr-amily on our trip to Nha Trang, February 2024.