I hate being alone when I'm sick, and yet that's always how I seem to find myself. I had a fever two weeks ago in a dorm room somewhere in Northern Vietnam. My persistent runny nose evolved into a nosebleed, and as I was cursed with the top bunk, my double-socked feet would slip on the iron ladder on the way down. Two sad tissues remained stuffed up both nostrils for an inconvenient amount of time. The day before, I prematurely booked a six-hour hiking tour in the hopes that

I didn’t fly across the world to eat a Crunchwrap Supreme in a strip mall. But it happened anyway. Today marks 30 days since I’ve been in Thailand. I’m on the island of Ko Samui, staying in a hostel situated right down the road from the most traditional-looking mall that I’ve seen in my month here. It contains a Starbucks, a Subway, a Cold Stone Creamery, and of course, a Taco Bell. It has intricately landscaped green spaces next to the escalators and little Christmas trees s

I made the mistake of sleeping 15 hours during the day after 36 hours of travel. In retrospect, it seems both reasonable and simultaneously weak. I woke up at one in the morning, too afraid to get up in my hostel dorm after I was heinously scolded by my bunkmate upon arrival. I waited 6 hours to use the bathroom. Every step I took, every time I unzipped a zipper, opened my locker, I imagined her eyes staring into mine, and her shushing me. Is it a cardinal rule that if one tr

I graduated from college in March. Four excruciating and thrilling years of trying to figure out what I'm good at, and wondering if I'm...