Another decision has been made.
For a couple of reasons, the nomadic life has gotten deep into me. The biggest reason I can tell you happened a couple of years ago, while I was trying to practice my broken English. I used to go out and meet strangers. People from all over the world, people that I know nothing about. We’ve talked, quite a lot. I mostly listened to their stories and asked them a lot about their lives, decisions and choices. I got to know about dozens of different lives, and a lot of them still stay in my head, exactly like the day I heard about those stories. As a newbie in the adult world, I didn’t really know how to navigate, so I did the only thing I could, listen and watch other lives, explore their thoughts, try to collect pieces, piece by piece, to somehow make my own way.
Let me tell you a short story about a Russian guy, a traveler, a slacker, homeless or an explorer — it all depends on you, your perspective. I met Mat in a coffee shop, at a coffee talk session. We chatted and shared a lot about life. I drove him home and asked him to hang out for another time. A few days later, he texted me, told me that he currently has company, I can come to his place, we can go to the rooftop and chill. That’s when I met a guy — I don’t remember his name — Mat’s friend. He was staying with Mat for about a week in Hanoi. After a couple of questions, I found out that this guy is also Russian, but hasn’t been home for so many years.
- What do you do for a living?
- I don’t
- How? How can you buy food without money?
- I don’t
Turns out, that was true. He didn’t buy food, he just found it. Then where can he find it? At some places where people give out food for free, churches and trash sometimes. That also explains why he doesn’t need to pay for rent, because pagodas, churches don’t ask for rent, as well as bridges, abandoned houses, or whatever places can hide him from rainy days.
- How do you commute? Where does the flight ticket come from?
- I do work sometimes. Last time I worked in Korea for six months and saved a bit of money — enough for flight tickets. Whenever I need money for commuting, I’ll do something.
- Don’t you feel like surviving? Every day, you have to think about where you can find food, where you can sleep. Doesn’t it frustrate you? It’s not living. Wouldn’t it be easier to get a job, live a life as almost everybody else does?
- I don’t have a job. I don’t have to think about it every day, you do. I don’t have a lot of other things to worry about, you do. For what I see, you’re surviving, I’m living.
I bet you might have heard this story somewhere else. I had. But that was the first time, I actually heard it from someone who was doing it. I wasn’t convinced, I’m not now and might never be convinced to believe in that idea. A big part of me, perceives it as an excuse, for the laziness, for the giving-up attitude. But I did, I do and will respect the guy and his idea.
I don’t think I will ever do that, but the story stuck with me and undeniably changed my life in a way that I might not even be aware of. In a way, that’s the beauty of life.
As they said in Forrest Gump: “Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re gonna get”. But you can just grab one anyway — and I do.
Have a nice time, all of you.