With the weather in Hanoi turning cold and dreary, and with the remnants of some throat infection - finally succumbing to the antibiotics - still making me cough, and with the holiday season now over, I’ve begun to notice more acutely the things I miss from home.

While this may seem a desperate plea for pity, it’s not. Rather, this post is meant to serve as a complement to earlier posts about what I love here.

And so, in no particular order, I miss

  • Libraries. I am a member of the public libraries of St. Catharines, Ottawa, Winnipeg and Edinburgh, Scotland. The idea of having most of the great works of English literature available to me free of charge at any time is both reassuring and exciting. Getting a library card is one of the first things I do whenever I arrive in a new city. Not having access to a large English-language public library is starting to bother me.
  • Parks. Hanoi has a few parks scattered about, but I have yet to find a place within a quick bike ride from my house where I can escape the noise and endless concrete of this metropolis.
  • Cold milk and cereal. Fresh milk is just too expensive here.  I have, however, found a steady supply of peanut butter.
  • Indoor heat. January has suddenly turned grey and nasty, and I’m working in an unheated office, wishing my feet and hands weren’t so bloody cold all the time. Imagine it, wearing long johns, mittens and a toque in 14-degree weather. (That’s in Celsius. For my American friends, I’m talking about 57 degrees Fahrenheit.)
  • Truly high-speed Internet. The ADSL in this country functions at a fraction of the speed I had grown accustomed to in North America. This will probably be seen as a rather bourgeois complaint by some of my fellow SALTers, whose access to the Internet is sporadic at best.  My apologies.

I think it’s a testament to how much I enjoy my life here in Hanoi that most items on this list are so trivial.