I travelled to Vietnam and you should, too

Food, nature, kindness— what’s not to like?

Vietnam is alien but familiar. It’s a country where I’ve learnt that keeping birds in a cage is a manly thing, and that nature is so overwhelmingly pretty that it can induce people not to even consider moving elsewhere. For a country 1600 kilometres long, the stereotypes of the Western traveler — the war, the communist Government, street food, the tropical flora — are ubiquitous yet delicate. Vietnam is long, narrow, and diverse in its climate. There is no best time of the year to…