Sometimes I think, in places like this, where the ocean meets the sky in a thousand shades of blue, that each force competes with the other. The ocean says to the sky, I can travel faster, sparkle without stars, sweep people up in a majestic underworld otherwise unseen and make them breathe in bubbles. And the sky says, well, that’s all very impressive. I only sparkle by night, my treasures are infinite but undiscovered and when I move, I myself …

“Remember this is Yellow. Bus. Number. 9″ bellowed Dung from the front of the stuffy bouncing vehicle as we trundled, honked and swerved our way down the road from Hoi An to My Son. Dung (pronounced Yung) has been a guide for two years and is pretty much the most enthusiastic human I’ve ever encountered. He probably speaks the best English I’ve heard anyone speak here in Vietnam too, although I got the distinct feeling he learnt it by watching …

All around me, women of different ages and different generations are wedging candles into piles of white sand inside tiny cardboard rafts. The sun is setting in old Hoi An, Vietnam and slowly, as the silver linings of every cloud are highlighted for all to see in a blaze of indigo, pink and amber, the candles flicker their way along the water, bought for a dollar apiece and set free by the hands of young lovers making wishes on the …

This is a bus with no seats; just beds on it. It is literally a moving sleepover on wheels! One by one as people got on just now the gasps of utter delight from backpackers all over town were akin to those of a group of playschool children being taken on a theme park ride. “Reeeeally? We get to ride on this??? Cooooooool!!!” (Or maybe that was just me – I do get excited easily). We paid the equivalent of …