Returning to Việt Nam

Katherine Tran
May 3
1 min read

I took this photograph during my first trip back to Việt Nam in 1998. Long before curated travel guides and luxury resorts reshaped how much of the world now sees the country, these streets were what stayed with me: the haze of motorbikes, tangled electrical wires overhead, storefronts weathered by heat and time, and the constant movement of everyday life.

To me, this was never simply traffic or noise. It was the feeling of returning to a place that had lived in stories, memory, and imagination long before I could fully understand what it meant to go back.

What began as my return would later become our journey...