I lost a phone in Bangkok, bought a used one in Chiang Mai, and then lounged on a top bunk in Pai, typing old names on my new phone. I couldn’t remember which letter of my Instagram I turned into a symbol. Was the “I” an “!”? Was the “o” a “0”? After watching the spotty Wi-Fi spin the loading wheel around and around, a page told me my name didn’t exist.

After three failed attempts, I got frustrated about being frustrated on vacation. I put my head down and exhaled. These actions sounded louder than usual, loud enough to wake a sleeping body in the hostel room. The only thing I could think of doing was lifting up my arm and looking at it.

The Thai sun had pulled Palestine to my pigment and blonded my Serbian hair in a way that Canada could never and Korea wouldn’t appreciate. I cranked my neck to my red shoulders, picked off some dead skin, and then flicked it to the foot of my bed. I looked at my toes.

Forty showers earlier, in preparation for the trip, I glided a Venus Extra Smooth Razor across the tops of my feet. As the soapy water ferried the hairs down the drain, I thought of future travellers not calling me Frodo.

A month into the trip, I expected a little stubble, but my foot hair had grown back with Sam Gamgee-like resilience and was already an inch long. Luckily no one had called me Frodo. In fact, I rarely heard my real name at all.

A group of Swedes had called me “Toronto” and then later in the night, after I was rapping to songs in the club, they started calling me “Drake”. A British guy and his Dutch girlfriend called me “Marco Polo” because I checked maps during our scooter trips. A Texan anointed me “The Finisher” in our flip cup tournament. A group of French smokers called me “Lighter Thief”. While dancing I knocked over a Latina’s mango vodka bucket and she called me “Asshole”.

These memories from the great wide world inspired me to get up and get down from my top bunk. I packed my phone and wallet in my fanny pack then swung open the hostel room door, feeling so confident that I didn’t stop it from banging shut. As the sun hit my skin, I felt so comfortable with myself that I didn’t want to share myself with anyone. Today, I would have a solo adventure. I would visit the giant Buddha statute and night market alone.

Outside I took power strides. Strangers were spread out on the lobby beanbags. I avoided eye contact because I didn’t need it. Over the music in my earphones, I heard a girl ask if I wanted to join them for breakfast. I pretended that I couldn’t hear her, and I knew I could get away with it because I had my earphones on.

I weaved through locals and slow foreigners on my scooter then hiked up to the giant Buddha. I stood under it while listening to a podcast about anti- Hilary Russian Facebook meme makers. I thought about the time my hockey team laughed at my back acne. Then, as the sun dropped, I drove my scooter towards the town and parked in a sea of other scooters. While walking through the night market, I listened to songs I liked in high school. Back in the parking lot, someone had moved my scooter but I found it.

I returned to the hostel and took a long shower. I waited in my room until I heard people outside. Then I went to the common area.

I tested the Wi-Fi and it was still spotty, so I sparked a conversation with a guy who was wearing a Denver Nuggets jersey. As we talked basketball, people started to clump around us, stretching their hairless feet, cracking beers, flicking lighters.

When Nuggets Fan went to piss, the Breakfast Girl addressed me, “Hey, I invited you for breakfast this morning, why did you ignore me?”

“Me?” I feigned surprise.

“Yeah,” she said boldly. Then she noticed everyone staring and changed her tone, “I guess you were listening to music, though.”

“Yes, sorry,” I said, avoiding her eyes. Thankfully, one of her friends overheard me talking about basketball and interrupted with a question about the Raptors.

An hour later, a man with a backwards hat stood up on a table and announced a free shot before the pub-crawl. In the herd of backpackers reaching out for grapefruit vodka, I happened to be next to Breakfast Girl. I grabbed two glasses and handed her one. “Sorry for not hearing you this morning! What was your name again?”

“You don’t remember my name? We met last night at karaoke,” she said and then became the second person to call me, “Asshole”.

“Ok, what’s my name?” I replied.

“I think it was Brian, right? Or Dave? Yeah, you look like a Dave. Oh, wait…maybe you’re a Stan? Are you a Stan? There aren’t enough Stans in this world.”

“And you were Tiffany, right? Or was it Trisha? I just remember you having a real unique and exotic name,” I said with sarcasm.

Inventing names for each other became our thing for the rest of the night. At the second bar, Nuggets Fan put his arm around me and said I should sleep with Breakfast Girl. I bought her a drink. She bought me the next one. When coming up with generic names for each other became less funny, we started making up hobbies for our names. Glen liked collecting beer bottles and framed them when he got a hundred. Trisha lied to her mom about pole dancing on Tuesdays because her mom didn’t understand what a core workout was.

Then I asked her about the difference between Trisha and Tiffany. Did they kiss different? She said she didn’t know, but now that I brought it up she was curious. She leaned and gave me a kiss in which most of her tongue touched most of my tongue. That was Trisha. Then she turned around, wiped her smile away with her hand, then leaned back in. Tiffany’s kiss was more like 4 pecks.

She asked which one I liked more. I said I liked Trisha’s. She said that Trisha wasn’t the biggest fan of loud music, so we left the bar. 10 minutes later, we were under the glow of a 711, eating grilled cheese and splitting Marlboro Golds, thinking of reasons Brian, Dave, Stan, Tiffany, Trisha, and Glen would never find love and/or get divorced. When the pack was empty, we walked back to the hostel.

She had a private room. While she rummaged for her keys, I stared at the whiteboard on her front door, and it had her real name written on it. When we went into her room, I started singing a made-up song where the chorus was just her name, over and over. She told me to stop, and when I didn’t, she put her fingers on my lips. We kissed and kept kissing until we started having sex. In missionary, I stared into her eyes then she smiled and moaned out, “Yes, Brian. Yes, Dave. Yes, Stan. Yes, Glen.” Since I felt nothing, I laughed and called her names that weren’t written on her front door.

The next morning I woke up before her. I picked up the condoms from the the floor. She woke up to the flush of them going down the toilet. While I dressed at the foot of her bed, she leaned on her elbow and said, “Don’t be a stranger.” Then I pulled my phone from my jeans and asked, “Is the Wi-Fi better in the private rooms?”