Ahoy Hanoi Turns 500!

This weekend Ahoy Hanoi had it's 500th post. That's right, 500. It is pretty surreal to me that I've written 500 blogs over the last year and a half. Sure, I know some of you are saying to yourself, "If you didn't count your monthly anniversaries with Huyen and your blogs about family and friends birthdays/weddings/engagements and blogs about how many blogs Ahoy Hanoi has had (like this one) then you'd only have like 400 blogs."

There are lots of cool things about having a blog. One of my favorite things is when I randomly see an old friend who I don't keep in regular touch with and they say, "Ben, I love reading your blog." And then I say, "You read my blog?" And they say, "Yup. Almost every day." This actually happened yesterday when I saw my friend Jeff from high school. I haven't seen Jeff since I've been back and the first thing he said to me was, "I owe you a big thank you. Your blog has been a great way to waste time over the last year." To me, it was quite a compliment especially since I had absolutely no idea Jeff had ever read even one entry.

The other great thing about having a blog is that it's the best journal I've ever kept. While cleaning out my room I've found a few old journals of mine. Rereading old entries are hilarious but unfortunately I would usually only write entries for a few weeks or less before quitting. The blog has been a great way to write down all the important things that have happened to me since February 2008.

So, on behalf of my 500th entry here are the latest stats (Note: I have only kept stats since August 26th of last year):
- Ahoy Hanoi has had 29,915 visits to the page and 49,604 Pageviews.
- Ahoy Hanoi has had 6,716 Absolute Unique Visitors (77.55% return to the site).
- The average time spent on Ahoy Hanoi is 2 minutes and 37 seconds.
- The day Ahoy Hanoi was read the most was Monday, November 3rd -- the day before the election.
- Ahoy Hanoi is currently read in 97 countries. Some interesting places: Iran, Yemen, Kazakhstan (yeah, Borat!), Nigeria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Namibia and Nepal!
- Ahoy Hanoi is read in every United States state except South Dakota. What the F, South Dakota! Honestly, has the internet not arrived there yet?
- The first two google searches to find my blog are "ahoy hanoi" and "ahoyhanoi." The third is "Hanoi massage." Why do so many people want massages in Hanoi?

Thanks for reading everyone! Here's to the next five hundred....