Hanoi was a totally unexpected amazing surprise for us. The Vietnamese capital is located in the north of the country, and we really didn't know anything about the city going in, it just seemed like a good stopping off point before we went on our Halong Bay cruise. But as we very quickly found out, Hanoi is an insanely lively city with its own culture, atmosphere, and personality that we immediately grew attached to.
Our first afternoon and evening in Hanoi completely set the scene for our visit. We were staying in the "Old Quarter" of the city, which is where most of the tourists stay. When you visit Hanoi, you immediately notice two things: first, there are WAY more motorcycles than there are cars; second, there are no discernible traffic signals. The streets are absolutely chaotic, with motorcycles driving down the wrong lane, and intersections a constantly flowing stream of intersecting lanes of traffic. Somehow, though, it just seems to work. Everyone drives at a reasonable speed and seems to pay attention (we only saw ONE girl texting while maneuvering her motorbike through this mayhem). The much scarier thing is not driving in a car, but attempting to cross the street. Hanoi has plenty of cross walks, but none of them seem to have a cross-walk signal that is respected by traffic. In order to cross, you have to LITERALLY play human frogger. I kid you not. Emily and I quickly developed a strategy of crossing the street wherein Emily grabbed my hand tightly and closed her eyes, and I dragged her across the intersection. This all led to my comment early on that "I'm glad we got that travel medical insurance."
Having survived the traffic, our first night in Hanoi we headed for an area where the receptionist at the hotel said there would be "some food, some shopping, and some drinking." This turned out to be the understatement of the year. We began at the Hanoi Night Market, which is exactly what it sounds like; every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night one of the main roads in Hanoi shuts down, and vendors set up stands to peddle their goods. You can get everything from designer clothes, to knock-off handbags, to fake Ray Ban sunglasses (which Emily and I are now sporting!). Having seen the Night Market, we figured we had seen all the nightlife that Hanoi had to offer, and headed for the food street, expecting a strip of calm restaurants. What we found is quite hard to put into words.
The main nightlife street in the Old Quarter of Hanoi is a bustling scene of pure energy. When we arrived, things were just getting started, and the restaurants were already filling up. In Hanoi, most of the restaurants don't have any room inside for people to sit down, so they put small plastic stools on the sidewalk for people to sit on and eat. As the night goes on and the place gets more crowded, the plastic seating overflows into the street. By the end of the night, it was almost impossible to walk through the center of the street because of all of the plastic stools. We sat down at one of the restaurants and ordered some amazing fried spring rolls and noodles, and a few local beers (Tiger beer...YUM!). This whole meal cost about $8 for the two of us, and gave us the opportunity to sit down and watch the people going by. It's an amazing area because it's neither predominantly tourist-saturated or locals. There's a nice combination of the local residents eating and interacting with the tourists, and the whole thing has a very communal feel.
After a few hours we were exhausted and ready for bed, so we headed back to the hotel, trying not to get run over by any motorcyclists along the way. We had our only snafu of the trip (so far!) that evening. At about 12:30am we were woken up to a lot of noise, and discovered that the electricity in the hotel had gone out! With a temperature of 110 degrees, losing the air conditioning was not what we wanted to have happen to us. The hotel manager assured us that someone was coming to fix it, and we spent a few sweltering hours before it came back on. That morning, the manager told us that the next morning all of the electricity in the neighborhood would be shut off at 6am -- another early morning for us!
We headed out to do some sightseeing around 10am, and quickly found out that museums and government-run buildings have a very different time schedule in Vietnam. Things seem to be open from 8-11am, and then are only open again from 2-6pm. This meant that we ended up completely missing the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, which is also closed on Mondays (our only other day in Hanoi). Still, we got to see some interesting sights in Hanoi, and found the capital of the country (and the capital of Communist North Vietnam) to be very eye-opening.
We began at the Temple of Literature, a centuries-old temple of Confucian study that had been highly recommended to us. This beautiful temple compound sits in the middle of the city, and was previously used as a national school of Confucian study. The temple has a beautiful pond in the middle, and is surrounded by breath-taking architecture. We had a group of Vietnamese school-children come up to us, who must have been there for their English class, and practice asking questions to us in English. It was very cute, and they gave us gifts afterwards: a small porcelain turtle, and two pretty fans. Unfortunately, one of us (who will not be name *cough* EMILY *cough*) subbsequently dropped the turtle, shattering it into a million piecces, and the fans had aa rather terrible smell to them. Oh well, it's the thought that counts, right?
After a relaxing (air conditioned! it was over 100 degrees again, with extreme humidity) lunch and some strong Vietnamese iced coffee, we headed to the Ho Chi Minh museum, which was our first exposure to Communist-Vietnamese history. For those unfamiliar, Ho Chi Minh (or "Uncle Ho") was one of the leaders of the Vietnamese Communist revolution, the country's first President once it gained independence, and the leader of North Vieetnam during the Vietnam War. The museum is very interesting, and focuses heavily on Ho Chi Minh's letters and writings during their struggle for independence from the French, and his communications with various other Communist countries. The museum also has a series of art installations meant to reflect the glory of Vietnam, Communism, etc. etc. At one point, we turned into what looked like a darkeened room in an attempt to sit down and rest for a few minutes, when suddenly the whole room lit up and a video began playing in Vietnamese. A sign on the wall explaained that the room was meant to convey the potential for growth and destruction that accompany technological progress, but we quiickly found that it was an aggressiveely anti-American piece. The film began with images of medicine, farming, and other scientific achievements interposed over images of Ho Chi Minh and other Commmunist leaders, and ended with images of the past 5 American presidents intersppersed with clips of nuclear explosions and other weapons of war. Needless to ssay, Emily and I got out of that room as quickly as possible!
We had a very relaxing rest of the day, heading back to a restaurant that we had passedd the previous evening. It's another restaurant where you sit on small plastic stools on the sidewalk, but you cook your food at your table, sort of like a Vietnamese loow-budget Melting Pot. They set up a small fondue-like open flame, and put a small aaluminum skillet over it. Then, they bring you some marinated meat and vegetables, annd you cook the food right there on the street. It was quite a fun activity, and very tasty! A young Vietnamese couple was sitting next to us, and we struck up a great conversation with the husband, who spoke excellent English. After dinner, we felt like we had earned massages, and went to get hour-long full-body massages. This is big business in Hanoi, and the countless massage parlors are open until late at night. It wasn't quite as cheap as some of the places we'd seen, but was a fraction of what it woould have cost in the States. Definitely worth it, and very relaxing.
For our last day in Hanoi, our goal was to see the Hoa Lo prison museum. This is the innfamous "Hanoi Hilton" where thousands of American POWs (including John McCain) were imprisoned and tortured during the Vietnam War. What the museum focuses on, however, is the prison's original purpose. The prison was built in the 19th ccentury by the French, and used to house Vietnamese rebels and political prisoners. The museum goes to GREAT lengths to describe the horrible conditions that the Vietnamese prisoners suffered, desccribing that some of them were imprisoned for up to a year (not dwelling on the fact that the POWs were in the conditions for 5+ years). After hearing all about the Vietnamese prisoners, I expected to FINALLY hear about the American POWs. Before you get to that part, however, there are several rooms describing how the Vietnam war came about (American aggression and occupation) and why these American pilots were in Vietnam. When the museum does get around to discussing the POWs, it's entirely propaganda BS. According to the museum, some Americans were "remanded" at Hoa Lo during the War, and received EXCELLENT treatment. We saw pictures of Americans playing basketball, celebrating Christmas, eatting delicious food, and receiving top-notch healthcare. Apparently, by the time the wwar ended, all of the Americans had come to see the error of their ways, and had become pro-Communism. Of course, this is entirely different than the first-hand accounnts of those POWs, like John McCain, who explain that they were tortured, forced to give false propaganda statements of their treatment, and denied food an medical aid (McCain was almost left to die of his broken arms and legs until the Vietnamese found out that his father was a high-ranking military official read more
here). The whole experience was a bit upsetting, and reminded us that despite how much we've been enjjoying Vietnam, it's still a Communist single-party country that keeps a very tight grassp on the way that they're presented.
TThe rest of the day was much more light-hearted. We explored the West Lake where we saw a beautiful sunset, got some souvenirs, and found a Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf (a CA-based coffee store) where I was able to get my favorite drink (Original Vanilla Ice Blend -- yumm). We ended the night with a nice dinner in a local restaurant where, feeling daring, we had fried frogs! They were delicious, and the whole evening was a nice way to end our pleasant stay in Hanoi. Next, we're taking a 3 day cruise along Halong Bay, which is sure to be relaxing!
