Hanoi
We were greeted in Hanoi with rain and touts. The rain was a bit of a surprise, the touts not so much. March-May is the hot, dry season in SE Asia. Jody and I had seen some rain on the way to Hue, and it had sprinkled a bit in Thailand and Laos. Seeing the rain was kind of refreshing after all the hot weather. The touts were more of a nuisance, to the point where Jody told one of them off. It’d been a long, uncomfortable night, and neither of us was in a good mood.
We couldn’t actually get a room for a while. Our train arrived around 6, before any guesthouses were able to take people. So we got some Pho and hung out around one area that said they had cheap (6$) rooms, but not yet. After a few hours of waiting we were getting different stories from different places as to when the cheap rooms would be ready (it was always “in an hour”), so we finally said fuck it and chose the place with the best price/location/not an absolute dump ratio.
We set out to explore Hanoi. We were staying in the French quarter, which has all these narrow twisty streets. In a way it reminded me of Paris, but not quite. We noticed quickly that there seemed to be streets that only sold one thing, such as the street that only sold toys, the one that sells herbal medicines, fabric, bamboo, electronic, etc. And of course, there are motos everywhere. At this point, we were able to navigate the moto traffic and cross streets with (too much) fear of getting hit.
We went to visit Ho Chi Mihn’s mausoleum, but sadly we missed the viewing time. We walked around looking for a lake that had a downed B52, but ended up being directed to the B52 museum, which was closed. There was lots of stuff just outside the museum, so it wasn’t a total loss. We then made our way to the Temple of Literature. For lunch went to KOTO, a restaurant dedicated to training former street youth for work in high end restaurants and hotels. We then headed north-east to Hoan Kiem Lake and walked around there, having some ice cream along the way, We topped off the afternoon with watching the water puppets show. That was really cool. The “floor” is actually a metre-deep pool of water. The puppeteers are behind a screen and scenery at the back of the stage, the puppets are controlled by underwater cables and rods. The puppets “enter” and “exit” by 2 top-hinged flaps (like a cat door) at the back of the stage.
The next morning we got up early and went to see Uncle Ho, that’s what they call Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam. We waited in a long line and went through multiple security and bag checks. No cameras are allowed in the mausoleum. Ho Chi Minh’s body is embalmed in a glass sarcophagus, and it’s really creepy to see. You’re ushered in and out really quickly, so you really only get a glimpse of him. Then we headed to the Hoa Lo Prison, which had been known as the “Hanoi Hilton”. It was a prison originally established by the French in the late 1800′s. Years later, many American POW’s were imprisoned here during the Vietnam war, including Sen. John McCain. There was an old guillotine For the rest of the day, we just wandered around, mostly in the Old Quarter. So many interesting alleys. I could have spend another just exploring them, but we were eager to get to our next destination, Cat Ba Island.
(We were in Hanoi April 20-21)
Categories: Robin's Travel blog
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