Thursday, April 10th, 2008
It seems the typical thing to do for travellers and backpackers is to outwardly turn their nose up at big bustling cities claiming too touristy, too polluted, too busy or too easy for the rough seasoned traveller while guiltily enjoying them and lingering longer than planned. I’ve somewhat done the same however, I have no problem admitting bluntly that I actually love big city life, especially Hanoi!
After spending 3 days in my luxury 5-star Sheraton Hanoi bubble, I expelled myself back into the fast pumping heart of the Old Quarter and spent the first evening romantically watching and enjoying street life from a barstool perch at a cafe terrace while writing in my journal. Here’s a dreamy little excerpt…
28-May-08 (Fri)
(…)
Sitting on the second floor terrace at The Golden Drum cafe in the Old Quarter drinking a coffee yogurt (my latest obsession) overlooking the intersection of Hang Hom & Hang Quat. The soft elevator music of the Sheraton Hanoi has been replaced with the gritty constant hum of motorbikes purring, honking, drifting voices and the clatter of dense life banging and grinding. It’s so good to be back!Three kids are playing on the sidewalk, two spin around with sticks while the third twirls a rope like a rhythmic dancer. The uniformed gentleman who was sitting alone in a sterile brightly lit office earlier is now walking home. A child cries and plays by the window of the narrow flat to my left. A lady who is collecting trash won’t quit ringing her loud “come-and-give-it” bell. A red and gold Vietnam flag hangs limp in the evening air two buildings over, above the office of the uniformed man. Two cyclo drivers ride slowly by looking for their next foreign victims. Down the road my tiny mezzanine room with the single mattress on the floor waits for me. A vendor woman, with her bone-crushingly heavy baskets of fresh fruit hanging from a bamboo stick across her shoulders, walks the street. Another lady passes, her stick balanced with two large full racks of mens and ladies button-up shirts. Yes, it’s so good to be back in the action! (…)
I happily allowed myself to be sucked into this world for a blurry indeterminate amount of time. It was good to have a routine for a while. I discovered yogurt bubble tea (which eventually replaced my coffee yogurt obsession) and my daily delicious local morning pastry shop. I ate dinner twice with an inspiring retired American tandem cyclist couple who I met in Son La (the northwest), took a cooking class and stumbled upon a fantastic traditional theatre performance. Despite the inevitable creeping in of modern shops and tourist service offices, the streets of the Old Quarter still show evidence of their old organization and naming conventions: there is a specific, appropriately named street for everything - musical instruments, paint cans, office supplies, metal furniture, religious shrine supplies (my street, lots of shiny plastic red and gold), shoes, plastic toys, hats, tools, etc. I took my time getting to the tourist sites but eventually found them. I let Hanoi soak in slowly, impressing me with its narrow streets, artsy vibe, leisurely Vietnamese attitudes and it provided me a much needed rest from so many weeks of constant motion.
Sometime later, I got a random email from a friend in NYC introducing me to one of his good friends… who just so happened to be arriving in Hanoi. Then an email from Dan, his friend here in Hanoi! We met up later that day at my local bubble tea shop and chatted for a few hours. It was just what I needed - someone to shake things up a bit and bust me out of my routine. I ended up leaving with him for a Halong Bay tour the next morning and picked up my tourist pace.
The 3-day Halong Bay boat tour was excellent. I honestly forgot how easy it can be when you pay other people to take care of the details. We were immensely fortunate with good weather (no rain and no heavy island-hiding fog) and lucked out with a fun crew on our cool Chinese junk - the large old wooden traditional fishing boats, refitted for touring comfort of course. We went spelunking (at “Surprising Cave”, a well-lit cavern with sidewalks, which is just how I like my underground abysses after my frightening Nepali cave experience), kayaked around jagged limestone islands in the bay, took a cold dip in the waters and relaxed on the sun decks. On the second day we visited Cat Ba island, where we rode bikes (something that seemed familiar but this time we used the local no-gear high-handlebars style envoking serious respect for these guys), drank snizard wine (potent alcohol with various animals floating around - in this case a snake and a lizard) and met some friendly butterflies in the forest.
Immediately following that tour and feeling rejuvenated by a good group tour experience, I signed on to join Dan for a day trip to Perfume Pagoda. A festival was in process so that added to the crowds and vibrant local excitement. We took a one hour boat ride to the pagoda on a calm river filled with locals and foreigners through the “Perfume Mountains”. An odd thing I noticed was the additional pet cuisine offering - the kitty cat, strung up skinned, pink and boiled for one’s dining delight (although I am becoming an edible meats connoisseur, I passed on this chance but, judging from the looks of it, I would guess that cat tastes much better than dog and more like chicken). I did however discover a delicious steamed root vegetable, like a steamed potato but denser and sweeter. A Vietnamese-origin Canadian couple from Vancouver shared this tasty treat with me during the much-appreciated modern gondola ride through the steamy hot and breeze-less steep 45-minute uphill forest path. I also held a huge (!!) rolled up snail bug in my hand, completely naive and innocent as to what it was. When rolled up they look like a marble or a stone, only later did I see the creepy crawlies uncurled and feel a shock of ickiness shoot up my spine. The pagoda itself turned out to actually be another cave, which was certainly more surprising than our previous cave experience of that name. It had sidewalks as well but the lighting was done by candles around shrines and shiny offerings and was filled with a damp thick scent of incense. Another great idea thanks to Dan.
His last favor to me was that he actually got me out of Hanoi. He told me tales of a Thai New Year’s festival that would be taking place mid April across Thailand and predominately in Bangkok. Being a recovering festival addict, this was extremely tempting. In addition to that, there were other factors in play… a) for someone in the mood to linger, I knew Bangkok had the goods, b) I wanted to be somewhere central in case a particular new project possibility worked out and I needed to make a quick move and c) as the weather continued to heat up, I had been debating the raw rugged northern Laos mountain crossing and never found the information, the confidence or even the desire to attack it on my bike solo. I was sitting in Hanoi and really didn’t know what I wanted to do next. I thought why not do this in Bangkok while playing at a festival?!
For more photos from Hanoi and surrounds…
Vietnam, Hanoi
Vietnam, Halong Bay
Vietnam, Perfume Pagoda