Hanoi, Vietnam 12-20-09

My flight from Laos to Vietnam was pretty amusing. Shortly after the plane took off I starting flipping through my camera pictures for fun and to reminisce the things I’ve done on my trip so far. I got to a gorgeous picture of a sunset in Thailand and the Vietnamese looking lady behind me one aisle over gasped “ohhh!”. She nudged her husband and pointed to my camera so he could see as well and then tapped her son on the shoulder who was in the chair behind me. He took out his camera and showed me a picture of a beautiful sunset in Laos. The fun rivalry was on, and for the next hour we compared pictures. I would show him a picture of a little girl in Cambodia with no shoes and he would show me a similar picture of a little boy in Laos; I would show him pictures of markets and fresh food from Laos and he would show me fresh meat and fish from Myanmar. It was wonderful and the three rows behind us, as well as his parents in the aisle next to him, were all in on the game as too and would “ouuu” and “ahhhh” and nod their heads approvingly when they saw a picture they liked. It was show and tell day on Vietnam Airlines.

I found out after we landed that the family of 10 were from China. I said hello, “Ne how” and how are you, “Ne how ma”, and then showed them how I could count to ten with the appropriate hand gestures (this is the phonetic spelling; E, R, Sun, Zsa, Ou, Leo, Tchi, Ba, Joe, Szhaa). They all laughed and nodded and smiled and then said the same words back to me in English. We were pretty much on the same page with our knowledge of the other’s language. I started naming the cities I had traveled to in China and they understood and would repeat the city names back to me. It was a pretty cool experience to be able to share a bit of what I learned in China with some Chinese I met on a plane.

We arrived in Hanoi just after sunset and I had instructions in my hand on how to reach my hostel, Hanoi Backpackers. My first mission was to find the public bus, check. I showed the driver the address I had written down before of my hostel; the driver nodded and started speaking in Vietnamese to me. “Okay?” I said… and just heard more Vietnamese from him. “Alright.. I’ll just sit up here in the front and keep asking you, okay?”. “unhhhh” (which means ‘yeah’ in Vietnamese I learned).

My 45 minute bus ride turned into three and a half hours due to a traffic accident on the freeway. I didn’t mind too much since I was still soaking in this hectic and buzzing city which was much different from anywhere I had been in the past two months. But the temperature here was a bit cold, maybe 60 degrees, so I tried to stay bundled up on the bus. I started doodling in my note pad and soon the three Vietnamese near me were huddled around to see my [terrible] art work. They sat back down when I looked up at them, but then another hour later I felt my hair being tugged on. I turned to see the man behind me smiling and making some sort of approving remark about my curly hair. I guess that was his form of saying- “Hello Miss, I like your hair, can I touch it?”. Anyway, he knew the word “real?” I nodded, and he seemed pretty impressed.

The bus driver and I had a few discussions along the way as we neared the center of the city, the conversation went something like this... “Is this my stop?”, “Nunhhh” (with a head shake), “Is this my stop?”, “Nunhhhh” (another head shake), “How about here?” “Nunhhh”. I knew it was my turn to get off when I was the last one still inside the bus and driver himself got out. He came back in to get me and waved his hand towards him to signal I should get out too. He pointed me in the right direction and I walked down the street with my massive backpack on, hoping the hostel would be near. I showed the addressed piece of paper to a few Vietnamese I passed along the way. They kept pointing down the street I was already on, but the last woman I asked made it seem like I went too far and should turn around and go left on the next street.

All I had on me were these directions and instructions that my hostel would be about 300 meters from the bus stop. In the beginning I was counting my steps.. 1, 2, 3, 4, … but after I reached 100 three times and realizing that only 100 meters had passed and I still had no idea where I was; I gave up and showed the address to a motorbike taxi (same as the tuk-tuk drivers but without the tuk-tuk part). We negotiated a price of 1 dollar (19,000 dong), and with my huge bag in front of him on the motorbike, I wrapped my arms around him and felt reveled to be off my feet.

Turns out, I was going the right way before and shouldn’t have ever turned around. But, I was glad I had the motor ride because the hostel was still a ways away from where I was. My savior dropped me off at the front door of Hanoi Backpackers and I happily paid him and walked inside. The receptionist was delightful and showed me to my dorm room right away. It was midnight at this point and all I wanted was to sleep, so I did.

Breakfast in the morning was complimentary downstairs and consisted of unlimited bread, sweet jam, bananas, instant noodles, and tea or instant coffee. I had some soup, bread, and bananas as I talked with a few other backpackers at our breakfast table. One 26 year old guy from Israel, Liraz, has been cycling through Mongolia, China, and Vietnam for the past 4 months. He had quite a story and we hit it off as soon as we started talking about China. He had just arrived in Hanoi as well so we decided to spend the day together and explore the city. We walked around the Hoan Kiem Lake and then just north of it to check out the local markets with clothes, shoes, souvenirs, restaurants, fresh food stalls, and more. We stopped along to way to try out as many new fruits as we could and tried Mangosteen, Sweet-sop, Guava, Waterapple, and Jackfruit. All were very unique and quite good... except for the Jackfuit.., that one might take a little getting used to.

 A few hours later we were back at the hostel and I took a nap. I woke up in my dorm to find Tom, a 26 year old guy from Australia, moving and setting down his belongings. Tom had just arrived from one day in Singapore and was on a two-week vacation from his law firm back in Brisbane. We chatted for a bit and then headed downstairs for the free beers our hostel was giving away tonight due to their 5-year Anniversary. We met up with other backpackers downstairs and each had several beers while talking, listening to music, and wearing Mexican sombreros our hostel owner was passing out.

It was a few days until Christmas and the hostel, as well as the entire city of Hanoi, was decorated with lights and tinsel and constantly played Christmas music. It made me a bit homesick when I first arrived, since I had just left my great traveling companions and now was on my own again. But luckily because I’m backpacking, there are always other people around and new friends to meet. Our whole hostel walked to a bar down the street called Finnegans where we had more free beers all night (I had good timing arriving here!). Tom, Liraz, and I played a drinking game that Will and Rich taught me called “Nominate”. The concept is pretty easy, you hold a coin in your hand and as the person to your left- “heads or tails and how many fingers?” If they say “heads and three fingers” and the coin lands on heads, they win and get to nominate someone at the table to drink three fingers worth of beer. If they lose and the coin lands on heads, they themselves have to drink the amount they originally picked. Then the coin is passed clockwise and the game continues. I don’t know who thought up this game, but it’s a sure fire way to get drunk quickly. I somehow managed to get my coin flip right 8 times in a row and everyone thought I had rigged it. Eventually my luck ran out and not only was I drinking my weight in beer, but everyone else at the table was nominating me to drink their winnings as well. A few more beers later we all stumbled back to our hostel and passed out for the night.

The following day Tom and I took a little tour around the city. He bought a few shirts and souvenirs from some stores and I bought a couple things for my mom and dad back home. We sampled fruit jelly candy, which is a little inch-sized container with a juicy-chewy-jelly that you have to squeeze and suck out to eat. Each jelly candy has a little piece of the fruit in it and they all taste like the actual fruit. We sampled strawberry, melon, mango, coconut, and pineapple- they were delicious!

We were still hungry after the candy and decided to find some real, authentic, different, but tasty, Vietnamese street food. We came across a lady spreading rice paper liquid onto a hot place (like the crepe masters do in Paris). We watched as the liquid turned into a pliable sheet; and then peanuts, herbs, mushrooms, green leafy vegetables, meat, and other spices were placed inside. The experienced woman rolled up 4 pieces at a time and then skillfully chopped the rolls into 12 bite-sized pieces. This whole process from start to finish took about one minute.

We were instantly impressed and walked inside to sit, after pointing to what they were making and saying “two, please”, while holding up two fingers. As we sat in anticipation I noticed signs up all over the walls (written in Vietnamese), that looked as though they claimed this place as the best spot in town. All different newspaper and magazine companies were raving about this place it seemed. We were excited. After 15 minutes of salivating and waiting impatiently, our plates of rolled up deliciousness arrived along with some sweet dipping sauce (with chilies on the side). The bits of rolls were unbelievably good… I couldn’t eat mine fast enough! They were sweet, yet savory, soft, but with a bit of crunch from the peanuts. It was a perfect snack, delectable, to say the least.

After we had the rice paper rolls (for less than 1 dollar each), we were still a teensy bit hungry and were lucky enough to come across a meat-lovers buffet on our walk back to our hostel. At the buffet was chicken, beef, pork, pork ribs, duck, fish, snails, shell fish, meatballs, even tofu! We just started pointing to things and shared a plate between us for about 20 dong (50 cents each). I have to say, although I don’t eat pork very often, the ribs were incredible and I was glad to have tried them.

On our walk back we passed some workers digging up an asphalt road. They were taking a break and smoking cigarettes, which was a common site to see in Vietname since most Vietnamese man smoke cigarettes. Ahead of the road was a market where all types of fish, turtles, snails, shell fish, raw beef, chicken, and vegetables were sold. The smell was severe and so overpowering that I literally had to cover my nose with my scarf and speed through. Tom was alright with the smell, he does a bit of fishing back home. Good on him.

Back at our hostel we took naps and then met up with a group downstairs to head out and find the cheapest beers in town. It was a bit of a walk to get to the famous spot, be our pack found the shop and sat in little red child-sized plastic chairs on the street as we drank our 20 cent glasses of cold Vietnamese beer. Life in Vietnam is good. After a couple rounds of cold beer we heard sirens and Vietnamese yelling through a megaphone. The police car moved towards us in the street yelling (in Vietnamese) that we should get off the street- we assumed, since the owners we picking up our chairs from under us and pushing us off the road and onto the small curb in front of their shop. Less than two minutes after the police passed our play-sized chairs were placed back on the street once more and we could relax in the comfort of our tiny seats.