SE Asia Day 6

January 29th, 2009

Today we woke up for a very full day of exploring Ha Noi. After a good breakfast with Vietnamese coffee, so good espresso and condensed milk, we braved the streets. The city is pretty chaotic and dirty but has lots of charm. When you cross the street you basically have to start walking...don't stop..and hope that the scooters swerve to miss you. Our first stop was an electronics vendor, I had forgotten my camera charger and needed to buy one. Let me say I am an excellent bargainer, here was my conversation with the shop owner.
Saleslady: New charger costs 175,000 dong ($10)
Me: No, no too much, how about 100,000 dong
Saleslady: No
Me: Ok, I'll take it!
I would like to think I got better after that, but I just had to laugh at my first attempt.

Hanoi is full of two types of buildings, the first are "tube" homes which are very skinny tall concrete buildings that house commercial on the first floor and residential on the upper floors. They are usually colored brightly in the front and pure concrete on the sides. As land prices are expensive, houses are generally very narrow with numerous stories. The second type of building in Ha Noi are government structures. They are usually very large, nondescript buildings that are guarded by communist soldiers. The soldiers seem friendly but freak out if you try to take their pictures....of course Jen found this out :)

We walked about 3 miles to Ho Chi Minh's tomb. The mausoleum is grand and sterile. Constructed in marble in a roman style, it is supposed to represent a lotus flower. Personally I don't see it at all. It has black marble and sharp edges. Before Ho Chi Minh died, he has said he wanted to be cremated and his ashed spread in the four corners of Vietnam, to represent a unified Vietnam. The one thing he didn't want was a mausoleum. he said he'd rather take the money and give it to the schools of Vietnam. Unfortunately the Communist government that survived after he died didn't feel the same way...under the influence of the Russians. We weren't able to go inside but you can view the preserved body of HCM.

Next to the HCM Mausoleum is the HSM Museum. Built in 1990 it is meant to document Ho Chi Minh's life and goals. It is the craziest museum I have ever been to. It's like a weird mix of communist propaganda and a modern art museum. For example they will have a section with random newspaper and leading snippets about Ho Chi Minh's struggle to liberate the south from the oppressive foreign government and then next to it have a huge art piece that is a giant bowl of fruit meant to represent the fruits of labor created if the Vietnamese people collectively work together. I wouldn't actually recommend the museum. There isn't really any flow to the museum and the content is limited, so it's difficult to get a picture of who HCM really was.

After the museum we walked...starting to get used tot he crazy moped, no rules, driving in the city. Next up was the Hoa Lo Prison aka Masion de Central aka the Ha Noi Hilton. It's a prison built by the French in the late 1800's, however it is more famously known in the western world as the prison of the American POW's of the Vietnam War. The museum, while interesting, again provides a one sided view of the war. There is an exhibit that shows photos of the American "Guests", including John McCain, "celebrating" at Christmas, receiving packages from home, watching movies and hanging out in their "rooms". It's very interesting since we know that the prisoners were tortured nightly for the 6 years they were kept there. There are also many exhibits about how the French government oppressed and tortured the Viet Nationals. It's depressing but interesting to see.

After working up an appetite seeing the torture devices at the prison we headed, for a second try, to Quan An Ngoc. This time they were open and it was worth a second try. The restaurant is set-up with tables in a large courtyard covered by a tent. On the edges are all the food stations that feature regional food from around Vietnam that you can see being made before eating. We ordered a bunch of stuff and it turned out to be our first very good meal of the trip. I had a beef stir fry w/ spinach and green beans on something like a fried noodle cake. It was really tasty. Jen ordered some ice drink that everyone around us was drinking. When it comes out it looks like a glass full of ice and milk with green peas and black worms in it. Yum right?!? The "worms" and "peas" where actually Tapioca gel and the drink was pretty good actually. Very refreshing. Overall we had a great experience at the restaurant and wanted to visit it again. Plus the whole meal was $7 for all of us.

To work off our meal, we opted to walk back to the hotel, about 1.5 miles. and see the park around Hoan Kiem Lake. With luck on our side, we happened to walk right into the New Year's Parade, 1/24 was the Chinese New Year; it is now the year of the Buffalo. The parade had 100's of people in many colorful, traditional outfits, dragons and dancers marching down the street. After snapping many photos, we made it back to the hotel and basically collapsed from all the events of the day. Jen slept while Kevin and I grabbed a quick dinner down the street and then went back to the hotel and fell asleep. I have a feeling we are going to miss most of the night life of SE Asia as we continue to be sleeping by 9:30.