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Hanoi is simply wonderful, in my opinion.

The people here are way cooler than in Ha Long City, and there’s so much more to do and see. There’s a nice nostalgic feeling in the air in Hanoi…probably because of all the 19th century French architecture and the fact they have quarters of the city named “Old Quarter,” and “French Quarter.” I especially love the wooden shutters and balconies. As I mentioned in an earlier entry (See “Overall Impressions of the Trip” if you have no idea what I’m talking about), there weren’t a lot of people who liked Vietnam too well, but there were a few of us who loved it, especially Hanoi. One girl said Hanoi was like everything she liked about Europe mixed with everything she liked about Asia, plus a little of Minneapolis (she’s a Minnesota native). I thought it was well put. Hanoi’s size is perfect also—not too big, but not too small.

What we did/Where to go:

1. Water Puppet Theatre: A centuries old form of entertainment that sprung from the many floods from monsoons. Eventually, someone got the cool idea to play in the water with puppets! Now it’s a suave, classy thing to do and see. Great entertainment—really. I saw puppet Phoenixes make an egg in the water. I wandered why they were swimming around each other so fast…

Website: www.thanglongwaterpuppet.org

2. Cyclo trip around the Old Quarter: I liked this because it put us smack dab in the middle of the psycho traffic. Not to mention we saw more awesome architecture. God, I need to go to Europe.

3. New Century Club: This place was really cool. However, it looked like a club for snotty, upper class younger Vietnamese people. But I still liked it. It has the reputation for being the best nightclub in Hanoi. A small group of us went there our first night until about midnight, which is when most of the nightlife dies in all of Vietnam. The decorations were kinda crazy, the music kinda sucked (it was mostly the same beat the whole time…some kind of techno), we saw some Vietnamese prostitutes, we smelled pot at one point, there were go-go dancers, one of the bartenders got mad at me because I ordered something and then I didn’t want it, Vietnamese men (probably also prostitutes) kept dancing with our professor, Nick, and then some of our group chatted with German foreign exchange students--an all around good time! I’d go ahead and go back.

4. Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum: This is so cool. I so would have taken pictures of Ho Chi Minh’s body if it was allowed…but I’m morbid like that. Now I really need to go to Russia so I can visit Lenin’s body and be able to say that I’ve seen the bodies of two communist leaders. I’ve already been to half of the world’s communist countries. Uncle Ho (as he was and is called) looks pretty good for a dead guy…fresh as a daisy. However, while we were there, we had to wait in a really long line just to see him. I don’t know if it’s always like that or if it was like that while we were there because of the 30th anniversary of the Vietnam War. Either way, the whole area was just oozing with communist vibes. While we waited in line, there was an old, scratchy record playing over a loud speaker somewhere of old, operatic commie music. And the guards rushed us along and got mad at some people in our group who were wearing sunglasses and who had their arms folded. It was a truely oppressive communist experience.

5. Ho Chi Minh’s home and work areas: These are all in an area not too far from the mausoleum. It’s composed of his Presidential Palace, his home, his bomb bunker, and his used cars—complete with a sign that read, “Ho Chi Minh’s Used Cars.” I love this country!

6. One Pillar Pagoda: This was not too far from Uncle Ho’s place. It was neat looking and ancient, but other than that I don’t remember the significance of it other than it is Chinese influenced and it rests on one large pillar. Hence the name.

7. Literature Temple: Seriously the first university in Vietnam—centuries old too. Now it looks like a fancy, Chinese influenced garden, but it was probably a bustling place of academia and learning in its day. There are stone turtles with engravings of students who earned degrees there too.

8. West Lake/Tran Quoc Pagoda: These were also both cool looking places, and West Lake is in an area that was heavily bombed and almost destroyed in the Vietnam War. Other than that and the Senator John McCain monument, the other cool thing is the monk coffin in the pagoda, which is a Buddhist pagoda and also Chinese influenced. I also bought a really cool book of Vietnamese Legends there. The pagoda is right next to the lake.

9. B-52 Bomber Monument: This rocked my socks. There is a pond (I don’t remember quite where in Hanoi) that an American B-52 bomber crashed and fell into, and the Vietnamese left the wreckage there to be a war monument. We visited the pond, which is covered in pond scum and has a nice little plaque that tells about when the wreck happened…I think 1972.

10. Ha Lo Prison (A.K.A The Hanoi Hilton): This was strange to visit. It was strange because it’s so quiet and made up like a museum for large groups of people to walk through, and it used to be a pit of hell and torture. You know while walking through that people suffered miserably here, and died here, but it’s all dolled up now for people to look at and they wonder through with a worry-free state of mind. Ha Lo was built by the French to torture and confine the Vietnamese, and then the Vietnamese used it to torture and confine American POWs. Most of the original prison is gone, but a good deal of cells and confinement areas remain, as well as some items used by American POWs, John McCain’s clothes, shackles, and an original guillotine. Creepy.

We also visited a pottery place, but it was mostly for us to see how the pottery was made, the people who worked there, and for us to buy some…probably for some commissions for our tour guide.

Well, that’s Hanoi in a nutshell. We went to Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City next.

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