Hanoi

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We got the train from Hue at 8am finally getting into Hanoi at 9pm. The ticket we bought was for a soft seat - I would like to have seen what a hard seat was!! After driving around in a taxi for ages trying to find our hostel and paying twice what it should have cost, we were told that the hostel was full and we would have to find somewhere else. We had booked about a week in advance and paid a deposit but this doesn't seem to matter in South-East Asia!!

The man at the hostel eventually said he would take us to another hostel - first saying we would have to pay for a taxi and finally relenting and saying he would take us! So at 10.30pm we each got on the back of a motorbike with all our bags and hurtled across town. It was the first time I had been on a motorbike and it was so scary (going through about 4 red lights at break neck speed and trying to hang on with a 15kg bag on your back) that I doubt I'll do it again! We eventually found a hotel and collapsed into bed.

Our second altercation in Hanoi came with a taxi driver! We wanted to go to the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum which is only about 2km away from our hotel. Once there he tried to charge us a price different to what the meter said. We argued with him about it and gave him what was on the meter and I got out of the car. He grabbed Chris before he had a chance and wouldn't let him get out!! Anyway, lots of shouting later, Chris threw the extra money at him and got out. The driver followed us and continued shouting and ended up spitting at us through the passenger window!! It was a rubbish spit and although he got me a little, it mainly stayed within his car!!! I don't speak Vietnamese but I understand a threat so we spent the rest of the day thinking he would find us!! He knew where we were staying as he picked us up, so when we went out again later, we went incognito - change of clothes, a cap each and I put my hair in a ponytail (Chris said he had never seen me in public with my hair up in 10 years!!). I think we've been reading too many crime books as needless to say he didn't come back for us!!

While in Hanoi we posted all our purchases home, we did a walking tour, visited the temple on the lake, saw Ho Chi Minh's embalmed body and went to a water puppet show. Apparently a trip to Vietnam is not complete without a visit to a water puppet show. It was quite good and funny in places - like Punch and Judy in water! The puppets are operated on long poles with the puppeteers behind the curtain waist deep in water. The Mausoleum was weird - it's only open for 2 hours a day twice a week, and has long queues of people (mainly Vietnamese) waiting to see a person who died over 30 years ago! In silence, everyone files past the embalmed body and out again (takes less than a minute!). Uncle Ho (as he's known to his friends) is worshipped in Vietnam and despite his clear wishes to be cremated, is touched up every year to keep him looking his best for his visitors!

Despite our bad luck in Hanoi, it is a nice city. All the streets in the Old Quarter are named after the produce that they sell (or used to many years ago). Our hotel was on Hang Ga - which is Chicken Street! On the walking tour we saw many of the industries still functioning. For example on Tin Street, there are tin makers and on shoe street, there were lots of shoe shops! It is also lot calmer than Saigon and easier to get around.

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