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After arriving late in the evening due to flight delays, Hanoi looked completely dead because everything was closed. There are some really beautiful colonial buildings in Hanoi and the winding alleyways of the old quarter are quite fascinating. On the next day after arriving, the first place to visit was the Ho Chi Minh mauseleum, which is only open for limited hours. Seeing Uncle Ho was quite interesting. It looks a lot like Lenin's tomb in Moscow, with the guards in similar uniforms and the architecture looking very much the same.
There are other places on the grounds of the mauseleum, but I only wanted to see the house on stilts that Ho supposedly lived in and two of his cars. He drove a 1950's Renault and Moskva. He lived very modestly (I've never seen such a hard bed before) and his cars were pretty simple too.
I also visited the Museum of Ethnology, which has many interesting exhibits about the culture of the Hmong, Cham, and other ethnic minorities who live in Vietnam. They have detailed displays of pottery, wavings, baskets, metalware, clothing, etc. from these many tribes. I especially liked the replicas of homes built by tribes
in various areas of Vietnam. These structures are behind the museum and you can walk into them and see how they are furnished. There are also detailed descriptions of the materials and building techniques used to erect each structure.
The Temple of Literature was an interesting place, not because of the pagodas, but because this was a university to educate the mandarins. There are stelae in the shape of turtles (the imperial symbol for long life) in several pavilion. Each stelae contains the names of students who passed their exams and the dates each student completed their studies. These records cover many years and are a fantastic source of information about life in imperial Vietnam.
Later that afternoon, I saw the Hanoi Hilton (Hoa Lo prison). Hoa Lo was established as a prison by the French. US POW's, including Senator John McCain and Pete Petersen, the first US ambassador to Vietnam, were kept here during the American War. There were two rooms of exhibits about the POW's, including photos and a flight suit worn by one of the US pilots who was shot down over Hanoi. However, most of the exhibits focused on the treatment of Vietnamese prisoners
by the French during the Vietnamese struggle for independence. There were instruments of torture and guillotines used to execute Vietnamese prisoners. A lot of the exhibits were political propaganda praising the communist heroes, but there is no doubt that the Vietnamese were treated badly by the French during their struggle for independence.
The number of motorbikes in Hanoi is incredible. Crossing the street is quite an adventure and you just have to keep walking even when there are hundreds of motos headed straight for you. They are used to dodging around pedestrians, so as long as you don't run or back up, everything is fine. I think I've been in Asia too long- my blood pressure doesn't even go up when I cross the streets in Vietnam or when I ride on the back of one of those motos with those maniac drivers. The key is to hold on tight and keep your knees in.
I also took an overnight trip to Ha Long Bay and stayed the night on the boat. It reminds me a lot of Krabi, with its limestone formations. The scenery was great and we visited a fantastic cave, which was one of the
biggest caves I've ever seen. I thought it was tiny, but it kept stretching farther and farther back into the mountain.
The people on the boat were great. There were some cool Dutch and Belgian people and these Vietnamese-Americans from Phoenix. Besides being a lively, friendly bunch of guys, they provided the crew with much amusement. Apparently, it is not very common for tourists to speak Vietnamese and the crew had a great time hanging out with everyone.
Unfortunately, there is a lot of trash in the bay, so most of us did not go swimming. Kayaking around the rock formations was fun, though they don't bother to give you any life jackets. In fact, I don't remember seeing any life vests on board at all, which is pretty typical of countries like Vietnam.
It was so quiet being out in the middle of the bay at night and it was very dark because there was little moon out that night. That is, until we boarded the next boat and had a party. They had a huge collection of Vietnamese karaoke artists, but the only decent CD they had was Boney M. It was pretty funny to
see all these people dancing to Boney M. Boney M is part of my Vietnamese soundtrack-you hear them everywhere. They finally kicked us off the other boat. We had a few more beers on our boat, but took the hint when they turned off all the lights some time after midnight.
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