Advertisement
Published: April 12th 2017
Our fourth time in Hanoi and still the chaos and noise slightly overwhelmed me when we arrived in the old quarter, tired from an evening flight from Bangkok where we had spent three days with our son, his wife and our two gorgeous little grandsons. It was fun to see Asia through the boys' eyes and we enjoyed visiting a snake farm, the zoo, tuktuk races around the streets and river boat rides on the Chao Phraya River. As well as lots of fun and laughter in the hotel swimming pool... They all went on to a more exciting place for little boys - Legoland in Malaysia and we headed off to renew our acquaintance with Hanoi.
After settling into our favourite hotel on Ma May Street (the Hanoi Guest House) we ventured out looking for something to eat. Ma May Street was traffic free that evening as it was Saturday night. When we returned there was a band playing on the street in front of the hotel. I think they were playing their version of celtic music, fiddles and all, but it was very loud and tuneless. Luckily we couldn't hear them in our hotel room.
Next morning
we faced the craziness of the streets - it is always hard the first time just to walk out into a sea of moving traffic. But you judge the traffic flow - less cars, more motorbikes - cross your fingers, keep walking at the same pace and somehow everybody just weaves around you. The old town has changed massively since we first visited seventeen years ago. There are many more tourists so more hotels, cafes and souvenir shops. Most of the hotels are moden - narrow, tall buildings but there are still hundreds of the ancient oriental style shop houses or French built houses. I do wonder though how the shopkeepers actually make a living - there are just so many shops and they all sell similar items. The receptionist at our hotel told us the smallest shop pays US$2000 a month in rent so that is a lot of T shirts to sell before you make a profit. And they compete with the women touts who are relentless if you show the slightest interest in anything they are selling.
There are more motorbikes in the old quarter but still not a lot of cars, mainly because the size
Restaurant scene in Hanoi
I think I'm getting too old for those tiny plastic stools!of the streets can't handle them. What we love about the old town is that even though thousands of tourists walk it's streets every week it is still very much a working community for the local residents. There are hundreds of tiny shops lining the narrow streets selling items tourists would never buy - tombstones, motorcycle parts, bedding - in fact every thing you can think of. Streets with nothing but bulk supplies of zippers or plastic kitchen utensils. The hardest part is getting into the shops as to cross the footpaths to get to them is sometimes near impossible as they are covered in tiny plastic stools belonging to food stalls, used to park motorbikes on, just to sit on for a chat or to play cards, as a workshop, storing building materials on... . In fact for everything but for actually walking along and any part that is bare is usually in such bad condition it is unuasble for anything.
There is also a bustling market which is fascinating to walk through. We think it is one of the best city markets in Asia. It is great fun just to stand and watch the traders and their
Footpath scene 1
The reason why you can't just wlk along he footpaths here. customers - a fish, so fresh it is hit on the head with a stick to kill it before it is handed over to the customer or a bunch of green vegetables from a tiny lady squatting behind her meagre selection of vegetables that she picked from her garden before she left for the market that morning.
One morning we caught a bus to Bat Trang, one of the villages on the outskirts of Hanoi that makes ceramic pots. We spent a few hours wandering the narrow alleys and watching the production of the pots etc. We see so many pots in Australia with 'Made in Vietnam' on them and one of the places we visited was making the current range of ceramics that Adairs sell. Most of the pots are made in moulds but there is no factory production line - each mould is filled one at a time by hand! We watched a young man shape and press the pattern of a peacock, feather by feather, onto a six foot tall pot. It would then have been fired before being hand painted. All the pieces are appear to be hand painted, even the cheapest children's money box.
We watched a young girl paint an intricate gold pattern onto a small funeral casket and another woman decorate a vase with bright flower patterns. It was a very pleasant morning, no pressure to buy and a welcoming smile when we stopped to watch.
On Sunday we were surprised to see all the streets surrounding Hoan Kiem Lake closed to traffic and local families out enjoying the sunshine. Little children were 'driving' big plastic cars which were being remotely controlled by parents or older siblings. They were having heaps of fun! There were portrait artists, balloon artists, lots of activities for children - you could buy kits of play dough and they were moulding it into intricate little figurines. We even saw a busker playing a banjo which made Jerry laugh. We tasted a sticky sweet that was being sold - it was based on condensed milk I think - a blob of sticky goo was covered with coconut and peanuts then pierced with a stick and handed to you between two wafers. Another man was cutting names with a scroll saw from plywood. Amazing to watch, we had one made for our grandson (it cost 50 cents).. The
Mosaic wall which runs 9 klms through the city
This section of the mosaic runs beneath Long Bien Bridge streets were still closed off after dark that evening when we returned to have a drink at a bar near the lake. The lake is the centrepiece of the old quarter and the parks surrounding it are used by local courting couples, elderly people doing their daily group exercise routines and tourists enjoying the surrounding bars and cafes.
As this was our fourth visit to the city we had no major urges to revisit tourist sites which we had already visited at least twice before. There were a couple of shops that I wanted to visit though - Tan My Design for some of their lovely homewares and a ceramic shop, Hanoi Hannah, which was conveniently opposite. Shopping successfully done we decided to walk to West Lake. It was quite a distance but we visited the Contemporary Art Museum enroute where we spent an enjoyable couple of hours admiring some of the paintings. We particularly like the art of bamboo etchings. Sadly, many of the backing boards and frames were scratched or marked and all the glass doors between galleries heavily smudged with fingerprints. The numerous staff happily ignored as whilst fiddling with their mobile phones.
Tay Ho,
the expats's area around West Lake is much more peaceful than the old town. We revisited St Honore's, a French style cafe with gorgeous tarts and cakes, and walked as far as we felt like around the perimeter of the lake before walking back up to the main road and catching a bus back to the bus station near our hotel. Our few days in Hanoi passed quickly - lots of coffee shop visits, beers and gins every night on the street side somewhere and yummy food. I was feeling very tired by the end of each day there - I was unknowingly breeding a bug though as I got quite sick a couple days later in Mai Chau.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.148s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 13; qc: 33; dbt: 0.0629s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Cheryl
non-member comment
Great memories brought back. Thanks for the blog Linese. I loved Hanoi. Cycling through It is an interesting experience also ?.