Honeymoon in Hanoi

Hanoi is a wonderful city to walk around. There are elegant European-style buildings from the French colonial era, pretty lakes, and interesting, bustling side streets where vendors sell everything from 1960s-era electronics to religious artifacts. The food is wonderful--both traditional Vietnamese and French-style cooking. Restaurant possibilities range from the elegant to tiny little pho (soup) shops. A side trip to Ha Long Bay is highly recommended for scenery you'll see no where else on earth.

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The Piano Bar in Hanoi is the closet thing to the fabled Rick's Cafe I've ever encountered. It oozes slightly decaying colonial elegance. Housed on the street level of an old French building in downtown Hanoi, it's run by a couple of French ex-pats and patronized by Europeans, tourists, and Hanoi's young nouveaux-riche.

Drinks are horrendously expensive, so go for the atmosphere and carefully nurse your cognac. There is a small menu of French cafe food--the crepes are really quite good.

Besides the ambience, the best thing about the Piano Bar is the truly awful jazz quartet--four young Vietnamese men who tootled their way through a predictable set of jazz standards, usually off key and out of synch with one another. When they all simulaneously lost their places in the middle of 'New York, New York,' they collectively burst into an infectious belly laugh and simply started over. We couldn't help but fall in love with them, and came back to see them night after night.

A local restaurant serving Hanoi's signature dish, called Cha Ca. It seems to translate to Fried Fish.

Cha Ca consists of spiced, sauteed chunks of a mild white fish served with sauteed greens over rice noodles. The dish is garnished with peanuts.

It was truly delicious! This restaurant, however, is not for those who don't eat fish, as Cha Ca is the only thing on the menu.

The Temple of Literature was built in 1070. It was dedicated to educating the children of Vietnamese nobility and students from all over the country who were able to pass a highly competitive examination.

You can still see the names of the top students carved into stone stelae that balance on the shell of a stone tortoise. These date from 1450 to 1780

This site is so important to the Vietnamese, who revere education, that they buried the stone tortoises and tables underground during the war so that they would not be damaged by American bombs.

It is a beautiful temple. More than anything else, visiting this temple gave me a feel for the depth, strength, and meaning of Vietnamese culture. There is much, much more to this society than Communism.

An absolutely charming show of puppetry and music! The puppets act out traditional scenes from Vietnamese peasant life and folklore. The stage is a pool of water, and the puppets appear to 'float' over the surface. Sometimes they dive underneath! I don't know how they do this, but the effect is wonderful.

This is a traditional Northern Vietnamese art form that originated in the rice paddies--hence the watery stage.

Our hotel offered a number of tours ranging from day trips to three to four day excursions to other parts of North Vietnam. The first one we tried was the Perfume River tour--a day trip to a shrine not far from Hanoi.

It was an eye-opener to leave the city. Anything resembling a modern road disappeared before we even reached the city limits. The traffic became increasingly outlandish--our little bus shared the road with bicyclists, foot traffic, ox carts, the occasional automobile, and home-made truck-like vehicles that appeared to be made from lawn-mower engines. Everything moved at about the same speed--maybe 4 miles an hour.

After what seemed like forever, we reached the banks of the Perfume River--a sleepy stream running through farm fields with mountains in the distance. We piled into rowboats powered by little old ladies with oars. I felt I should offer to row instead!

The trip down the river was pleasant, peaceful, and very scenic. After half an hour or so, we disembarked for a hike into the mountains to visit a temple and a shrine to Buddha located in a cave at the top of a mountain.

We were followed by a pack of little boys who tagged along to sell us sodas as we huffed and puffed our way up the rather steep slope. Lunch was provided at a little restaurant in the middle of nowhere. We also stopped at a temple that was half way up. Finally, we reached the top--and climbed into a dark hole in the side of the mountain to see an ugly statue of Buddha. It was rather anticlimactic.

Coming down was much easier! Thanks to the little boys, who were at our heels the entire way both up and down, we stayed reasonably well-refreshed. The downside all the refreshment was having to use the truly disgusting restroom facilities.

The trip back to Hanoi was much the same--we were ferried upstream by the little old ladies, then packed into a little bus for the interminable ride back to the city (which was probably only 30 miles away).

Hanoi is a very pleasant place to walk. The city is attractive, friendly, and safe, and the street scenes are endlessly interesting.

Like my home town of Minneapolis, Hanoi is a city of lakes. Hoan Kiem Lake (The Lake of the Sword) is right in the center of downtown Hanoi. A pleasant tree-lined walking path encircles it, and there is a bridge to a little temple that sits on an island.

The European Quarter, just southwest of the lake, features wide, tree-lined streets, and big old colonial houses, most of which are embassies now.

The Old Quarter is, as the name suggests, the traditional Vietnamese part of the city, with narrow, teaming streets lined with countless small shops and restaurants. The streets are organized into guilds, and the street names reflect the kinds of goods that are sold there. For example, there is Bakery Street, and Textile Street, and one which could only be called 1960's Era Electronic Parts Street.

Most of the inexpensive small hotels are found in the Old Quarter--we, for example, stayed on Temple Street, where the shops sold exclusively religious items and temple decor.

It's endlessly fascinating to watch the traffic in Hanoi. There are few autos and the occasional small truck. Nearly everyone rides a bicycle or walks. One of our favorite passtimes was trying to spot the most outlandish load tied to a single bicycle. The guy who was hauling three full-size couches won--unfortunately, I was too startled to take his picture.

We encountered nothing but friendly, open people in Hanoi. Some of the older people will attempt to converse in French, and quite a few young people sought us out to practice their English. We could detect no animosity towards Americans. In some areas, particularly around Hoan Kiem Lake, begging children were a problem. It was hard to pass them by, but if we gave a coin to one, we were quickly surrounded and followed by 20.

In short--Hanoi is a surprise and a delight--an elegant, attractive, and open city with many interesting sites, excellent French and Vietnamese food, and friendly, helpful people.