Our first taste of Vietnam was a few days spent in the capital. Hanoi hit me like a brick in the face; the biting cold weather after so many months in hot countries, the potent smell of coffee and the smoke from men squatting on the street with their bamboo pipes, big-eyed and beautiful tots waving hello from behind their dust masks, red-toothed grandmothers sitting in doorways chewing euphoria-inducing betal nut, thousands of shops and stalls spilling out on to the street, women in conical hats selling colourful food from the baskets on either side of a pole slung over their shoulder, trays of roughly chopped up and cooked animals on the street, puppies bouncing around, colourful lanterns and shop signs adorning the buildings and of course, let's not forget the traffic....wow, the traffic! Walking across a road in Hanoi is like playing the ultimate game of Total Wipeout where the punishment isn't being thrown into water, it is...being wiped out! Scooters and motorbikes zoom in every conceivable direction without an ounce of worry about who they are going to hit. If you look into the traffic and pause they'll fly right by you within millimetres, we learnt that the best way to navigate this death match is to look straight ahead, plough through and pray to Buddah that you're not going to get mown down.
Hanoi has many new experiences to offer its visitors. We saw numerous coffee shops with tubs of coffee beans outside bearing the label 'WEASEL' - curious and assuming a mis-translation we tried a cup and it transpires that the coffee beans are fed to weasels, collected from their...ahem...waste, and then made into coffee! Verdict on weasel poo coffee? Actually, it's very delicious (albeit quite strong, not weasely at all I promise!). Another Vietnamese delicacy we dared to try was deep fried cow's nipples. They were fatty. They were rubbery. They may have put me off beef for a long time!
Aside from shivering in my newly bought jumpers and coat we managed to pack a lot of things into our time in the city. We visited the mausoleum of Ho Chi Minh, the communist revolutionary leader, where we stood just inches from his perfectly preserved 46 year old corpse in his glass case surrounded by military guards; the embalmed body gets sent to Russia for three months every year for maintenance and they're obviously doing something right because he looks just as though he's sleeping. We whiled away the evenings sitting on minute plastic chairs in the street on top of a sea of sunflower seed shells sipping 5000 Dong beer which is about 15p - no complaints here! A large amount of our time was spent walking amongst the streets of the old quarter that's riddled with shops; each 1000 year old street, or 'Hang', is dedicated to a particular product so for example every shop on 'Hang Bac', with 'Bac' meaning silver, is brimming with every type of jewellery you can imagine in gargantuan proportions.
Although Hanoi is most definitely not for the faint-hearted, easily offended (or easily run over), I have to say it is one of my favourite cities in Asia so far. The culture is immensely rich and interesting, the hard working people are unrelentingly friendly and to have fun and experience the real Vietnam you just have to get stuck in and do as the locals do!
The infamous Hanoi traffic, this is a crossroads completely lacking any lanes, lights or organisation - a motorist free for all.
Hard working women roam the streets all day and night selling their wares.
We watched a beautiful water puppet show where tiny wooden dragons and fish danced around in the water to Vietnamese music with the odd interjection of fire and smoke.
Hanoi has many new experiences to offer its visitors. We saw numerous coffee shops with tubs of coffee beans outside bearing the label 'WEASEL' - curious and assuming a mis-translation we tried a cup and it transpires that the coffee beans are fed to weasels, collected from their...ahem...waste, and then made into coffee! Verdict on weasel poo coffee? Actually, it's very delicious (albeit quite strong, not weasely at all I promise!). Another Vietnamese delicacy we dared to try was deep fried cow's nipples. They were fatty. They were rubbery. They may have put me off beef for a long time!
A standard menu in the roadside restaurants of Hanoi: fried frog, boiled pig's ears, grilled dog meat and deep fried cow's nipples.
Yes, it's dog.
Vietnam has the best coffee I have ever tasted. Both the weasel and non-weasel kind.
Aside from shivering in my newly bought jumpers and coat we managed to pack a lot of things into our time in the city. We visited the mausoleum of Ho Chi Minh, the communist revolutionary leader, where we stood just inches from his perfectly preserved 46 year old corpse in his glass case surrounded by military guards; the embalmed body gets sent to Russia for three months every year for maintenance and they're obviously doing something right because he looks just as though he's sleeping. We whiled away the evenings sitting on minute plastic chairs in the street on top of a sea of sunflower seed shells sipping 5000 Dong beer which is about 15p - no complaints here! A large amount of our time was spent walking amongst the streets of the old quarter that's riddled with shops; each 1000 year old street, or 'Hang', is dedicated to a particular product so for example every shop on 'Hang Bac', with 'Bac' meaning silver, is brimming with every type of jewellery you can imagine in gargantuan proportions.
The mausoleum (no photos allowed inside) was once ranked the sixth most ugly building in the world.
Live owl on a keg. Standard.
This is Hang Duong aka 'sweet street'. It's also the location of a primary school (cunning design right?!) and when the parents collect the kids at hometime the streets get 'chockablock'!! (I'm sorry...I couldn't help myself).
Although Hanoi is most definitely not for the faint-hearted, easily offended (or easily run over), I have to say it is one of my favourite cities in Asia so far. The culture is immensely rich and interesting, the hard working people are unrelentingly friendly and to have fun and experience the real Vietnam you just have to get stuck in and do as the locals do!
Brrrr must be refreshing to be a cooler weather for a change. Those streets are crazy, you be careful pls x
ReplyDeleteAfter seven months of hot hot hot I found the cold very hard! Thankfully I've survived Hanoi's roads xx
ReplyDelete