Hanoi Trip – Day 1

I was up bright an early at 5.45am having cleverly arranged the night before for a driver (who I had become friends with) to pick me up. What wasn’t so clever was my decision to stay up until 1.30am, which had me feeling like “absolute crap”. Nevertheless I got all my things together and jumped in the car. The driver (I don’t know his name) didn’t speak any English, however usually my limited Chinese was enough to allow us to have a conversation. On Saturday morning my ears were working about half as well as my eyes were, and my eyes weren’t working at all and I won’t even start on my brain. In short, the journey was fairly quiet. We picked up another teacher on the way, and in my state of semi-consciousness I could figure out they were talking about me, it all seemed fairly harmless however.

I got to the airport at about 7.10am, in plenty of time for my 7.40 flight to Guangzhou. I went through all the formalities and before long was sitting in the waiting room trying to stay awake so not to miss the flight. When you lift weights, often you pick a weight and lift it until at some point your muscle cannot lift that weight anymore. Having your muscles fail you can seem quite strange at first, especially if the weight is light. My eyelids were failing to lift their own weight. Thankfully I made it onto the plane, and after congratulating my ability to have been given an aisle seat with the adjacent seat empty (on a flight that was almost empty), I passed out.

Before I had been able to start fabricating a dream we had crashed down in Guangzhou and I was up and about once more. It would have been about 8.30 and my flight to Hanoi didn’t leave until 11.55. Anyone who has transferred from a domestic flight to an international flight at Guangzhou airport knows this is not good news. Come to think of it anyone who has ever been to Guangzhou airport knows this is bad news. Guangzhou Airport, simply put, is a piece of crap. For a city of ten million plus, the word ‘crap’ may under exaggerate how bad this airport actually is. It more closely resembles the production line at a car factory than an airport. Having arrived more than 90 minutes before my flight was scheduled to depart, after entering the international terminal I joined the herds and waited for check-in to open. The cheery fellow I had asked informed me that I would be good to go in 15 minutes, unfortunately his sense of time was as poor as his English. 85 minutes later I was on my way through customs. Of all the negative things I feel about Guangzhou airport, the waiting hall isn’t actually that bad, but then if you get stuck drinking Budweiser for a few months VB tastes like liquid gold. I settled in and started reading through the Hanoi section of my Vietnam Lonely Planet guidebook.

I don’t know where I got the idea of going to Vietnam, I think it may have originated somewhere in my stubborn desire to add as many countries as possible to my travelogue. I was sitting there talking to Mush (my traveling companion) on MSN, trying to come up with ideas for the holiday and it there it was. Like most of what I have done in the last 5 or 6 years, it pretty much came out of nowhere. The idea was one thing, putting it into practice was quite another. It involved guessing the dates of the holiday (in China, University’s don’t schedule holidays until two weeks before they actually happen), submitting my passport to a sketchy travel agency who claimed they would organize a visa, and then booking flights. Somehow it all came off. My exponentially diminishing faith in anything made this all the more exciting (who said pessimism never pays off). And so there I was, finally deciding to find out a little about the place I had decided to go, I wouldn’t have had it any other way.

Hanoi is the capital of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. It has a population of a little less than 4 million most of whom own 7 motorbikes. The city is located in the north of Vietnam on the Song Hong (Red River). When Vietnam first reopened Hanoi had a reputation for hassling foreigners, however this has since changed, and in the last few years it has become very popular with tourists. Hanoi’s most famous sites include Ho Chi Minh’s Mausoleum, the old flag tower and numerous museums. It is also the nearest major city to Halong Bay, a world heritage spot.

After a short wait I was onboard flight CZ371 and on my way. My empty seat luck had changed as the flight was packed. We arrived at what I assumed was Hanoi’s newly built Noi Bai Airport at 1.40, after putting my visa to work I was good to go. One thing that really surprised me about Hanoi airport was the lack of people, it just wasn’t busy. After coming from China this is a bit of a shock to the system, it took about 10 minutes of dazed stumbling before I got my act together, changed 100 US$ and found my way to the Vietnam Airlines minibus which was to take me into the city. Unlike other airports the exchange rate was actually quite favorable.

The minibus service is quite convenient. It costs 2 US$ and if you are kind will drop you of at the door to your hotel, for a 40 minute trip that’s not too bad. I found my way to a stand, paid up and jumped into the cool of the air-conditioned vehicle, the first passenger. Half an hour later I was to learn that being the first passenger was not a good thing, as the buses did not leave until the were full. We were still two short. My minibus companions were a group of 5 French travelers who from what I could gather had come from China where they also lived. Despite their accents indicating French was their mother tongue, they spoke English 80% of the time. To assume these French folk were being polite would have been presumptuous. The only others on board were an American couple up front, and despite all our geopolitical tensions we all banded together in the name of progress, and threatened to leave and take taxis if the bus didn’t leave immediately. After squirming for about 13 seconds, the driver succumbed. The drive in from the airport was quite interesting. Most of the surrounding countryside was farmland however what created interest was the architecture. All over the place were these 3 or 4 story semi detached (yet fully detached) houses painted in bright colours. They were quite attractive, and very different. Each floor would have a set of large double doors leading out onto a balcony. The balconies must have accounted for at least half of the floor plan, a plan which can’t have been all that big to start with.

The minibus dropped me off at the Hong Ngoc hotel and after handing over my passport in exchange for a room key I was opening the door to what had become a greenhouse thanks to a few closed windows and a switched off aircon. I changed that. Mush and I had arranged to meet in the room at 5 O’clock, and it being only half past three I decided rather than continue to enjoy the company of my own sweat I would go out for a wander.

One of the first things to surprise me about Hanoi was the lack of a real CBD. I had expected the city to resemble any other major city in Asia, however it didn’t. You could count the number of tall buildings on one hand, and most of those were Hotels. It was actually quite refreshing; a city yet to fully fall victim to the black hole that represents the unsustainable development of Asia. The area I was staying in was called the Old Quarter. Located in the north-east of the city it is an labyrinth of rather narrow streets, all lined with older architecture. Each street would specialize in a product; from hats and shoes to toys and sunglasses, if you wanted it... the Old Quarter had it. If the picture you have painted resembles somewhere you could lazily wander down cobbled streets then you are horribly wrong. The place is actually absolute madness, mellowed for me only by the fact I live in Shantou. There are more motorbikes in the Old Quarter than there are blades of grass at the MCG, and the road rules only take effect in the vicinity of the infrequent police officers having tea on a street corner. There is no footpath and to the unexposed foreigner this would seem like the beginning of the end. If the drivers in Hanoi were from any western country it would be closer to the end of the end. Motorbike riders and drivers in cities like Hanoi are actually better drivers than anyone anywhere in the economic north. They are extremely perceptive and use all there senses. When the government introduced a law requiring all riders to wear helmets, the number of road accidents rose 50%, simply because no one could hear properly (the law was removed). The cacophony of horns is not noise pollution but simply how the system works. So long as everyone always knows where everyone else is, there are no problems. And what better way to let everyone around you know where you are than a blast on the horn. There are no real functioning crosswalks for pedestrians, you just cross when you want. Everyone on the road will avoid you.

Amongst this I wandered for about an hour, not wanting to do anything to monumental until Mush had arrived. I made my way back to the Hotel at about 4.50, jumped in the shower, then lay on the bed with the TV on. 5.30 arrived and Mush still hadn’t. I closed my eyes and was out like a light only to be awakened 10 minutes later at 6.40 by the phone (which could easily have been a bomb siren in my dream). It was the front desk telling me she was on her way up, an hour and a half late (or so I thought). After apologies, greetings and salutations we decided to head over to Handspan, a recommended tour group and restaurant to check out trips to Halong Bay and grab a bite to eat. Unfortunately the tour desk was closed so we had a bite to eat and caught up. It was the first omelet I have had in as long as I can remember and after eating China Southern airplane food earlier in the day it really it the spot, despite it’s failure to satisfy my newly developed MSG addiction. After managing to settle down the resulting shakes we paid up and decided to head down to the Water Puppet Theatre to check out the show.

We decided to live the good life and hence splurged 40’000 dong (about two and a half US dollars) on first class tickets, and received a free recording of the music. The show was scheduled to start at 8.00, which confused me greatly as my watch said it was already 8.30. It was at this point I first discovered that there is a time difference between Vietnam and Guangdong, and Mush had not been an hour and a half late, but only half an hour late. My whole world began to make sense once again. After arguing about this for 5 minutes, then resetting my watch it was 7.40, so we wandered around the streets for 15 minutes before settling in for the show.

All in all it was very good. Water Puppetry involves a pool stage about waist-deep, in which the puppets are seen. At the back of the stage there is a screen behind which the puppeteers ploy their trade. The puppets are supported by frames under the water rather than string from above. It is all quite entertaining, with boats, water buffalo, fish, birds and more. the Lonely Planet describes it accurately as Punch & Judy in a pool. The drama is accompanied by a band playing and singing Vietnamese music to suit each scene. All the dialogue and singing is in Vietnamese so it is pretty hard to get an idea of any detailed storylines, however from what I could gather there wasn’t one, it was more a set of short stories that lasted about 5-8 minutes each. The show was entertaining after about an hour of action the audience (myself included) left satisfied. (For more info on Water Puppetry I will add a link to the Lonely Planet’s excerpt).

9pm – Bar Time. After checking in vain to see if Handspan’s tour desk had reopened we found the nearest drinking spot (a cozy little place called Bar Le Maquis) and attempted (again in vain) to drown our fatigue. After discussing the state of the world, politics in China, and much less important matters we decided it was time to crash. We penciled in Handspan tour booking and Uncle Ho for the following morning, and before CNN could even consider a round of it’s 10 minute news cycle I was out cold, and helpless prey for mosquitoes everywhere.