Our flight wasn't until the evening, so we had the day to kill. We ate
breakfast and got some Internet, catching up the blog and searching
for good lodging for the next few cities. The best meal of the day
though was lunch. We found some hotel that was serving soup, Robert
got a Lao style soup and sticky rice while I got standard noodle soup.
He was excited because his soup was similar to the one he really liked
in Nong Kiaw. The Nong Kiaw soup was called Khamu soup, but we
discovered that Khamu isn't the name of the dish, it is the name of an
ethnic group in Laos. We were worried that we wouldn't be able to find
it again because we didn't know it's name, but this was close. As for
my soup, I enjoyed the giant bucket of greens, herbs, green beans and
peanut sauce that accompanied my soup. They gave me so many greens
though there was no way I could eat them all, let alone fit them all
into my bowl. I wondered if they reused the leftovers or just threw
them out, composted them rather. I saw them tucking trash into the
leftovers, so at least they aren't reused. Souper tasty!
Next we went to an Internet cafe to print out the e-ticket for our
flight. The errand was ho-hum, but as we were leaving, the guy said
something to us. Our brains went click, click, click...trying to
translate it into english. It took a while, but we finally recognized
the phrase: Merry Christmas and happy new year!!
I have been struggling with liking Vientiane I think because I wanted
it to be like Thailand, but it isn't. It is so undeveloped, even the
two biggest cities are tiny towns. The roads are atrocious and there
isn't much to do. Sometimes the scenery is breathtaking, but it is so
hard to get to, so how can you really appreciate it? As for Vientiane,
it has taken me days to find any charm in it at all. It is so
important to keep an open mind and just keep trying to find the good
bits of the city. Robert, however, seems to like it here, not as a
travel destination, but if he was going to live somewhere, he thinks
Vientiane is quit livable. He likes that there is good western food
available here, so if you were here for a long time, you can get
western food that you miss. Also, the streets are clean and the city
is big enough that you escape the touristy bits pretty easily. There
is more begging here than in Thailand, probably because it is poorer
in Laos. Several times while we were eating at a sidewalk cafe, little
kids or adults came up to ask for money or pointed to our drinks for
us to give them. One really interesting experience was when a guy who
we think had polio because his legs were all messed up came up to us.
We turned him away, but a guy at a nearby table tried to give him a
500 kip note. The guy didnt want it. He just crawled back to his
wheelchair bike contraption and left it there. 500 kip is very small
money, but why wouldnt he take it? The bike he was riding had a hand
pump handle to turn the wheels, a very clever contraption we think was
built by a group called COPE that works with people injured by
unexploded ordinance. Anyways, two opinions of Vientiane.
We visited a Lao Starbucks knock-off, True Coffee. The list of drinks
was considerable, but Robert liked his espresso and my iced peppermint
peddy latte was okay. They charged for wi-fi though $&?! capitalists.
Flight
Then it was time to fly! We got a fair fare to the airport and made it
there three hours before our flight left, maybe a little overkill. We
exchanged out Kip, which is all but worthless outside of the country,
turning it into bahts. We forgot about snacks though and when I tried
to buy snacks with Bahts, they quoted me four times the price. Oh
well. We will eat in Ha Noi. Finally we were boarding. Our seats were
in the exit row, so they didn't recline, but for an hour flight, we
would survive. The first thing we noticed though was that there were
mosquitos on the plane! A lot of them. The second thing we noticed was
the chic uniforms worn by the flight attendants. They were elegant and
flowy, linen pants with a long sleeve tunic that dropped all the way
to the ground. I later read the airplane magazine and learned that it
is traditional Vietnamese dress, called an ao dai. Flying made me feel
so normal - we were escaping the undeveloped country of Laos into the
"real" world. The one problem with flying is that we have been
struggling with a sinus cold and the pressure on the plane wreaked
havoc on our sinuses, soon enough though we were landing.
Getting to our guesthouse
We were quite nervous getting off the plane in this strange new world.
We were the rattiest looking people at the airport, apparently our ilk
all opted for the cheaper transport - the 24 hr bus ride - suckers! We
made it through customs and then went to wait for our checked bags,
which we did at the wrong turnstile for a whopping 45 min!! We started
to get worried when the throng of people cleared out and still no
bags. Then we located our sad, lonely bags left strewn on the airport
floor at the other turnstile that we didn't even know existed. If
that's the worst mistake we make in Vietnam, I'm okay with that. The
airport is 45km from Hanoi and getting into the city can be quite
tricky. We read about the numerous scams that happen at the airport
and decided the safest option would be to take the Vietnam airline
shuttle. It has a fixed fare of $2 usd or 40,000 dong, which as it
turns out it's better to use US since the exchange rate is 19,500 dong
for $1usd and it's very easy to use 20,000 for the conversion on the
street.
So once on the shuttle, it's always a trick to figure out where you
should be getting off the bus, but this shuttle stopped running at our
destination, so it was pretty easy this time. It was after 10pm when
we finally arrived in Hanoi and now we have to find a guesthouse
amongst the crowds of people on the streets. The guesthouse that
Robert wanted to go to described itself as difficult to find and it
really was, but for the first time in SEA there were addresses on the
store fronts, which makes things much easier. Even with addresses
though, the store front was only a doorway. We missed it on the first
pass, but the second time around, his very keen eyes spotted it!
Thankfully, it was still open with the family that owns and runs it
sitting in the lobby watching tv. The old man showed us up three
narrow flights of spirally staircases to our room. He was very nice
and was probably alive during the Us war here. The room is very large
with one double bed and a twin bed so it could easily sleep 3 people.
There is also a small tv with English channels and a mini fridge. I
like these beds better than any that we have had yet and Robert says
we should get a Temperpedic when we get home.
Dinner anyone?
So now it's about 10:45pm and we haven't eaten since 1:30pm, so we
went out to find dinner in our new home. At the very frigid tempature
of 62 deg F, we decided that a big bowl of pho was in order. Right
outside our guest house there was a very tasty steamed bun seller, two
in fact, but we each got one of those to stave off the hunger demons.
They really hit the spot and then on to the crazy night streets of
Hanoi. We went to the first sit down restaurant that looked alright,
named Bia Minh Restaurant, really the first one we saw and got two not
so great bowls of pho. After that we tried to walk around the walking
street that was lined with vendors, but at 11pm everything starts
shutting down. So we just procured some much needed water and tried to
find our way home. We flip on the tv which is very novel and reminds
us of home and watched some tv before bed. We found this great
televised circus that was all in French, but it was the most
entertaining tv I have watched in a long time!
Obseervations
One aspect of being in Vietnam that we are truly excited about is that
we are literate here!! Thailand and Laos have their own scripts, whose
letters look like swirly-curly ques to us. Vietnam on the other hand
uses ROMAN LETTERS. This means we can actually read street signs and
menus! We can't pronounce anything, but we can use a map with ease.
Not trying to compare squiggles on a map to squiggles on a sign, which
if you haven't tried it before is damn near impossible.
Another aspect of Vietnam that fascinates us is the traffic. Hanoi is
busy. I mean, every street is used above capacity. The best metaphor
we have thought of is that the traffic is like water. It flows
seamlessly and constantly. If you want to cross the street, you do so
by very slowly and steadily walking out into traffic. If you don't
make any sudden moves, the motorbikes will TRY not to hit you. What is
most crazy about this system is that it works. We can cross the street
whenever we want without waiting for lights, just cross. Another
traveler also described to us that here, "they drive by the horn." It
is a good phrase. If you don't have a horn, you basically can't drive.
If anyone tries to cut you off or doesn't see you, just honk, Honk,
HONK, until they heed your right of way. It is crazy and wonderful, it
might be worth coming here, just to see the traffic!
1 comment:
Ha, gotta love the traffic. Miss you!
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