{"id":1450,"date":"2012-12-15T03:04:30","date_gmt":"2012-12-15T03:04:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/?p=1450"},"modified":"2025-11-23T07:22:20","modified_gmt":"2025-11-23T07:22:20","slug":"quirky-hanoi-and-farewell-to-vietnam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/2012\/12\/15\/quirky-hanoi-and-farewell-to-vietnam\/","title":{"rendered":"Quirky Hanoi And Farewell To Vietnam"},"content":{"rendered":"

There was something gloomy about the low misty grey cloud that never managed to lift all day on Wednesday 12\/12\/12.\u00a0 It felt like it was signalling the end of something; maybe it was because we were just finishing our trip around, what I considered, the best bit of Vietnam. The bus took us back to Hanoi, this time avoiding another inimitable road hazard.\u00a0 Traders stand on the hard shoulder of the motorways selling bread, and all the bikes, cars, even big trucks, would stop in the slow lane to make their purchases.\u00a0 The traders sit on the side of every other type of road, so why not stand on a three-lane highway too?!!\u00a0 Traffic and its rules seem to be fabulously random and Rodney has decided that vehicles must be designed more creatively in Vietnam than in the rest of the world, as they seem to be built with a force-field around them, to prevent collisions\u2026.<\/p>\n

\"How
How To Cross The Road In Hanoi….<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

We got back to the very nice Gondola Hotel (now covered in Christmas decorations) and were greeted by the staff as if we were old friends; they did make us feel special.\u00a0 Breakfast the next day was later than we intended because a stupid migraine hit me in the middle of the night, but we still managed to spend the rest of the day ambling around the streets of Hanoi.\u00a0 We walked out of the Old Quarter and found our way to Ho Chi Minh\u2019s old house, the Ho Chi Minh Museum, Ho Chi Minh\u2019s Mausoleum and the One Pillar Pagoda. The last one on that list, I do believe, had nothing to do with Ho Chi Minh. While walking through one of the parks we heard a song playing over a tannoy.\u00a0 Rodney thought it was a football chant and wondered where the match was; it certainly sounded like one, initially\u2026… ” ho, ho, ho, ho, ho chi minh\u2026..” We moved on\u2026..<\/p>\n

\"Ho
Ho Chi Minh’s Mausoleum<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

Roaming around Bach Thao Park, Hanoi’s Botanical Gardens, we hardly found a flower in bloom, but there were plenty of lovely trees and it was nice to be away from playing chicken with the traffic for a while.\u00a0 On West Lake we walked out to the Tran Quoc Pagoda.\u00a0 Every opening, all the way up to the top, contains a white stone Buddha, each one in a different style.\u00a0 I do like wandering around Asian temples, the colours, the gold leaf, the little piles of offerings and flowers, the chanting, the heady smells of the burning incense and the inevitable rows of shoes outside each door.\u00a0 And they are always a little haven of peace from the buzz and noise outside.<\/p>\n

\"Tran
Tran Quoc Pagoda<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

The lake was covered in an eerie mist, which hung there heavily all day and the floating pedalo-swans huddled together in a corner with no takers today.\u00a0 From the lake we zigzagged back towards the Old Quarter and the massive Dong Xuan Market.\u00a0 Here you can buy all sorts of \u2018stuff\u2019, things you would probably never need in your life; so much of it in plastic.\u00a0 Though upstairs there was a jungle of fabric stalls.\u00a0 Neither of us has ever seen so many bales of so many different types of fabric and all in the one place.\u00a0 It was wonderful; I thought I\u2019d found heaven, but when you only have a suitcase and the airplanes have limits, I had to pull myself away empty handed.<\/p>\n

\"A
A tiny section of the fabric stalls in Dong Xuan Market complete with a trader using the bales as a bed<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

On the way back to our hotel I did buy a very colourful, partly embroidered, Flower Hmong style rucksack; look I can put my shopping in it\u2026.\u00a0 As we entered our hotel the cheery bellboy asked me what we had done today and then asked to see my purchase.\u00a0 He asked how much I had paid for it and then pronounced \u201cyou pay too much, only copy Hmong\u201d !\u00a0 I\u2019ve seen many a copy Prada, Dior and Gucci in the shops in Asia, but I didn\u2019t realise there are copies of the local tribe handicrafts too!!!\u00a0 With every purchase in this country you always wonder if you paid a fair price, but as the rules of bartering say, if you\u2019re happy with the price you finally agreed on, then that\u2019s ok and I was very happy with what I had paid for my lovely rucksack.<\/p>\n

\"The
Laura and the bellboy at the Gondola Hotel, Hanoi<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

After spending all day dicing with death crossing roads, declining taxis, cyclos, motorbikes, fruit, doughnuts, t shirts (actually no, Rodney did buy one of those), postcards, Zippo lighters and all the other continuous stream of vendors desperately trying to make you buy, we decided this had been more exhausting that the actual walking!\u00a0 It was still too early for dinner, so after a quick shower, the hotel organised a free lift to a local spa.\u00a0 We were given cups of green tea and then taken to a lovely room together where our feet were washed and then lying on beds next to each other, we were massaged for a full hour.\u00a0 This was now my fifth massage in our three weeks in Vietnam and it certainly cleared the remains of last night\u2019s migraine.\u00a0 We declined a lift back to the hotel and tottered slowly through the still busy streets seeking out a place for our last local meal in Vietnam.<\/p>\n

\"Hanoi
Hanoi Opera House<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

Having organised a late check out, we wandered down to the Hanoi Opera House after breakfast.\u00a0 It\u2019s a very grand building styled on one of the opera houses in Paris.\u00a0 We then promenaded through Hoan Kiem, the French Quarter where the buildings are much bigger and smarter and the roads are more like boulevards.\u00a0 In fact it\u2019s very different to the Old Quarter, especially when you find a game of badminton in full swing in the middle of one of the pavements.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Not
Not Sure Who Won The Match…..?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

I know it\u2019s silly having Santa Claus dressed in a red fur-trimmed suit in an Australian summer, but seeing so many Christmas decorations in Vietnam, a predominantly Buddhist and Communist country, does seem even more weird.\u00a0 I guess the commercial side of Christmas has hit countries throughout the whole world nowadays.\u00a0 Rodney just wishes that the shops, hotels and restaurants didn\u2019t play such awful Christmas songs in awful squeaky American voices\u2026..<\/p>\n

\"Ho
Ho Ho Ho Santa’s Coming…..<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

We\u2019ve had fun spotting whacky spelling errors in the \u2018soovenir\u2019 shops and ‘restaurats’.\u00a0 We really weren\u2019t sure about eating \u2018fried squish\u2019 and I will always call squid \u2018squish\u2019 from now on.\u00a0 Some of the names of the businesses are brilliant: The Polite Pub, Nice Silk, Hanoi Posh Hotel, Feeling Tea (feeling???), Super Place, Happy Hotel, Dung Palace Hotel (glad we didn\u2019t stay there!), Phuc Mi (it was a clothing store\u2026), Turkey Fashion (I didn\u2019t know turkeys wore clothes), Nice Dreams (they sold rolls of lino\u2026.?), and then there was IKEA Home Furnishing, which looked like a genuine sign, but it turned out to be a flower shop\u2026..?<\/p>\n

\"Maybe
Maybe It Is….We Never Went In……!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

The compulsory wearing of helmets for adults only, is still amazing me.\u00a0 Watching helmeted adults carrying toddlers and babies between their arms as they drive, with up to three more children sat on the back of the scooters and motorbikes, just looks so scary.\u00a0 I was relieved to never see one drop off; the children must learn to hang on from a very early age.\u00a0 Stalls selling the helmets are everywhere and there is the most incredible range of colours and styles; they seem to have become a fashion statement.\u00a0 Some people pop a wide-brimmed hat underneath, presumably for sun shade.\u00a0 Some pop a hat on top, maybe to fool the police, and the ladies can even buy one with a slit in the back for a ponytail to stick out\u2026brilliant!<\/p>\n

\"Take
Take Your Pick…..<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

To end our Vietnamese shopping experience on an incongruous note, after all the constant hassling and staff following you around shops, at the very last one, before dashing to the airport, I couldn\u2019t find a shop assistant.\u00a0 It was a picture shop and the front of the shop was wide open.\u00a0 I chose five greeting cards that I liked and, after waiting ages for someone to appear, I called very loudly up the stairs at the back of the shop.\u00a0 A very sleepy lady, still wearing pyjamas, came down the stairs apologising profusely for being asleep.\u00a0 I handed her some money, she asked for more and then instantly gave up on bartering, handed me the cards and returned up the stairs\u2026\u2026\u00a0 I wondered if I was still in Vietnam!<\/p>\n

We both love the little shrines that are placed everywhere, not just in temples, but inside and outside of homes, hotels, shops, etc. There are apparently various gods that need to be kept happy, even one in the kitchen.\u00a0 We strolled down one street in Hanoi, where most of the shops (in the old tradition) were selling the small carved wooden platforms that form the base of the shrines.\u00a0 But it\u2019s what people place on them that makes us chuckle a little.\u00a0 On the one in the hotel foyer there were, amongst other things, a couple of cans of coke, some fake money, incense, a packet of Pringles, some nice fruit and even a large box of Choco Pies (not sure what they are, but I hope the \u2018Foyer God\u2019 likes them).\u00a0 We never actually found out how long the items are left there, or how often they are replaced.\u00a0 At Rick and Lan\u2019s home we always wondered if the yummy pomelo we had just eaten, was the one ripening on their shrine the day before\u2026.?<\/p>\n

When we were checking out of the lovely Gondola Hotel we were asked if we would like help with our suitcase because \u201cit would be an honour for the hotel to take your bags to our reception\u201d.\u00a0 We\u2019ve never been told that in a hotel before and I don\u2019t think anything was lost in translation; the people there seemed to genuinely want to please and to help you.\u00a0 When we finally left the hotel, the staff were all standing up, waving goodbye and shaking our hands \u2013 it was quite a sending off party !!!<\/p>\n

At the airport our last 40,000 dong was spent on a can of iced tea and a packet of minty Mentos.\u00a0 I can\u2019t wait to get back to using a currency without the excessive number of noughts on the end.\u00a0 My brain can\u2019t cope with buying things that cost half a million \u2026\u2026\u2026..!\u00a0 And so ends our trip around Vietnam.\u00a0 Our next and last stop for the year will be Singapore\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026..<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Who
Who Needs A Van When You can Get It All On A Pram….?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Or
Or You Can Get It All On Your Bike……<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There was something gloomy about the low misty grey cloud that never managed to lift all day on Wednesday 12\/12\/12.\u00a0 It felt like it was signalling the end of something; maybe it was because we were just finishing our trip around, what I considered, the best bit of Vietnam. The bus took us back to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1461,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-asia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1450"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1450\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8207,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1450\/revisions\/8207"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}