December 29-31: Hanoi

When I first arrived in Hanoi, all I could think of was:

omg, traffic.

I live in Asia. In a rather large city. I'm used to seeing people/automobiles in mass quantities. I've been to the big intersection in Shibuya in Tokyo where like a billion people cross at one time. None of these hold a candle to Hanoi traffic.

A Vietnamese parking lot. In English, we call it a "sidewalk". 

Notice the lack of lines, direction, or any form of rhyme or reason. 

KL airport: 4 a.m. 

We had paid for the hotel taxi to pick us up at the airport. I had heard too much about taxi and hotel scams and we had spent the night in Kuala Lumpur airport and it was very early in the morning so we were tired and did not feel like dealing with scamming taxi drivers. The guy picked us up and I think it took about an hour to get to the hostel, but I'm not too sure since I fell asleep on the way.

He parked on the side of a busy road. I got out of the taxi, collected my bag from the trunk, and the taxi driver pointed across the street.

"There it is!"

He said it like it was so easy. Like getting there would be no problem. I stood there on the side of a small street clutching my backpack, looking at the wall of motorbikes buzzing by in front of me in all directions. There were no lanes. No crosswalks. No lights. No traffic regulation whatsoever. And no sign that the motorists were going to stop or slow down.

"This way," said the driver, and he stepped into the road, motioning for us to follow. I walked close behind him, and the sea of traffic closed in around me. We walked steadily across the street, with bikes whizzing past on either side, parting around us like a stream around a large rock, and after what seemed like an eternity, we reached the other side, and I was able to breathe again.

The traffic at a large intersection just outside the Old Quarter in Hanoi. 

It took nearly our entire time in Hanoi to become accustomed to the Vietnamese street-crossing techniques. The trick is to just kind of start walking and keep going until you get to the other side and cross your fingers that the guys on the motorbikes are paying attention. Most of the time they are, but sometimes they're not, as we witnessed on a few occasions. Most of the time, I believe it's more trouble than it's worth for them to hit you, so they generally try not to.

The evening of our arrival, we walked around in the area near our hostel. At first, we tried our best to navigate our way around without crossing streets but soon found this impossible. The first few times we tried to cross, we had to sort of psych ourselves up and do a kind of countdown and just jump in, but after awhile, we had it figured out.

We had set out to try to find dinner. I had found a place that sounded really good recommended online called Bun Cha (actually, the name of the food they serve is called bun cha), and we headed out on our quest for dinner. The intersection in question wasn't very far from our hostel, but it took a bit of courage to get there. The glorious thing about Vietnam is that they label their streets (now we just need to get Japan to jump on the "our citizens actually know where they are" bandwagon), so we were able to find it in no time.
I saw the store first, and pointed it out to James, who clearly had a different idea of the kind of place we were looking for. I had seen the description online, so I knew it wasn't going to be the nicest looking place, but I don't think either of us expected it to look like the back room of a Seven-eleven in the bad part of town. It was just one room, open to the street, with small, child-sized tables spilling out onto the side walk. Two ladies, the women who worked there, sat inside along with a few customers. James was skeptical, and it took us a few walks around the block for me to convince him to go back. We generally act like spoiled foreigners whenever we go anywhere. Being that we live in Japan, I generally take the opportunity of traveling to find restaurants and things I miss from back home. Even after going to Kuala Lumpur multiple times, I don't think I've actually eaten any Malaysian food, because I'm always so distracted by Chili's and all the nice western restaurants they have. I was determined, though, to get some real Vietnamese food. I told him I really wanted to go, and that if we both ended up with cholera or something to blame me. Apparently he was not very reassured by this promise, but agreed to go back.

Al fresco dining in Hanoi.

We walked back to the restaurant, and went inside, looking at the two women with uncertainty. They gestured for us to sit down, so we did. There was no menu, so we simply motioned "two" and the woman nodded, in a few minutes bringing us each a bowl of broth with an assortment of pork, as well as a heaping plate of mixed greens (including ::gasp:: fresh cilantro), a plate of cold noodles, another bowl of cold, sweet-flavored broth, and a huge plate of fried spring rolls and another empty bowl.

I had no idea what to do.

We had sat down at about the same time as a Vietnamese couple, and while I ate a spring roll I tried to watch the couple out of the corner of my eye and see how they went about tackling this mound of food. It seemed similar to a Japanese dish, where you have the broth in one bowl, and you take a bit of noodles and greens and dip them in, and then eat them. There was also a bowl on the table of chopped peppers mixed with something (ginger, perhaps?), and James added some to his bowl, realizing too late that unlike the Japanese, Vietnamese like their spice, and these peppers were hot. He gave me a couple to add to my bowl, and  after adding only 2 pieces of hot pepper to an entire bowl of broth and noodles, my mouth was burning.

Glorious, glorious spice. The whole meal was absolutely amazing, and way too much food. The noodles and greens are actually unlimited, but we could barely finish what we had. It was just fantastic, and probably the best thing I ate while in Vietnam.

Afterwards, we walked around some more to try to work off some of our huge dinner, and were thrilled to accidentally find a bakery we had been searching for which that day was having a special of gingerbread cookies.

My first gingerbread man in 2.5 years.  Yum. 

We spent the rest of the evening walking around Hoan Kiem Lake, and the next day, we had the whole day for sight-seeing in Hanoi. We were able to see most of the major sites of the city, most of which were concerned with President Ho Chi Minh, or the Vietnam War.

Evening view of Hoan Kiem Lake.

Walking around the lake-- all the decorations are up for New Years. 

Flower Festival surrounding the lake. 

These bird cages are hanging everywhere.
I think there's a town nearby that specializes in them,  but I'm not entirely sure why they're so popular. 

Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum

I wish I would have been faster to my camera. The man in the center of the picture is riding his bike while carrying a bunch of individually bagged goldfish. Not your usual cargo. 

We visited the Ho Chi Minh Museum. We arrived just before closing, so they let us in for free, although it normally only costs a dollar to get anyway. It was actually a very interesting looking museum. Extremely high on propaganda (as is everything in Vietnam), but very cool aesthetically.

This is somehow supposed to represent a human brain (?)

Artifacts from Ho Chi Minh's death.
A watch he was wearing stopped at his time of death, his last entry in his journal, those kinds of things. 

After leaving the museum, we found ourselves at the entrance to a temple, and then accidentally at the One Pillar Pagoda. 

One Pillar Pagoda.

We then headed onward to the Temple of Literature.

Turtles carrying tablets inscribed with the names of graduates. 

Turtles are supposed to be one of the 4 mythical/magical/special creatures in Vietnam.
The three others are unicorn, phoenix, and dragon. 

After the Temple, we stopped at the "Hanoi Hilton", or the Hoa Lo Prison. Originally, it was built by the French, and was used for the imprisonment and execution of Vietnamese freedom fighters. During the Vietnam War, it was used to house American POWs, and was known as the Hanoi Hilton.

Most of the displays emphasize the mistreatment of the Vietnamese at the hands of the French, with a very small portion dedicated to the American soldiers. The American exhibit, however, is just a bunch of baloney. They try a bit too hard to talk about how well the Americans are treated-- most of the exhibit looks more like an advertisement for a summer camp (prisoners laughing and smiling while playing basketball and having Christmas parties) than photos from a prison. Vietnam doth protest too much, methinks.

They claim to have John McCain's suit from when he was shot down. 

In the evening, we decided to visit a nearby night market, and purchase the obligatory knock-off goods, including but not limited to a "Gucci" wallet, and also a wallet from "Burberry".

And that was Hanoi. 

We were meant to spend one more day in the city, but instead booked a side trip further north to Ha Long Bay, something I had been looking forward to for a long time. 

Onward! 

December 23-28: Merry Christmas, Bali!

First "kampai" in Bali.

Lunch on the balcony. 

Out of all the locations we were headed on our vacation, I think Bali was the place I had been looking forward to the most. We had planned it as not so much a trip for traveling, but just a place to relax and be a bit spoiled for a few days.

Christmas morning sunrise

In the early days of planning the trip, I was browsing through places to stay, looking mostly at places that were on the beach, but not very expensive. Just for fun, I started scrolling through all the high-end resorts, and happened upon a deal (about half price) for an all-inclusive resort in Bali. It was at the high end of the budget, but doable, and I emailed James, asking what he thought. He replied through email with what he told me later was a sarcastic yes, but being that it was communicated via email, I didn't catch the sarcasm, could only think of how much I wanted the hotel, and booked it. I found out later he was kidding and, while I could have canceled, still wanted to stay there, so I started to read off the list of things that were included. He listened while I told him about the "motorized watersport activities", the "non-motorized watersport activities", the pool, the restaurants, the minibar. And then I said the magic word.

"Oh, they include milkshakes."

From then on, James was 100% on board, and all he could talk about was how many milkshakes he was going to have while we were there (although he ended up drinking mostly lassi).

Rainbow after the rain

Afternoon clouds.

Decorated for Christmas

A bed on the beach!

Inside the lounge

Glass-bottom boat picture fail. 

The whole stay in Bali was just fantastic. We had a bit of bad weather, but whenever it rained we retreated to one of the amazing restaurants in the resort, or sat on our balcony overlooking the ocean. Most of our time was spent in the resort, but we did venture out one day for some shopping. Another day, we had booked a trip on a glass bottom boat to a nearby Turtle Island that had basically a small petting zoo with eagles, fruit bats, giant turtles, snakes, porcupines, and other miscellaneous birds and critters. The glass-bottom boat part of the tour was a bit disappointing, since we were going too fast most of the time to see anything, and for the short time that we were parked above a school of fish, other boats in the area started feeding them and they swam away. The animal place was very interesting though, and probably one of my favorite parts of the trip. 

Adorable baby turtles. 

The tour guide, after handing us the turtle, says, "He's albino... Just like you!"

As you can see, this is where the big turtles are. 

And they are very big. I felt a little uneasy standing in a pool of water with bare legs and a whole bunch of giant turtles swimming around me.

Again the tour guide wasn't shy about sharing her thoughts.
"You guys look like a happy family!"

I showed this to my students, and they were mortified that I was handling a reptile while sporting bare shoulders.

The bird on the left was INSANE. He wouldn't stop moving-- hopping back and forth and back and forth. Behind him, I'm clutching James' hand in terror. 

They told me to shake him so his wings would open.
It feels wrong holding an animal upside down by his feet and shaking him. 

James decided to go on a Sea Walk, where they give you a helmet that looks like part of an old-fashioned scuba suit, and you walk along the bottom of the ocean and look at the fish. He had me talked into it for a little while, but at the last minute I backed out and I was glad I did.

As I feared, they give you food so that the fish kind of swarm you and nibble on you, which is the opposite of what I want to happen when I'm in the ocean. James enjoyed it, but said they didn't really let them walk very far. I enjoyed sitting in the room ordering room service and also not walking very far. 

Statue on the taxi ride to the hotel

Towards the end of the week, I decided to concentrate on fulfilling my desire to be pampered, and booked not only a beach-side hour-long massage (only $20 US :D ), but a mani/pedi (including hand/foot scrubs, massages, and many other wonderful things) at the spa next door. Both were magical.

Outside the spa

Before I knew it, my time in Bali was drawing to a close (time flies when you're having an amazing time and there are unlimited mojitos). I was really sad to leave, but excited to head to our next stop---  Vietnam.