Millionaires in Ha Noi
After a night in Singapore with the sibling and an amusing drive with a cab driver who introduced himself as a “fellow ceylonese” and proclaimed, much to my delight, that Singapore has “too much order and not enough character”, we made the final flight to Ha noi on SQ. The nervous energy quietly built up as our first aerial glimpses of the country were, unsurprisingly, checkered green. Immigration took longer for us given the privileges of the LK passport - the officer had obviously never seen one before and kept flipping it over as if expecting it to turn luminous green. “It was issued in New Delhi” I ventured, and he nodded his head. Despite having a pre-issued visa that cost us a ridiculous LKR 20k (we could only find one travel agent willing to sort out a viet namese visa for us), I was concerned that we may not get our full request of 2 weeks stay. After what felt like an eternity the immigration officer reached for a stamp and thumped it hard on my passport and on the immigration form - I nervously flipped through it till I got to the visa page “permitted to stay till 07/10/08 - 16 days”.
The bags turned up soon enough and I opened the doors passed customs to a sea of faces and placards with a mixture of Western and oriental names. Amidst this there was one board with an old Portugese name - I walked up, smiled and waved and the face hiding behind the placard lit up, “citygate? you come!” He tried to persuade us to change our money at the hotel but the rate at the airport money exchange counter looked somewhat attractive based on the forex info received on the welcome to Viet Nam text on my mobile. I changed US$340 and became an instant millionaire. The teller counted out hundreds of thousands of Dong and I ended up with 5.5 Million VND - not too shoddy. We had arranged to spend our first night at a hotel right at the gate of the old city - the Old Quarter. The drive to Citygate was not particularly inspiring - it was hot and the outskirts of Ha noi were more concrete oriented than the picturesque countryside we would encounter later.
An hour or so later the vehicle came to a halt on a narrow lane and the driver showed us the old white arch, grinned and said “citygate!” The actual hotel was hidden amongst a cluster of little shops selling nicknaks and eats. The entrance housing a makeshift reception was narrow and long and it led to a lift - the pride of citygate hotel. After a quick wash we went out in search of our first Viet namese meal. There were two immediate challenges. The roads in the Old Quarter are really a maze - and it took a few minutes to figure out possible routes. Once we had a basic idea it was time to cross roads. Even though it was 2.30pm, hardly rush hour, crossing roads for the first time felt like a mission in itself. As soon as we tried to step out, motorbikes, cycles, scooters came charging at us from the left, the right and diagonally. After yet another eternity, we finally just stepped out and slowly walked, stopping, starting again, stopping - and as the bikes whizzed by, we got to the other end. The Lonely Planet map of the OQ was pretty good and we eventually found our bearings and made our way along Dao Duy Tu Hang Chinh towards the centre of the old part of town.
We decided to eat at Little Ha Noi I (Viet Nam’s copyright laws are somewhat akin to Sri Lanka and restaurant names are not immune - there’s a Little Ha Noi II just down the same lane). One of the specialties here is the Catfish nem - a type of Viet Namese spring roll. It turned out to be a DIY meal with the rice paper, fish and greens provided separately along with the requisite sauces. It was superb. The classic fish sauce, Nuoc Mam, coloured with floating chopped fresh red chili, would become a staple sidekick with most meals. By the time lunch was done with the sun had eased a bit so we decided to make the best of this half day by getting some administrative tasks out of the way. The first thing to sort out was the boat for Ha Long Bay. Thorn Tree provided some insights into the process and we had been forewarned that you really get what you pay for in Ha Long. We had highlighted Columbus travels and Handspan - and went with Columbus based on price and the really nice ppl who worked there. Their best option was priced at US$ 125 and the lowest price at Handspan was also US$ 125. This included overnight in the boat, 3 meals, transport to and from Ha Long, sea kayaking, cave exploration and swimming. This would easily be our priciest investment for the entire trip - but it felt like a sensible option.
Pleased with the afternoon efforts we headed towards the main lake in the OQ - Hoan Kiem lake. Soon as we stepped on to the road a woman came along with two baskets of fruits balanced on a pole placed across her shoulder. She came beside R and promptly placed the pole on her shoulder followed by the famous conical hat she was wearing on to R’s head. Our protests were mingled with laughter - and she said “no money - take picture. It ok.” I hesitantly snapped a quick one and she promptly began packing a small plastic bag of her fruits. Our protests were no longer mingled with laughter, despite the cleverness of her tactics. “40,000 dong” she said, the equivalent of about US$ 2.50 for a banana and a mango. We firmly said no and headed off towards the lake. The roads felt somewhat more familiar now, helped significantly by the map. The plan was to catch a performance of the water puppet theatre - a Ha Noi institution, and then grab a bite for dinner. Outside the water puppet theatre there were lots of tourist buses and we struggled to get tickets until a last minute cancellation opened up two seats for us which turned out to be excellent.
The show itself was a fascinating glimpse into Viet Namese culture - encapsulating traditional viet namese life which we would encounter repeatedly in the our travels over the next two weeks. The show consists of puppets expertly wielded over water from behind a veil. This was also our first taste of classical viet namese music including the fantastic Dan Bau - a single string wind instrument, and an assortment of viet namese violins, flutes and guitars. The folk tales and depictions of village life including duck farming, agriculture and religious ceremonies went on for just over one delightful hour. The classical theme didn’t rule out the use of special effects though - the dragons that exhaled fire were a fantastic exhibition. Thoroughly satisfied and even more excited about the prospects of exploring this country, we left the building and had a lovely walk around the lake. Ha Noi was getting ready to wind down for the night with people jogging, doing tai chi or just ambling around the perimetre of the lake, chatting or contemplating in silence.
We headed back towards town looking for a night market on Don Xuan road. This provided us with a taste of Ha noi that we’d get to really savour on the third day - walking through the specialised street markets - each a concentration of a particular product. We eventually ended up at an improvised food market near Bach Ma temple. The place was packed and utterly chaotic. We just stood aside figuring out whether we need to speak to someone first because it certainly didn’t seem like there were menus or anything of the sort. Eventually we ventured out of the collection of motorbikes and stepped up towards the jam packed tiny tables and even tinier chairs where about 50 viet namese were munching away. Soon someone came up and thrust a menu into my hand and pointed to a couple of chairs next to two diners. We asked if we could sit closer to the fan. The young boy looked confused and then shook his head. “No. Different” We were puzzled but then figured that the table near the fan is owned by a different proprietor. The menu looked good so we sat down. R ordered her first Pho Bo (beef noodle soup) and I tried the eel braised with mushrooms washed down by Bia Ha Noi (4.2% alcohol - less than my cough syrup). It was superb. And the atmosphere really helped a lot - there was so much chatter, people came and went, xe oms (motorbike taxis) revved, orders were shouted, bia bottles clashed as we dined amongst Ha nois best. It was a great way to end a fantastic night that really encapsulated Ha noi - ordered chaos, great food, great atmosphere - i was sure our Singaporean cab driver would have approved. On the way back to citygate we came across an interesting looking hotel called Prince II Hotel. We had a look at the rooms - fantastic quality plus a desktop with free internet to boot. We checked the price, $20 a night, breakfast included. Pretty damn good value for money so we booked for the next night and also booked a transport to the perfume pagoda the next morning. After all this the tiredness set in. We had just been in Ha noi for about 9 hours but we had done so much. At citygate we flopped into bed - a pretty auspicious start to what would be a fantastic journey.
