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| Ho Chi Minh - Saigon River |
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| Jade Pagoda |
Dear Mom and Dad,
This summer
vacation I had the chance to go to Vietnam for two weeks with my good friend
Natalie. We had decided on Vietnam late
last winter, so we were plenty excited by the time summer rolled around. We sent off our passports early in June for
our Vietnam visas which took about 2 or 3 weeks. You can get tourist visas at the airport, but
you have to wait in line, and you aren’t always guaranteed a visa right
away. We had other friends on the same
flight as us, and that’s what they did.
They didn’t have any problems, but we didn’t want the hassle of getting
it done at the airport.
We had planned our hotels and flights
separately, but neither were extremely expensive for a two weeks stay. Our flight was more than our two weeks of
hotels. We stayed in Hanoi for 5 days
and Ho Chi Minh for 7. Our hotel was
about $15 per person per night, and it was a very nice place. Ho Chi Minh was a little more expensive $30
per person per night, but it was a 4 star boutique hotel. Pretty sweet.
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| Shop in the Old Quarter |
So we had a
total of three flights to plan for. We
flew Vietnam Air, of which I think I am not a complete fan, but the flights
were uneventful. I am glad for
that. The flight from Incheon to Vietnam
is about 4 hours and for all four hours we either had static or the flight map on
the TV monitors and no working cabin lights.
Or rather they worked, they just flickered every few seconds. The domestic flight was fine though.
In Hanoi we
stayed in a pleasant hotel in the Old Quarter right in the center of Hanoi’s
market district. It was certainly an
adjustment from Korea. Traffic is totally
different and although Korea had scooter ajjussis who are death on wheels,
Vietnam is an entire country full of scooters.
However, they are not daredevils when they drive, they just never
stop. Unless there’s a red light. But a lot of places just have massive traffic
circles and you have to figure out how to cross it. The trick is, and we learned this quickly,
although it always felt wrong, is to not stop.
So we felt like we were always moving, when we were there. There is very little space in the cities, so scooters are parked mostly on the sidewalks and people walk in the
street. This means you watch for
traffic around you and you might never walk in a straight line. If you are walking in a straight line you are
probably crossing the street.
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| Temple of Literature |
Because we were
in the market district, we of course, did a ton of shopping. Most things had a price but it was expected
that you could haggle the price a bit.
Not that anything was majorly outrageously priced. No, most things were actually well under
$10. Many things were less than $5. Tipping staff was not necessarily expected,
but was good manners and very appreciated, so usually we tipped about VD50,000
= $2.50. And that was still pretty
generous.
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| Water puppets! -Hanoi |
While we were in
Hanoi we tried to get to at least one major tourist spot a day, and the rest of
the time we spent in coffee shops writing post cards, lazing away the afternoon
over Vietnamese coffee and fruit juices galore.
Or we went shopping…! The first day
we went to the Hanoi water puppet theater!
Amazing!!! Amazing!!! Except for the woman from the Bronx behind us
that just had to ask “*Debbie*! There’s actually water!?” Some people should NOT travel… Okay rant over. I think…*Name was changed cuz, I didn’t
bother to remember it in the first place :)
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| Hanoi Hilton |
We didn’t get to Halong Bay while we were
there, although that is on the list of major things to see. There was a typhoon that tempted us to stay
away. In fact, our flight to Vietnam was
delayed because of it..
Over the next
few days we went to a couple of temples, one of which was called the temple of
Literature, a very fascinating visit.
And lastly, to the Hanoi Hilton. Ironically, most of the prison has been destroyed, and in it's place stands a luxury hotel. Even so, for what was left, I wasn’t
sure what I expected there, but it was much harder to go through that place
than even I thought. I had to sit for
awhile. It doesn’t rest comfortably on
the mind, but it was important to go.
Photography was allowed but I could only get a picture of the front. It didn’t feel right to me.
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| dragonfruit juice |
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| pineapple juice |
I did get to see
a monkey in the Old Quarter among other many delightful sights! And of course we spent a lot of our time in
restaurants trying out the cuisine. I am
a major fan!!! It looks like we were constantly
eating piles and piles of food, but most of it was actually fruits and vegetables
and salads of various kinds (amazingly fresh and delish!) I couldn’t get enough of the fruit
juices! Korea, unfortunately, does not
have nearly the variety of drinks. It’s
either coffee, soda or alcohol in Korea.
I love the coffee, but since I rarely drink soda anymore my choices here
are limited. I had lemon juice, coconut
juice (in the coconut), dragonfruit juice, passionfruit juice, kiwi juice,
strawberry juice, mango juice, watermelon juice, orange juice, apple juice, if
you can make juice from fruit you can probably find it there.
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| Vietnamese milk coffee |
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| Spring rolls -fresh and fried |
Thursday we made
our way by plane from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City, Our flight was 2 hours. We checked driving travel time = 25 hours… Glad we flew, even if the wait time for
luggage was awful.
Ho Chi Minh. We
did more of the same that we did in Hanoi.
We visited some pagodas and wandered the city, just relaxing and going wherever
we felt like it. Our hotel was excellent
about helping us get reliable taxis and information; pretty much anything we
needed, they were on the ball. One
morning we took a cooking class that was absolutely a blast! I wouldn’t mind doing something like that
again. We learned to make fresh spring
rolls, green mango salad, lotus leaf fried rice. It was soooo good! Who needs
lunch?
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| The Chef and I |
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| My first fried rice |
While in Ho Chi
Minh I got to meet some friends for a meeting on Sunday. It was a special meeting and I was so lucky
to get their contact information from a very good friend whose family lives in
the city. I got to meet many friends
from there as well as some who were visiting from other places, a young couple
from the Philippines and some visitors from China, Cambodia, and Japan as well. Many people could speak English and so it was
my first meeting in at least partial English since our convention in May. One lady invited me to dinner on Wednesday,
before we met some other friends in the area that evening. One other visitor was there from Pakistan,
and so we had a very pleasant but very quiet evening.
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| sugar cane snacks |
All in all, it was a great trip, and very
interesting, although there were some bits, like the markets and crossing major
streets that I don’t think I would be fully comfortable with. It was strangely easy for me to get lost and
turned around, although Vietnamese used an easily (to Western eyes) recognizable alphabet (even if I can’t
say “Thank you” correctly). We did experience
this one day. We were looking for the
post office that was designed by Gustav Eiffel.
We even mailed some postcards in a post box on the street where this building was supposed to be. We wandered around following our various
maps, and never found it! Then, on our last day we wandered by, looked up
and lo and behold, there it was. Right
behind the mailbox we mailed our letters from…
Apart from that
I could easily get used to the inexpensive foot and back massages, the coffee,
juices, meals, although the rainy season was pretty rough…. Never leave without
your umbrella. Sometimes though, the umbrella
just wasn’t worth it, and you run through the drops!
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| 48 hour incence |
Our last day
there we finally crossed off one very strange and somewhat sad objective that I
started a very long time ago. We finally
found McDonald’s two days before we left.
I thought I could get out of it, since we didn’t see any McDonald’s
during our entire trip. But
unfortunately we found one just before we left.
Right across the park from our hotel…
So we stopped and got some fries.
So now I have been to a McDonald’s in every country I’ve visited so far… (Japan, can I please escape this horrible
self-inflicted torment?? Please??)
사랑해!!!
