Hanoi

I woke up early today and went to do my laundry as it did not dry overnight. I packed up all my things and headed to the airport again. I had gotten quite familiar with the metro system of Hong Kong in my few days, so I knew exactly where to go and what to do. I caught the train to the airport and chilled out for a bit. When I went to check-in, there was a pretty strict document policy. If you recall before, I needed to fill out some intricate paperwork that I would present to get my Visa-On-Arrival when I entered Vietnam. If the Visa people did not like the paperwork, my handwriting, or my face, they would have every right to deny me a visa and put me on a plane back from whence I came. With that in mind, I boarded the plane, found my seat, and promptly passed out for the short flight.

‘They say you come to Vietnam and you understand a lot in a few minutes, but the rest has got to be lived. The smell: that’s the first thing that hits you, promising everything in exchange for your soul. And the heat. Your shirt is straightaway a rag.‘

So goes some memorable lines from Graham Greene’s The Quiet American. And he could not have been more right. However, having had my share of hot late Louisiana springs, I can understand why it was such a popular destination for people fleeing Vietnam. Dripping with sweat, I deboarded the plane and got on the people-mover to the terminal. I had a faint inkling that I was not in Kansas anymore. Arriving at the terminal, the first thing to greet me was an ATM. There is a $30 Visa fee to enter the country, again, if they let you in at all. Luckily, I was prepared for this. In my many hours of research, I learned that there is a service that not only gets you to the front of the Visa line, but also has a 99% success rate of letting you enter the country. All for an additional $50. I was able to send them my money weeks in advance, so after looking through the throng of people, I found a gentleman holding my name on a sign. I approached him and told him who I was. He then asked for my passport, my $30, and my paperwork as he motioned for me to sit down. Now, the first rule of travel is NEVER give your passport to a stranger. Since he had my name on a placard, I thought it would be alright. I watched this gentleman stroll up to the counter, past the dozens of people waiting to be processed. He seemed chummy with the gentleman in the military uniform behind the counter. They shot the shit for a minute or two, and then he handed my items over. Five minutes later, they were returned to him and then to me. I shook my facilitator’s hand, went through another military checkpoint, and just like that; I was in Vietnam. I understood a lot in a few minutes.

Going down to the main terminal, I was amazed at what I saw. This was not the Communism that I had expected. Having traveled through Cuba and its dilapidated everything, I was gobsmacked: everything was modern and looked like the airports back home. There was even a Popeyes! But I had brought the lessons of my direct experiences with Communism with me and knew not everything appeared as it seemed. One of these lessons was to have pristine dollar bills to change. When I went to my bank back home and asked them to trade my fistful of wrinkled Uber tips for new bills, they scoffed at me and said money was money. I told them where I was headed and what I needed them for. They looked at me with incredulity but carried out my request anyway. The lady at this change counter looked at every single bill I had like she were a art dealer deciding on a collection. I had also learned that $1’s were the best to change as larger notes would have even more scrutiny. I decided to change this wad of bills because I did not know how available credit card processors and ATMs would be. Of the $100 I wanted to change, $5 bills were returned to me for being too wrinkled. But that is how it goes. At 36, I became a multi-millionaire in under 3 minutes as there are 23,000 Dong to the Dollar. I thanked the lady, then went to secure my ride.

For some reason, my preferred choice of transport was not available in this country. South East Asia’s Uber equivalent is called Grab. It is a fascinating little app where one can choose either a car, a tuk-tuk (motorized scooter taxi), or for the incredibly brave, the backseat of a motorbike with an included helmet. I chose the car option. What is also great is that it provides on-the-spot translation as my Vietnamese was rusty. I ordered a car and 3 minutes later, after comparing the license plate information to the app (which everyone should always do everywhere along with comparing the photo of the driver with what is presented in the app,) I found my ride to take me to the city.

Going back to the quote about understanding things in Vietnam in a few minutes, I understood that people give exactly zero fucks about traffic laws, if there are even any at all. As we sped along the highway, it was absolutely astounding what people would do. Motorbikes would go down up ramps, go up down ramps, cars would drive the wrong way on the shoulder, trucks would bob and weave like mopeds, jockeying for position on the crowded highways, all while water buffalos lazily chewed their cud, watching this human madness. As someone that had my unfortunate share of auto accidents, my hand gripped the provided handlebar. I had never seen anything like it. And I have driven in Louisiana, Houston, and Los Angeles!

After about a 45-minute ride for $9.50(!?!?!?!?,) I arrived at my hostel. I was shown my room, a beautiful six topper with a private bathroom en suite and curtains on every bed, dropped my stuff and headed out for a late lunch. As I was walking out the door, I was reminded about the all-you-can-drink free beer social hour. Already, I knew I picked the right place.

I was in a touristy section of Hanoi with a lot of hostels, restaurants, and shops. I found a restaurant right outside my hostel and sat down for a delicious late lunch of Com and a local beer. I had been eating Vietnamese for many years. The simple ingredients masterfully prepared have been a favorite of mine ever since the biggest Foodie I know, my father, took me to a Vietnamese restaurant in Philadelphia while I was still a teenager. Since then, I moved to Louisiana and would eat it as often as I could.

I walked around my new home for a bit. There were so many restaurants, bars, hostels, hotels, shops, stands, merchants, and the like; it was a little overwhelming. I found a shop that sold postcards, bought one for my nephews, then headed back to my hostel for the free beer.

One of the things about travel, especially backpacking, is that it helps change one’s nature. I am not naturally an extrovert. But being in a tight place with so many people doing exactly the same thing you are is a natural ice breaker. Getting a frosty mug of beer, finding an open seat, and asking if you can sit down was what I liked best about this experience. I also learned that English really is now the Lingua Franca of the world. I joined a group and introduced myself to Francesca, Sophie, Ivan, and a few others. We became fast friends as we tried chugging our beers to maximize our power hour. As our conversations continued, they were hungry. I decided to join them, even though I just ate. We walked to a little restaurant that they had eaten at the night before. As the beers kept flowing, I asked where the restroom was. They pointed. Inside a closet, there was a naked incandescent bulb hanging from the ceiling. There was only a urinal, about the size of an inverted athletic cup with an angry-looking eight-legged resident. Needless to say, I held it. After dinner, I bid my new friends adieu as I wanted to clean up and go to sleep after my long day of travel. The room was empty when I arrived, so I grabbed my items and took a fantastic hot shower. I then walked out of the shower in my boxers when I noticed I was not alone anymore. I introduced myself to my bunkmate, Lucia from New York. We had a nice little conversation before we crawled into our separate bunks. I knew I liked Lucia after she yelled at one of our roommates, an incredibly drunk Belgian, that confused the floor of our room for a urinal in the middle of the night. So far, so good in Hanoi.

The next day, I woke up with the minimal plan of going to the Hoa Lo Prison, more commonly known as the Hanoi Hilton. Hoa Lo was built during the late 19th century during the French colonial era in Indochina. It served as a place where political prisoners were often housed, tortured, and executed. From what I saw, I could understand how this place became radicalizing; like too many prisons the world over. The conditions were utterly subhuman. Eery manikins served as the stand-ins for the people that once populated this place. One exhibit had a few dozen shackled by their feet in a large communal room. One cell showed a prisoner restrained upside down so that their urine would run towards their heads. But that was not the worst of it. In the women’s wing, they showed a variety of torture devices used especially for them. I was probably the only one in there that knew what the glass bottle was for, thanks to The Sympathizer. What made it worse were the obviously French tourists that were fist-bumping these pallid figures, or worse, cackling as they played prisoner.

After the Vietnamese expelled the French from Vietnam, it was they that became the jailers. This became the home of the counter-revolutionaries and the American VIPs of the Vietnam War, including the one and only Senator John McCain. I saw a facsimile of his bed where he was held as a prisoner of war after sustaining what would become life-long injuries from ejecting from his shot-down plane. His face was plastered all over the prison, including his flight suit and parachute. There were even pictures of him when he returned in 2000.

I would say that possibly one of the most surreal experiences on my trip (and that is saying a lot) was looking at these same exhibits as a cadre of active Vietnamese army, dressed sharply in their uniforms. We cordially would walk around the small exhibit hall, clearing each other’s line of sight so much that it became a little joke. 40 years earlier, and it would have been an incredibly different relationship.

After the prison, I went for a little lunch nearby. I hung out for a bit, then decided to go and see the “hidden” John McCain monument. Monument may not be the right term. Marker might be better. On the shores of Truc Bach Lake in Hanoi, the camouflaged marker sits, telling the story of when on October 26, 1967, on a bombing run over Hanoi, John McCain’s plane was shot down. He crashed into this very lake but was kept from dying and taken to the prison I had just visited. He was there until 1973 when this admiral’s son was finally let go. I won’t speak ill of the dead, but there are many stories about his time in the Navy, POW, and his eventual ascent through the ranks of American politics that are worth reading. And considering. Before he came into the more national spotlight in 2008, I read about him while I was still in high school. I took an incredible semester-long course on Vietnam and one of our textbooks was The Nightengale’s Song that chronicles the lives of several Annapolis grads, including John McCain. 

As it was late afternoon and very hot, I headed back to my hostel. I took a cold shower and then made my way to my bunk for a nap. I woke up, got dressed, then headed down for happy hour. I had drinks with two Norwegian guys and a German girl, and we decided to head out and have dinner. Then drinks, then more drinks, then still more drinks. We moved to a street by my hostel, which was a little like a petite Bourbon Street filled with restaurants, bars, and clubs. We took a seat on the street, so narrow that not even tiny cars could come down. We were warned by the bar owner that we might need to move in from the street when the police came. We gladly agreed as the Beer Hanois piled up. Suddenly, like Bourbon Street at 12:00am on Ash Wednesday, a group of about 15 smartly dressed police officers came down the street, yelling at patrons, grabbing their tables, and throwing them towards the restaurants, food, and drinks going akimbo. I took the opportunity, told my friends to grab their drinks, picked up the small table, and moved it closer to the restaurant. The police marched past us to the other end of the street. After a few minutes, all the tables were back out in their original places, including ours. This happened about every half an hour. Maybe it was for safety, but considering the low hanging power lines and the deathtrap structures around us, probably was not the case. What I think it was a reminder to the shopkeepers about who was really in charge. Or more of a symbiosis in the Communist state where everyone needs a job to do; the restaurant owners need to sell food and the police need to assert order.  

All having had our shares of drinks, as nature called, we asked the restaurant if there was a bathroom nearby. We were directed down a dark alley and told to go into this apartment to the second floor. As we walked up the stairs, I noticed they were very wet and slippery. Rounding the corner of this empty apartment, the bathroom was little more than a leaky cracked toilet and a cistern full of water and a large ladle used for flushing. It was better than the arachnid one from before, but not by much. After a few more drinks, the young lady needed to go, so I volunteered to be her sentry as the apartment was dark and open to the world. She really appreciated it. We then continued with the night. They got some Bahn Mi sandwiches while I finally got some durian.

For those unaware of this infamous fruit of legends, durian is a gigantic, spiny, pungent fruit from these parts. It is well known for having such a strong odor that it is banned on most forms of public transportation in South East Asia. The warnings were all over the MTA in Singapore, so I just knew I had to try some. Of the fruits I had in Vietnam, it was the most expensive at a whopping ₫80,000 or roughly $3.50 per baggie. Consider that my daily mango fix was half that; you can understand why I felt it a little pricey. It was good, but having had my fill of food and drink, I could not finish the bag. I tend to get a little more friendly after I drink and offered passersby samples, some of whom took me up on my deal. After a little time at an empty dance club, we decided it was probably best to head back to the hostel.  

The next day was a recovery day for a variety of reasons. First, I was out until about 3 am. Second, I had a little hangover. Third, I had been running all over Hanoi for the past two days. Fourth, I just needed some time to relax. I got up to have breakfast, then a little later to have lunch. After that, I headed over to get some Bahn Mi, and being exhausted from this; I headed back to take a little nap. On my way back to my hostel, I had yet another surreal Vietnamese moment: on the street, there was an older woman holding her grandchild on her knees as she sat on the sidewalk in a chair facing the street. As I walked by, the prostrate child expelled an almost perfect arc of urine into the street drain below. It was one of those moments when you had to look away just as you realized what was going on. As I heard the tinkling of piss on the concrete, I realized I was not even in Oz anymore. I got back to my hostel, watched a movie to round out my lazy day. I knew I needed it but was ready to head back out there.

The next morning, I woke intending to go to see Ho Chi Minh. Ho Chi Minh, aka Nguyen Tat Thanh aka Nguyen Ai Quoc aka Bac Ho aka Bac aka Uncle Ho, born in 1890 and dying in 1969, was the Communist revolutionary leader of the Vietnamese liberation movement of Vietnam. The reason for his various noms-de-plume turned to noms-de-guerres should be pretty apparent based on how they treated those looking to be free from French colonization. Ho Chi Minh was a complicated man from a complicated country. After attending college in Hue,  he traveled around the world, to France, Brittain, and even to the United States. He returned to France, where he got his revolutionary education, later traveling to Russia and China. After the Imperial Japanese made their move on Indochina, he became the leader of the Viet Minh guerilla force that attacked both the Vichy French Nazi collaborators and the Empire of Japan. He did this with the aid of the OSS, the American precursor to the CIA. After the war, the French returned and demanded their colonial rights back. Ho Chi Minh even petitioned, no doubt quoting Thomas Jefferson (as he was want to do,) then-president Harry S. Truman to honor the Atlantic Charter, a 1941 document that served as the basis for the United Nations Charter of self-determination. Truman’s reply was never given. The world had changed since the document was signed, however, and Vietnam was no different. The country’s conflicts at this moment were an ever-changing kaleidoscope of decolonization, Civil War, and an important domino in the nascent Cold War with Ho Chi Mihn at the center of it all. I made my way down Dien Bien Phu Street. Dien Bien Phu was a famous battle in 1954 that was the straw that broke the French’s back in Vietnam. After sustaining heavy losses after a protracted Indochina War, the French let the Americans take the helm of dealing with Vietnam.

As I got closer to where I needed to go, I noticed a large throng of people. Apparently, it was a national holiday to get ready for May Day, the holiest day on the Communist calendar. I had to walk around to the other side of a park and get in line with conservatively, 80,000 people. While the heat was strong, it was interesting standing in line with these people. Children would go out of their way to try and talk to me. This one boy, Trong, was seven and started talking to me in English, asking me where I was from. I told him. He looked at me and smiled. Then asked me where I was from. It was cute. I shuffled in line with my comrades of the day as our serpentine path inched closer. After an hour and a half, I was at the entrance of Ho Chi Minh’s Mausoleum. It reminded me of Lenin’s Tomb in Moscow.

Honestly, I have no idea why the hardcore communists like Lenin, Mao, and Uncle Ho want to lay in repose for decades, but here I was face-to-corpse. You are not allowed to take pictures inside, which the armed soldiers lining the entry steps remind you of. Uncle Ho’s glass sarcophagus is in the middle of spotlights in the center of a dark room with only one entrance and only one exit. Guarding him were four smartly dressed soldiers in white, with chromed bayonets affixed to their no doubt locked and loaded AK-47s. We circled Ho’s body and anticlimactically were ushered out.

Back in the hot Hanoi afternoon, I made my way to the Ho Chi Mihn museum. It was very big on propaganda and not too much on history. Even in the museum, I was still approached by school-aged children asking where I was from. It was surreal.

I walked back to the hostel then took a shower and a nap. I started doing some work for a client when my friend Lucia came back. We decided to go downstairs and have a drink; then we headed out to have dinner at a nice restaurant. We then headed back to the lounge area because I really did not want to go back to work.

The next day was an Admin Day as I had a client that needed work done. I took a break for lunch and went with Lucia to get some mangos. Down the street from where I was living, a woman would come every day on her bicycle stacked with fruit from the countryside. I would usually get a large cup of mango slices in the morning for a snack and one in the evening. I became this lady’s regular. After my mango fix, I headed back to my room to finish my work just in time for happy hour.

I couldn’t find Lucia for dinner, so I headed out to the restaurant we all ate in on the first night. Since I was alone, they sat me at the kid’s table; in that, it was a very low plastic table with small plastic stools practically on the street. It took a little bit to get their attention, but they brought me short ribs and rice, which was amazing. As I was walking home, I wanted something sweet for dessert. Since my regular mango lady had gone home, I tried some green mango which I thought was covered with powdered sugar. I was wrong. It was salt and chili pepper. Being from New Orleans, I am used to spicy food. This was almost inedible. I suffered through as much as I could before I had to throw it away. I headed back to the room, read a little, then went to bed.

The next morning at breakfast, I met Lyndsey. She defined herself as a 34-year-old, pot-smoking, lesbian, digital nomad living in Bali from Colorado. She was very nice. I found Lucia and another guy from our room, and we all went to the Chợ Đồng Xuân, a three-story Soviet-style Market filled with everything imaginable: from clothes to toys, electronics, souvenirs, and nicknacks. After the market, I escorted them to Hoa Loa Prison but had no intention of doing it again. I headed back and decided to stroll around Returned Sword Lake, down the street from the hostel. It was a holiday, the 44th year since the “reunification” of the country. All the boulevards around the lake that were once packed with cars were now empty of vehicles but full of people enjoying the wide-open spaces. I headed from there to a rooftop bar for a beer in the humid spring afternoon. I headed back to the hostel to read until dinner. 

I decided to go to Bun Cha Huong Lien restaurant for dinner. This was a personal journey for me. When I was back in my apartment with my then-girlfriend, we spent our nights when she was not at the hospital or on-call watching the American chef Anthony Bourdain’s Parts Unknown on Netflix. He traveled all over the world, eating glorious food with glorious people. On one particular episode, he sat down with the United States’ then president at a small restaurant in Hanoi, the Bun Cha Huong Lien. While I was not a fan of Obama, I was a big one of Anthony. His passing in the summer of 2018 left a mark on me. And it felt like coming to this restaurant was an homage to a kindred culinary spirit gone from this mortal coil too soon. It was there, at the threshold of this restaurant, that I knew I would stop everywhere I could on my trip to eat at places he had eaten. 

I arrived at Bun Cha Huong Lien and asked if I could look around before I was seated. I asked where the table was and was whisked upstairs by the owner. There were already diners in the small back room, but there it was, encased in plexiglass for evermore; the table where a chef and a president shared food and drink. I then headed back down the stairs and took a seat at the front of the restaurant. I ordered my Combo Obama and waited. The combo included a beer, fried seafood roll and bun cha which is best described as grilled pork in a sweet, vinegary broth with noodles. It was incredibly good and worth the almost $4. 

After dinner, I headed back to the hostel but took a detour to a 6 story luxury goods mall. I was aghast at all these designer goods in a Communist country. Rolex, Cartier, Armani stores were filled with the sounds of Despacito coming from a player piano. I realized that this building was right next to one of the central government buildings of Hanoi, and thus one of the head government buildings in Vietnam. So, of course, there would be a designer goods marketplace within walking distance. The true Communists of today no longer needs to hide their obvious ostentatiousness. 

Upon returning to the hostel, I found Lucia and we headed to a rooftop bar for a drink or three. She was my first travel buddy on my adventure, so it was nice just to sit and talk about life, love, and travel over drinks. As it was a festive time, when we were walking back to the hostel, people were doing drunken karaoke in the middle of the sidewalk with mobile amplifiers on wheels. We then headed home as the next day would be my last full day in Hanoi.

This May Day started with breakfast where I had a lovely conversation with Lucia’s Swedish friend Rebecca. Afterwards, I accompanied Lucia and our other roommate to help her look for patches that she could sew on to her clothing. Seeing how we were in the garment district, there was a variety to choose from. As I needed to do some shopping of my own, I left them and headed back to Chợ Đồng Xuân. I was looking for a metallic AK-47 keychain. However, the stall owner thought I was taking too long going through his wares and rudely told me to move along. I guess customer service is not a virtue in Communist countries. I headed back to the hostel where the roommate had already checked out. I went for lunch at my local restaurant where I had always gone for Com, a meat/rice/vegetable dish. After, I headed for my daily portions of mango from my lady as it would be my last time seeing her. I gave her a tip for taking care of me almost every day and she really seemed to appreciate it. Lucia wanted to go to the Obama restaurant but needed to confer with Rebecca. I did not hear back from them.

Since it was May Day, there was a lot of action around Returned Sword Lake: lots of people, food, vendors, and performers. Mimicking what I had witnessed before, a little boy heeding nature’s call dropped his pants in the middle of the festivities and peed in the street as his loving parents look on. Walking to one of the vendor carts, I found my keychain.

On my return home, I stopped at one of the only places in Hanoi that accepted credit cards, the Circle K. Supprised that there was such a Western Store in the depths of South East Asia, it was a godsend. They had everything a weary traveler would need, such as snacks and booze. I purchased my new favorites, Ice Cream flavored Oreo cookies and a personal bottle of Soju and headed back to the hostel. I struck up a conversation with a mustachioed gentleman in his twenties who had spent the last few years in China teaching the kids of rich party bosses how to get into college in the West. We shared a few beers in the Hanoi night talking about the state of the world and how he knew due to the zero fucks given in China about anything, how they were on the way to taking over the world. I parted ways from my new friend and went up to my room to unwind. The next day, I would head to Hue.