An Intense Dose of Hanoi

Despite having aching feet from tramping round Hanoi, I think I've finally got the energy to have a bash at describing Hanoi. What's extraordinary is the sheer number of people. Hanoi is actually more how I imagined China would be. I didn't think of it at the time but now I realise that one of the reasons China wasn't how I expected was the lack of people. Not that its exactly deserted, but it didn't have that feeling of a seething mass of humanity that I thought it would - at least no the places I went to at least.

Hanoi does have that feeling. It's partly the traffic (almost all of it scooters, plus some bikes and only a few cars) which speeds by in constant chaotic motion. Sometimes the road is so thick with scooters that if you decided to end it all and throw yourself under the wheels of a passing motorbike, you'd be hard pushed to find a space to throw yourself in. As you can imagine, crossing the road in such circumstances is a challenge. There's no point in waiting for what we would think of as a gap. The best way is to find a crowd and then you all move across in unison, letting the traffic part like the Red Sea.

The other thing that contributes I think is that life is very much not lived behind closed doors. The pavements are where people seem to cook, eat, socialise, play games, just about everything except walk! Shops all treat the pavement as an extension of their display space, spilling out right to the curbside. Again, this makes walking around a challenge, but the result is a city so vibrant and full of life that the first evening I was just walking around with a huge smile on my face.

There's tonnes of restaurants of all sorts. I had a nice lunch today in a place which is run by a charity (KOTO - Know One Teach One) that helps to train street kids and other disadvantaged youths in the catering trade so they can get good jobs. The restaurant both raises money and also lets them practice their skills in a real environment - a great idea.

Today I saw most of the sights - nothing that spectacular to be honest. The most interesting (Ho Chi Minh's embalmed body) is away being restored. "Uncle Ho is on holiday" is how it was described to me be a local. But Hanoi is about wandering the streets and soaking up the atmosphere.

Tomorrow I'm heading to Halong Bay to spend the night on a boat so definitely no updates for a few days.