Hanoi First Day

3/23/2018

We were in a high rise apartment building, I believe it was through AirBnB. That's Hanoi across the river. It was easy getting a taxi from the apartment to the city but not so easy the other way around.

Looking Back

My niece, a digital nomad, was in Vietnam at the beginning of the Covid pandemic until she was able to come back in late summer 2021. She hadn't planned to be there that long, but she also fell in love with the country, as I had. So we have a lot to share. She asked me a question and I referred to this journal to answer it. To my horror, it seems I got distracted and never did finish entering my whole account of my time in Vietnam. I had left out Hanoi and Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City). I am thankful for Facebook and the habit I had of using it to share my travels. I also had a computer mishap and lost most of my photos! In recent times, because of so much ugliness around politics, I had stopped posting and going to FB, I am thankful for it for saving my memories! This post is a summary of Hanoi, using Facebook as my memory jogger.

Walking Around Hanoi

Thrilled to find Guam-style mangoes, barely ripening.

Saturday is a day without motor vehicles, not even scooters, so was pretty nice.

We were hungry so we just chose the first one we saw, which turned out to be good! High class, but still cheap. $10 each for all that food. Expensive compared to street food at $2.

The Huc Bridge in Hoan Kiem Lake.

This is the view from the restaurant. Note the lake across the street. So if you want to find this place, look for this view.

Thang Long Water Puppet Theatre

This was on my list of must-dos. It originated as far back as the 11th century and the stories seem to be folk tales. The water is the stage and the puppeteers control them from behind the temple facade.