Travels in Northern Vietnam Part I: Hanoi

We were scheduled to visit Morocco in February, but the trip was canceled with only 5 days' notice due to security concerns and instability in the area. We were crushed, suddenly left wondering how and where we could take our scheduled vacation time with very little notice. If we didn't use our time off, we would lose it, which is unacceptable to us. We were scrambling for a replacement trip. We called on our friend Toni Neubauer at Myths and Mountains to see if she could help us out. We had been planning a southeast Asia trip for some time in the future, probably around 2015. But now suddenly we were in the market much sooner. Craig called her and we discussed what we would want out of such a trip: opportunities to learn about the local culture, homestays, a great guide, plus a healthy dose of beautiful scenery. She told us that she knew the perfect trip for us: "Vietnam: From Untouristed Hill Tribes to Halong's Lagoons."  The trip focuses on Northern Vietnam and some of the minority ethnic villages in the mountains near the Chinese border. It also includes several days exploring capital city Hanoi, and concludes kayaking amongst the beautiful limestone islands of Halong Bay. And best of all, the trip is led by Le Van Cuong, whom Toni considers to be one of the best guides in the country.

Toni was able to put all of this together with incredibly short notice, and we ended up flying out a month to the day after our scheduled departure for Morocco. We had the utmost faith in her as Myths and Mountains had put together a fabulous trip to Bhutan and India for us in 2007, which resulted in a lifelong friendship with our Indian guide Mukul Pandya. Toni assured us that we would adore Cuong. An excellent guide makes for an excellent trip, and we were sold. We have absolutely no regrets; the trip was fantastic, and we feel that Cuong is a kindred spirit. Toni really came through for us when we needed it most, and this will not be the last trip we will take through Myths and Mountains.

Roadside mosaic commemorating Hanoi's 1000th anniversary in 2010

We flew out on March 9, from Boston to London on Virgin Atlantic, then London to Singapore to Hanoi on Singapore Airlines. Though the flights were long, they were quite enjoyable, with attentive, cheerful  flight attendants and quality tasty meals.

We landed in Hanoi at 12:05 p.m. on Monday, March 11. An airport employee greeted us as we disembarked and walked us through the visa process, through immigration, and then sent us to collect our luggage. We found a cheerful man named Nguyen waiting for us outside (Cuong was finishing up a previous tour today, so we would be hooking up with him tomorrow, the first official day of the tour). He introduced us to Mr. Giang (pronounced Zang), who would be our driver for the duration of the trip.

We drove to the Metropole Hotel, a French colonial gem recommended by Toni. There was a lot of traffic en route due to a fire, but Mr. Giang knew shortcuts which got us there expediently. He was a very good driver and we felt safe with him negotiating his way through the busy streets. As we approached the hotel, we passed a several-kilometer long mosaic wall which celebrated Hanoi's 1000th anniversary in 2010. Boston, one of the oldest cities in the USA, is less than 400 years old. A thousand year old city is hard for us to fathom.

We checked into the hotel and were shown to our room, #308, in the historic Old Wing. The room was plush with high ceilings, crown molding, and dark wood furniture.  After 2 days of air travel, we were happy to flop down on the plush bed and take nice hot showers in the marble bathroom.

Nguyen Truong To Street, Hanoi

Our friend and coworker, Binh, is originally from Hanoi. His younger brother Loi still lives there in the family home, and Binh hooked us up with him on our first night in the city. Loi met us in the hotel lobby and it was wonderful to have a friendly face welcome us to Vietnam and give us a preview of his city. Loi drove us to Cha Ca La Vong, "The oldest restaurant of Vietnam", which has been serving its namesake "Vietnamese special dish" since 1871. Loi dropped us off on a bustling street in front of the restaurant while he found a place to park. We enjoyed watching the motorbikes pass by,  people heating tea kettles over coals on the sidewalk, the tangle of electrical wires draped over the street.

Dinner at Cha Ca La Vong with Loi

Loi reappeared a few minutes later and led us into the restaurant and up a flight of stairs to one of several small dining rooms. Craig and Loi each got a Ha Noi beer. A pan sat on a sterno burner in the middle of the table, and an employee came over and prepared a fish stir fry for us. Fish sizzled in oil and  various greens and herbs were mixed in. It was absolutely delicious, and this is coming from someone who doesn't usually enjoy fish. Loi split up the remaining food between Craig and myself. It was the perfect amount and we were feeling satiated. Just then, an employee reappeared with a plateful of more fish and created a whole other pan of food. After finishing as much as we could, Loi retrieved the car and we drove around Hanoi.

For a Monday night in a communist economy, a lot of people sure were out and about. Loi drove us around West Lake, where people were eating near the water, and some were even in the water fishing in the dark with flashlights.

The Baooanh Special

Loi wanted to take us out for ice cream, and we went to Baooanh Bar and Coffee. We were told by the waitress that it was too cold to sit outside on the roofdeck (though the temperature seemed lovely to us - we were having snow at home) so we were seated inside by a window overlooking the lake. I asked Loi what I should order and he recommended the special. Soon both he and I were delivered a coconut filled with vanilla ice cream and topped with yellow raisins and nuts. It was delicious, and I scraped the fresh coconut from the inside. Craig was too full from dinner, but he enjoyed a fresh orange juice. We enjoyed chatting with Loi and looking out the window at everyone out and about, cruising the strip by the lake on their motorbikes and cars. More and more customers piled into Baooanh, and everyone was ordering the ice cream special. People were spending money and enjoying themselves; not what we had expected from a communist economy.

As Loi was driving us back to the hotel, he pointed out the Ho Chi Minh mausoleum, with its large, blocky, Soviet-inspired architecture. It was lit up red in the darkness, and a large number of people had congregated to watch the nightly lowering of the Vietnamese flag.

Nightly lowering of the flag at the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum

Loi stopped in front of his house and called up to his children, who came out to meet us. His son Hieu and daughter Thao were lovely, and they presented us with a very thoughtful gift: a book called Vietnam On the Move. Loi had also presented us with some Vietnamese sweets.

We are very grateful to Loi and his family for giving us such a wonderful welcome to his city and country. After such a long flight it was wonderful to sit down with a new friend and start learning about life in this fascinating country.

Craig, Hieu, Thao, and Steph

The next morning, we enjoyed our breakfast at the Metropole's French restaurant, Le Beaulieu. We enjoyed fresh baguettes, cheese, home-made yoghurt, dim sum dumplings, fresh fruit, coffee, and orange juice. We were about to leave the table to meet our guide Cuong at 9 o'clock in the lobby when a cheerful Vietnamese man approached us. "Would you mind if I join you for coffee?" Though we felt this was very sweet and friendly, we made apologies for having to leave to meet our guide... The man's face broke into a wide knowing smile. "You're Cuong, aren't you?" I asked. He nodded enthusiastically. We all had a good laugh at his creative way of breaking the ice. We knew from the get-go that we had similar senses of humor and would get along just fine.

We headed outside together into the drizzling rain and Mr. Giang was waiting with the car. It was nice to see him again. Our first stop was Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum, which we had driven past with Loi the previous night. We weren't allowed to bring anything inside, so Cuong took our bags and our cameras while we went through a metal detector and got into a queue on the sidewalk.

Vietnamese people come from throughout the country to pay their respects to their "Uncle Ho", many of them children on class field trips. We were to put our hands at our sides as we solemnly walked into the building and around the perimeter of a room where we saw Ho Chi Minh's preserved body lying in state. Military guards ushered us through quickly. There was no time to dawdle.

Once outside, we met up with Cuong again. We wandered the area, which included Ho Chi Minh's living and office space, as well as his three luxury cars. We saw the mansion that he eschewed in favor of more humble quarters. But Cuong dispels any notion that Uncle Ho was a humble man. "They called him the father of the nation, and he quietly accepted it. How can this man be the father of a thousand year old nation? He was not humble."

One Pillar Pagoda

Next we went to see symbolic evidence of the thousand-year old culture here in Hanoi, the One Pillar Pagoda. This is a wooden pagoda originally built in 1049 by King Ly Thai Thong to thank a goddess for his single son (the current pagoda is a replica since the French destroyed the original in 1954).

Next we went to the Temple of Literature. This is a temple to Confucius which was built in 1070 and served as the nation's first university. Five courtyards represented the five elements: metal, wood, water, fire, and soil. Five qualities were striven for: righteousness, patience, wisdom, loyalty, talent, and virtue. The emphasis was on being a good [hearted] man first, and only after that focusing on knowledge and education. "The talented man is our national asset" became their slogan in 1442.

Temple of Literature

Temple of Literature

We wandered around the various courtyards, looking at the various slogans written in flowers. We saw giant stone stelae engraved with the names of scholars who passed examinations to become mandarins. The stelae were perched onto the backs of stone turtles, a symbol of longevity. We entered the Confucius Temple which contained altars and statues. There were many Vietnamese schoolchildren touring the temple grounds, and they seemed more interested in us than they were in the temple. They smiled and laughed and greeted us in English, asking where we are from and what our names are. It was adorable.

Temple of Literature (Photo courtesy of Cuong)

Followed by schoolchildren at the Temple of Literature (photo courtesy of Cuong)

Mr. Giang then drove us through the French Quarter of Hanoi. Wide, tree-lined boulevards showcased French colonial architecture, most of it yellow. Yellow had been the royal color of the Nguyen dynasty in Vietnam, and the French appropriated it during their colonial period.  We saw the train station, opened by the French in 1902. Its two outlying wings are yellow French colonial, whereas the center is simple and blocky, having been rebuilt in the Soviet style after being bombed by the USA.

Next we drove a short way out of town for a cooking lesson. Some cheerful ladies demonstrated and helped us to cook three courses: pork and mushroom spring rolls wrapped in home-made rice paper, fried fish spring rolls with carmelized onions and greens, and beef with rice noodles in a sauce made of vinegar, brown sugar, water, and fish sauce. We had some good laughs at our expense as we tried to delicately peel the rice pancake up off the heat with a chopstick without tearing or dropping it. As with most Vietnamese cuisine, presentation is key. This could not be left out of our lesson. Craig and I were shown how to create flowers out of cucumbers, and how to make a rose out of a tomato peel. We had to do this with some surprisingly primitive-looking blunt knives, and needless to say the final product didn't look much like a rose. But the food was all delicious, and we had had a wonderful time.

Mr. Giang

Craig learns to make rice pancakes (photo courtesy of Cuong)

Time to eat the springrolls we made (photo courtesy of Cuong)

Cuong with our cooking instructors

 Next, we went back into the city and Cuong introduced us to the Old Quarter, where he lived as a child. The streets here were narrow and crowded. Buildings have a narrow small footprint but are several stories high. He showed us the Golden Wings II Hotel, which now resides in the building which was until recently his parents' family home.

We walked a couple of buildings down and went into the Ngoi Nha Di San (Heritage House). This is an 18th century dwelling which has been restored to its former glory with elaborate woodwork and containing beautiful antique furniture and musical instruments.

Then Cuong took us down some alleyways behind the storefronts visible along the narrow streets. There was a whole world hidden back here, families living in small, dark apartments with their kitchens and bathrooms in small outbuildings in the alley. Although the conditions are cramped (only 22 square feet per person in Hanoi!), they prefer this life in the Old Quarter to the new, modern, suburban apartments and townhouses that the government has been erecting. They know all of their neighbors here and everything is close by. They have a sense of community that they feel they would lack in modern apartment buildings. These people are not poor. They have new motorcycles and flat screen TV's. This is where they have always lived and they want to stay, even as the area starts to become more gentrified.

Cheo musicians

Next we went to a community house (dinh, in Vietnamese) for a private cheo performance. Cheo is Vietnamese popular opera, and these performers were part of the national troupe.  We were very lucky to have a private performance of this art form which dates back to the 11th century in the Red River delta area. We sat next to a beautiful ancestor altar. Four musicians sat in the background, playing a variety of instruments: flute, percussion, a stringed instrument played with a bow, a stringed instrument looking somewhat like a banjo.  Male and female singers and dancers appeared in elaborate, colorful costumes with expressive make-up and exaggerated facial expressions. They welcomed us and poured us cups of tea, and handed us yellow roses and betel nut carved into a flower.

Cheo performance of Thi Kinh

They proceeded to act out three stories. The dancers' movements were very fluid and graceful.
One of the stories is a folk tale called Thi Kinh, in which a woman falsely accused of killing her husband disguises herself as a man and lives as a monk in a pagoda. Upon her death she becomes a Buddha.

Cheo dancer

The performers passed out small amounts of dong (Vietnamese currency) to us as a symbol of good luck. Women danced with fans, swords, and fire. Costume changes occurred onstage, blocked from view by fans or shimmering pieces of silk. At the end of the nearly hour-long performance, Cuong got our photo with the troupe, and one of the actors presented me with a yellow fan as a souvenir.

Steph and Craig with the Cheo performers (photo courtesy of Cuong)

Next we went to a nearby building which houses Cuong's family's ancestor altar. Ancestor worship is very important to the Viet people. Today was the first day of the lunar month, so Cuong needed to make an offering. Although Cuong's family owns the building, under communism the family was forced to take in boarders, and now several families live rent-free in the building, none of them being Cuong's family. But they still maintain the altar here. Cuong lit some incense and then showed us a family history book through which he has traced back his ancestors for eight generations. Being more progressive than prior generations, he and his brothers have included wives in the previously men-only historical records. It was very thoughtful of Cuong to share this special family tradition with us, and we felt honored.

Cuong lights incense at his family's ancestor altar

Old Quarter, Hanoi

Afterwards, we headed back out to the street and Cuong hailed three cyclos (bicycle rickshaws). We each got into one and were pedaled around the Old Quarter. Motorbikes and cars swerved around us in the chaotic streets. The number 1 rule of the road in Hanoi seems to be "beep and pass". Noone stays in their proper lanes, and it is a free-for-all, but somehow it all works, like intricate choreography. It had been sprinkling and cloudy for most of the day. It started to actually rain while we were in the cyclos, but they had roofs so we stayed dry. We passed through the "36 Streets" section of the Old Quarter. In the 13th century. there were 36 streets which were each devoted to a particular artisanal trade. Today the various trades still cluster here, and we pass silk shops, gravestone artisans, paper lantern displays, hardware shops, flower sellers, etc. Craig felt a little bit uncomfortable being chauffeured around by someone like this, but it is a popular tourist way to see the city. It lets you get an intimate look at what goes on in the streets without needing to worry about getting run over.

Steph and Craig on cyclo tours of the Old Quarter (photo courtesy of Cuong)

Cyclo ride through Hanoi's Old Quarter

Our cyclos delivered us to the Metropole Hotel. Cuong's wife Nhung is the manager of the Vietnamese restaurant at the hotel, Spices Garden. She has been with them since 1978. Though the restaurant was currently closed in between lunch and dinner, we were seated at a table and enjoyed tea, chocolate pastries, and fresh fruit. Nhung came over to greet us, and invited us to come back for dinner this evening.

Cyclos take us back to the Metropole Hotel

We said goodbye to Cuong for the night and headed upstairs to our room. At 7 o'clock, we headed back down to Spices Garden. We wanted a light meal, as we had eaten quite a bit at lunch. Madame Nhung took our menus away, assuring us that she knew what we wanted despite having just met us. Craig got a Halida beer and I had vodka with passionfruit juice. Our first course was a banana flower salad with chicken. It was delightfully light and flavorful. Next came a bowl of beef pho (rice noodle soup) and a slate dish bearing an assortment of eight different spring rolls, all artfully presented, of course. Everything was incredibly delicious and had contrasting flavors and textures. As much as we enjoyed it all, we didn't have room in our stomachs to finish all of the spring rolls. We had a small scoop of mango sorbet for dessert, and Nhung suggested camomile tea so as not to interfere with our night's sleep. She and Cuong took such good care of us!

Tea with Cuong at Spices Garden

The next morning, we once again enjoyed our breakfast at Le Beaulieu. We met Cuong at 9 o'clock, and Mr. Giang drove us to the Vietnam Museum of Ethnology. Cuong wanted to introduce us to the  cultures of the 54 ethnic minorities which live in Vietnam today before we headed north to meet some of them in person.

The outdoor part of the museum is really interesting; they have taken actual structures (houses, tombs, etc). from various parts of Vietnam and have reconstructed them piece by piece on the museum grounds.  Cuong drew our attention to the Tay house, a wooden house built on stilts with a thatched roof. He told us that we would be sleeping in one of these for our homestay tomorrow night.

Tay house at the Ethnology Museum

Then we went inside the museum. Cuong told us it would take an entire day to do the museum the right way, but we didn't have that much time. So although we could have lingered in front of each exhibit, we made our way through quickly and admired the various costumes, houses, tools, water puppets, weaving looms, musical instruments, ritual trees, jewelry, and furniture associated with the various ethnic groups of Vietnam.

Next we drove to Thanh Chuong Viet Palace. Thanh Chuong is a painter who has been quite successful since the market opened up in the 1990's and he has been allowed to sell his paintings internationally. His paintings are rather abstract and generally feature brightly colored children and water buffaloes. He has used his considerable fortune to collect Viet buildings, furniture, art, statuary, etc. which he has displayed  in a serene oasis about 20 miles outside of Hanoi. He even has his own water puppet theater for his collection of puppets. Many Vietnamese villages feature a welcome arch, and he has erected one here as well. You pass underneath it into a lush garden paradise with banyan trees providing shade. Much like the ethnic museum, we could spend an entire day here admiring the artifacts of Viet culture in a very relaxing and peaceful environment. But there were entire buildings we didn't even have a chance to enter. It was a fascinating place, and we had the entire place to ourselves. There was not another tourist in sight.

Peaceful grounds of Thanh Chuong Viet Palace

Peaceful grounds of Thanh Chuong Viet Palace

Thanh Chuong's water puppet collection

Peaceful grounds of Thanh Chuong Viet Palace

Next we stopped in Tam Tao village. We went into their communal house and saw their ancestor altar. The caretaker proudly directed our attention to the bust of Ho Chi Minh on the altar. Cuong was offended by this. He asked why they were displaying Ho Chi Minh, instead of focusing on the founder of the 300-year-old village. The man replied that the tourists like it.  Cuong advised the man to remove Ho Chi Minh's statue from the altar, because discerning tourists would prefer that the altar be authentic, honoring the founders of the village. He said once again that Ho Chi Minh, having only been involved in Vietnam during the past century, could not be the father of a thousand year old nation.

We went into a little meetinghouse  and were seated to watch some people from the village perform some folk songs. These performers were not professionals like yesterday's cheo performers, but instead were local farmers who like to keep the tradition of their folk songs alive.  Three women and a man sang for us while two other women played instruments which looked to us like hammered dulcimers. The older woman poured us cups of tea while they sang a welcome song.

Musicians in Tam Tao village

Folk singers, Tam Tao village

The melodies were quite catchy and pleasant. Cuong knew all of the songs and cheerfully sang along.
They ended with a song which Cuong said was titled Stay, Please Don't Go. After the performance, we enjoyed a picnic lunch with food that Cuong had brought from the hotel: fresh baguettes, cheeses, cold cuts, and fresh fruit.

Steph and Craig with the folk singers, Tam Tao village (photo courtesy of Cuong)

After lunch we drove to Bat Trang, a village known for its ceramic production. The village lies across the Red River from Hanoi. We parked near the riverbank, and entered the village's communal house. It was much more extravagantly decorated than Tam Tao's had been, This village has had great success with pottery sales, and is therefore more affluent. We wandered through the narrow alleyways of the village, peering into ceramic shops. They made all kinds of products, from human-height blue and white vases to piggy banks.

A man invited us into his house and chatted with Cuong in Vietnamese. He used to be a teacher but now runs a business creating ceramic lighthouses and exporting them to Spain. He gave us each a shot of  alcohol made from sticky rice and we toasted one another. He stuck some tobacco into a water pipe, lit it, and took a deep drag. He said that he is also a fortune teller, and judging from our ages, he could tell that we were compatible. This guy was a character.

We thanked him and said goodbye, and visited some of the ceramic workshops. We saw various stages of production, from molding to drying to painting. We popped out at the market where the community sells its wares. We wandered through aisle after aisle of brightly painted ceramics and picked out a few very reasonably priced small items to remember the village by.

Ceramics studio in Bat Trang

We were back at the Metropole by 4:45, in plenty of time for our 6 p.m. hotel history tour. Since the hotel's establishment in 1901, it had a storied history. But the main focus of the tour is its role as a haven for activists and journalists during the war. We met Duc, the hotel historian in the lobby, and he took 9 of us on a very informative nearly hour-long tour of the hotel, which culminates with a trip to the air raid bunkers beneath the hotel.

Duc, the Metropole historian, takes us on a hotel tour

The bunkers were only rediscovered 18 months ago. Although some of the same staff work here now, they had repressed the memories of the bomb shelter, and its existence had passed out of knowledge for decades. The hotel excavated it, and just began these tours within the past few months. We donned hard hats and walked down the steps next to the swimming pool and bar to the bunkers. Each bunker was narrow and was only meant to house 10-12 people. In addition to stability, this also helped to contain panic from spreading (during air raids, hotel staff would be present in each bunker with just a few guests each). Most guests at the time were either journalists or activists. The air raid sirens near the opera house would go off at night as carpet bombs fell on the city. Guests would have to get up 3-4 times per night to get into the bunkers. There was an air intake valve but it was not always open due to fears of chemical warfare.

At Christmas in 1972, Joan Baez came to Hanoi to deliver Christmas letters to the American POW's imprisoned at the "Hanoi Hilton" Hoa Lo Prison. This coincided with the so-called U.S. Christmas Bombings on Hanoi, where 60 bombing raids took place over 11 days. As a guest staying at the Metropole, she spent time in the hotel's bomb shelter during these raids. She had a portable tape recorder and recorded audio for what would eventually become her 20-minute "Where Are You Now, My Son?" while in the bunker.

Copy of Joan Baez's album "Where Are You Now, My Son?" partially recorded in the hotel bomb shelters.  This autographed album was delivered to the hotel by a friend of Joan Baez at Christmas, 2012: 40 years after its recording.

While we were in the bunkers, they played an excerpt from the song. You can hear a Vietnamese mother wailing about her lost son. Joan's words are poignant and it gave us chills to hear this down here in the very bunkers where some of it was recorded. We could hear the air raid sirens and the bomb blasts. We could see how much it affected Duc, who was a  child of 10 at the time, and who had to go into personal bomb shelters under the streets (basically manholes) around Hanoi which could house an adult and a child to protect them from shockwaves and shrapnel. Duc gives these tours four times a day and it is obviously very emotional for him. He concludes the tour by saying that be believes in forgiveness; that he is glad that former enemies can now become new friends. We ascended from the bunker and were given a complimentary drink as we all chatted about what we had just learned and thanked Duc for sharing his knowledge with us. We are very lucky that we were able to take this recently established tour. It gave a lot of historical context to this lovely hotel.

Craig in an air raid bunker at the Metropole Hotel

We really enjoyed our few days in Hanoi. It is a vibrant, bustling city full of lively, friendly people. We could easily have spent more time there; we barely scratched the surface. But it was an excellent introduction to Vietnam. Tomorrow we would be bidding farewell to the city and heading to the more pastoral Ha Giang province to encounter some of the ethnic minorities of northern Vietnam...


UPDATE 4/10/13:

I just read in the Huffington Post that Joan Baez returned to Hanoi and the Metropole Hotel a week or two after we were there! Very glad to hear that she made it back. And we're sure that Duc and the hotel staff were thrilled to get the chance to speak with her.

She was quick to visit the recently unearthed bunker that sits just beyond one of the hotel bars. Soon after descending, she put her hand to the cement wall, closed her eyes and sang out the African-American spiritual, "Oh Freedom," a song she often sang during civil rights rallies in the United States in the 1960s.

 "I felt this huge warmth," she said of her feelings. "It was gratitude. I thought I would feel all these wretched things about a bunker but it was love that it took care of me."

...

On the Saturday before her flight left, Baez shared tales of life of Hanoi under American attack and the hotel's history with former staff, including its hairdresser and general manager. Many of them were on double duty: digging graves for the victims of the bombing as well as serving the hotel guests.

The ex-general manager gave her an embroidered bag, which she said she would use to carry the soaps she planned to steal from the hotel. Housekeeper Tieu Phuong said she remembered Baez staying at the hotel. She also remembered seeing some American pilots, who were released from Hanoi jail at the end of the war, staying at the hotel before flying home and thinking "they looked so nice, how could they bomb our country?"

Under the hazy spring sun, Baez took her hand and tried to explain: "It's so true; they were just kids, they were just following orders."

 - Chris Brummett, Associated Press, 4/10/13

Joan Baez revisits the Metropole bunker, April 2013 (AP Image)

Joan Baez's painting now hangs in the Metropole lobby, April 2013 (AP Image)