A City of Surprises: Three Days in Hanoi

If Bangkok was busy, Hanoi is the physical embodiment of chaos.

Actually, scratch that. Hanoi is chaotic, relative to Bangkok or not. While there was traffic in Bangkok, the vehicles stayed in their lane and drivers were not blind to the color of the lights. Here, there is only a mass of screeching horns and weaving motorbikes whizzing past your face at every possible moment. And they are dangerously close to your face, too – although sidewalks here are abundant and wonderfully wide, they are not for pedestrians. Motorcycles are, more often than not, parked across them in entirety, blocking any hope of using them as one might suppose they were intended. So as a walker you must dance cautiously between parked cars and zigzagging bikes as you maneuver down the pavement. And if you happen to have to turn? Good luck. Crossing the street is a near-death experience every single time.

Mom and I arrived here late in the evening and we were coming off of a hectic and stressful day of travel when we got to our hotel, only to find it was the size of a walk-in closet and, um, dingy. I’ll put it this way: the shower? Effectively a hose in the middle of the bathroom. The one time I used it, the entire bathroom was covered in water. The toilet? I couldn’t sit on it the right way because my knees didn’t fit between the seat and the wall. We ventured half a block out for dinner and almost got run over probably between ten and fifteen times. We were exhausted, it was dark, it was loud, and over our steaming bowls of pho, we started looking for bus tickets to get the heck out of here.

But, instead, we resolved to find a new hotel room in the morning and give it a day. One chance. If we hated it as much as we thought we would, we’d leave and seek out the quieter Hai Phong, a port city a couple hours away. Sitting on a bed that took up three-quarters of our room, the idea of a beach sounded almost too good to be true. But one day. We would give it that.

And boy am I glad we did.

On the flight from Bangkok to Hanoi, my mom and I sat next to a boy who had lived in this Northern Vietnamese city his whole life. When we asked him, tentatively hopeful, if we were headed for somewhere quieter than the Thai capital we’d left, he laughed. “The horns, the construction work, the noise? That’s a distraction in Bangkok. But in Hanoi? That’s peaceful.” My mom and I could hardly believe it but oh, how right he’d prove to be. Once you get over the sheer volume of the city, once you master crossing the street without being plowed into, once the newness and craze begins to feel a little less overwhelming, you start to hear something. The cars still honk, sure, and the endless rush of movement is still there, but you begin to listen better. After a little while here, I can now make out the song of Hanoi. It’s made of the honking and the shouting and it’s beautiful.

During the three days we’ve been here, Mom and I have discovered a city intoxicating enough to make me seriously imagine, as we wandered through a beautiful park and drank in the soft sunlight, living here.

We’ve eaten pho so good I almost cried.

We’ve navigated the streets of the Old Quarter (where we’re staying), a world of juxtaposition where flower stalls spill breathtaking colors onto mud-splashed concrete.

We’ve had egg coffee – a dish that conjures images of scrambled eggs sitting in cold brew but is, in reality, a liquid tiramisu dream.

We’ve visited a prison nicknamed after a hotel and seen recollections of unimaginable pain and oppression (and the oddity that is blatant propaganda), as well as stepped foot into Vietnam’s premier fine arts museum and taken a journey through the magnificent thousand year history that is artistic creation in this country.

We’ve found tranquility twice in the incredibly aptly-named Tranquil. Books and Coffee, a refuge of a coffee shop in the island neighborhood of Truc Bach.

We’ve had a pork rice noodle soup thing so good I almost cried again in a tiny hole-in-the-wall where we were the only Westerners and an old woman and her young granddaughter look confused but smiled when we walked in.

And, finally, we’ve crossed the street. Many times. And not only have we lived to tell the tale, I think we’re getting pretty dang good at it.

We’re leaving in a few hours for the central coastal city of Da Nang where I look forward to beaches and day trips to places where entire towns are UNESCO World Heritage sites, but a part of me is sad to go. This is not the city I was expecting, true. It was so much better.

So that’s all on Hanoi, for now. Check back soon for more dispatches from our life on the road!

In love and adventure,

E