Now me and the English teacher from London, England were sent to a homestay in Hanoi City, when we both got there naturally is was shocking and disappointing from what we left, to what we came to. I did not like it at all, so I made arrangements in finding another homestay to live and teach at thus leaving my roomie behind. As it turned out the roomie left another day or two after me finding himself a better set up also, we both decided to meet up with each other the first Saturday at the ‘Old Quarters’ area beside a Lake called Hoan Kiem, where there was a large open square with many restaurants, coffee shops, and plaza. This Old Square area is quite exciting and vibrant, and at night very colourful especially with the lights coming from the Pagoda off of the lake.

Now the walk around the Hoan Kiem Lake has many sellers selling all sorts of souvenirs at very inflated prices, so walk away from the area about two to three blocks and the prices will be much better or get very good at bargaining, for instance a t-shirt at the lake for 150,000, two blocks away 50,000 VND for the same t-shirt. Getting around Hanoi City taking the bus is the cheapest at 7000 VND, then Grab at about 3-4X the price depending where you are going and as always taxi the most expensive, but Grab is very reasonable as like when I was in Jakarta, Indonesia using Go-Jek both are online motorcycle services providing cheap transportation.

This Capital City is very busy with traffic especially motorcycles, horns always honking, congested roadways and some pollution but not as bad as the pollution from vehicles as in Manila, Philippines. Personally after being here in Hanoi I think next weekend I will visit Halong Bay, and then leave for Hoi An as this busy noisy city life is enough for this peaceful “country boy” or “beach bum”, besides I need to see and explore as much of Vietnam in the time I have, and if it means spending my own money instead of staying at homestay’s for free in exchange for teaching, so be it, but I need to be happy and a noisy, heavily congested city will not do that for me.

Here in Vietnam there are more motorbikes than cars as was the case in Taiwan, so the motorbikes seem to rule the roadways getting ahead of cars leaving cars and trucks stuck behind in traffic, also the motorbikes are used to carry all types of cargo and stuff, such as propane bottles, mattress, dishes, ladders, fruits, you name it and it is carried and transported by motorbike, even the entire family all five of them. Also the very beautiful Vietnamese women all ride motorcycle with skirts showing their lovely sexy legs.

Overall my experience in Hanoi was great as I met very friendly Vietnamese people, always willing to help me out and I added a few new contacts to the phone and trust I will stay in contact with all these new friends. I am going to miss a favourite coffee shop where I drank the most delicious Vietnamese coffee, and the lady’s smile that always served and hosted me, as I will always miss the lady that cooked and served me my breakfast sandwich. A couple of young beautiful Vietnamese girls I will truly miss and Hanoi City is a vibrant beautiful city with parks and many Lakes to walk around, many coffee shops everywhere and great tasting coffee’s, give the Egg Coffee a taste or Coconut milk coffee both delicious. I did go to the POW Prison in the Old Quarters area and found it interesting as the prisoners were not treated well at all. The Old Quarters are is very exciting and busy, the big attraction is Hoan Kiem Lake and the open square at one end of the lake, during the day it is exciting to see how the traffic orchestras itself through this open area and at night it his closed to traffic, yet another experience with so many people walking around and sitting next to the fountain for a romantic evening I suppose, but it is truly colourful with all the lights. I even noticed a Bently drive by, wow someone has money here in Vietnam. I was starting to enjoy parts of Hanoi and really enjoying my time here, but I had already made a decision to leave, and after a 12 day stay I am now going to DaNnag by train and to visit Hoi An as well.