D90 -- Touring Hanoi

Yesterday I read about a big festival taking place in a city park. We paid the $0.10 entrance fee and wandered around for about an hour. There were not many tourists and it was nice to see Vietnamese families out for a day of fun. After lunch we headed to the Temple of Literature, which was originally built in 1070. The first national university was housed there until 1802. Some sections have been destroyed over the years, others were added on. One of the sections that survived contained large stone slabs called stelae that sit atop stone turtles. Some date back to the 1400s and each has engraved the names and hometowns of scholars who earned their doctorates there.


Our next stop was the Museum of Ethnology, which had excellent exhibits and videos on Vietnam's many ethnic minorities. They even had whole homes built by ethnic minorities on the grounds. It was great to learn about the H'mong people, ethnic minorities that live in northwest Vietnam, since we knew we would be seeing them when we go to Sapa tomorrow. After the museum we headed over to the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum complex to visit the One Pillar Pagoda. It was built in 1049 and stood until 1954 when the French maliciously destroyed it after they lost colonial rule.










Also on the grounds is the glass sarcophagus of “Uncle Ho,” as some people here call him. He is preserved for all to see just like Lenin, Stalin, and Mao. Elva wanted to go see him out of a morbid curiosity, but he's only on display in the mornings.

That evening we attended a street market and tried a Vietnamese restaurant for dinner. We ordered a classic Hanoi dish called cha ca, which was described to us as fish cakes but at this restaurant was a white fish in boiling water with spices. After dinner we decided to finally try riding a cyclo, which are everywhere in Vietnam and consist of a large tricycle with a seating area at the front and a guy pedaling in the back. Like a rickshaw with wheels. It was only a short distance back to our hotel, so we figured it would be nice short trip. It was a really tight squeeze for the two of us, and we felt pretty ridiculous when we were in it. During the ride I felt like people were staring at us, but I figured I was just being paranoid. The next day we realized that only one person is supposed to ride in the cyclo, so we felt all the more foolish. Luckily, I had given the cyclo driver a really big tip!

-Tom