we are in vientien, laos and it is wonderful. hanoi is a beautiful city--no doubt, but after a while, like say, 2-3 days, it really started to drive me nuts. we were staying in the old quarter which is a gorgeous compact, crowded neighborhood of french colonial structures piled on top of french colonial structures with new conrcrete buildings clustered around one of hanoi's lakes, (the one with the pagoda from the photos), anyway, emerson did not find it as nerve-taxing as i did. i felt like the old quarter is something like mid-town manhattan during rush hour all day, but everyone is on motorbikes, and nobody knows how to drive them because, quite ironically, they have laws regarding motorbike licenses, (you must be 18 to drive one), unlike cambodia and thailand where you'll see an 8 year old speeding around so by the time they're 18 they've been driving a motorbike for more than half their life and can maneuver through traffic almost intuitively. in vietnam they really don't pay attention to the road--i almost got hit a number of times, as there was no other option but to walk in the street since whenever motorbikes are not being recklessly driven they are inevitable parked in rows on the narrow sidewalks, making it impossible to pick your way around. i got the distinct impression that the motorbike drivers really didn't care if they hit you--outside of the fact that it would have been an obvious inconvenience, an accident. i guess it's like new york or any big city where you feel as if the people are hard-edged. the only time anyone smiled at us it was because they were trying to sell something.
we took a trip to ha long bay, about 4 hours outside hanoi--it's a saltwater bay on the coast with almost 1,000 limestone and jungle islands rising out of the mist. it was beautiful, we went on a 3 day boat tour. the first day was warm and hazy but it grew colder on the second and third day so we were unable to swim in the bay, or go hiking on one of the islands in the forest, mud, and thick fog. we did get to take a long walk through the jungle though--about 7 miles--from the boat landing to a tiny village in the basin of one of the bay's larger islands. there was so much oxygen it was like breathing in jungle elixer--heady and euphoric. the population of the village was only about 300--the town consisted of about 50 houses along the road. the houses ranged from tilting mud and bamboo structures, to brand new concrete french architecture boxes that, (our guide informed us), had just popped up in the last year and which cost the unthinkable sum of $500 dollars to purchase and build. since wo couldn't go hiking we sat at a family's out-door restaurant and drank tea and ate watermelon seeds with the locals, an old man and an old woman who spoke no english. we were the only 2 people on our boat tour who opted for the third day so we had the guide all to ourselves and things became markedly less formal which was nice.
we regretted that we did not have time to go trekking out to sapa to visit the hill villages where many of vietnam's ethnic minorities live, we had to leave the country just in time to avoid overstaying our vietnam visas. but due to a happy accident at the border our laos visas were issued for a month long stay when we only purchased 2 weeks so hopefully we will be able to take some time and go off the beaten path.
in the meantime we are thoroughly enjoying the mellow atmosphere here in vientien. the locals seem to take a refreshing friendly yet indifferent stance towarsd the tourists. you can browse in a clothing store without having someone point at everything that you glance at and say, "you buy? you buy?" the people smile readily, and you don't feel like they are constantly trying to hustle money out of you.
yesterday we went to the most wonderful wet sauna on the outskirts of the urban area right next to a buddhist monastary. first we sat in a wooden room with aromatic steam of eucalyptis, lemongrass, cinnamon, basil, garlic, and about 15 other herbs. it was so soothing. then we had tea on the deck with the woman who owns the business, noi. she was really funny and charming and a great person to listen to. after that we had our one hour massage which was different than thai or khmer massage--it was based on pressure points and on lines of energy in the body. when we were done i felt like i had been completely cured of the hanoi stress/negativity/aggro vibe that had been making me feel tense and raw for the past few days.