This morning we went to see a B-52 Bomber wreckage in a lake in West Hanoi, which was shot down by Viet cong on Dec 27, 1972 during the "Christmas bombings". Its pretty crazy, like I wonder if the pilot is still down there..? Now its mostly residential buildings overlooking the lake-- can you imagine waking up in the morning and walking out onto your balcony to see that shot down bad boy everyday? Anyway, afterwards we strolled over to the Botanical gardens which were very beautifully laid out-- not many flowers but two nice lakes and lots of artists painting the scenery.
Then we had lunch on West Lake not far from where we're staying and we had some proper good fresh seafood-- Caro had these huge prawns and I had the largest fish I've ever seen-- it was definitely cooked to serve 3 people (whoops!) so a little bit of Beijing over-ordering deja vu (but this was just one dish so not my fault!). Had my haircut as well (complete with head massage :-) which was a little overdue.
Yesterday we did a day tour of the Perfume Pagodas, which was quite an amazing experience. We were up at 6.30 for a van which drove us 2 hours out of Hanoi to Duc village, where we took a canoe for an hour to get to where you hike 3km (or the brand new cable car..) to this beautiful cave-pagoda, the most holy in Vietnam. During the lunar festival in February and March thousands of Vietnamese make pilgrimmages from all over the country to get to these pagodas, hence the building of the cable cars. Then lunch and the hour canoe + 2 hour van back to Hanoi again. Got dinner with Benny again at Hanoi Garden (really good food!) and some fruit smoothies by the Cathedral in the French Quarter (quite thick... and just 5000d! 5000d=17p). Then a couple of xe om (motorcycle taxis) to get us home, whereupon we witnessed a full-on collision at an intersection just a meter from us (Caro was actually right next to one of the bikes which collided and fell) so a little traumatizing!! My driver, after this, took my arm and put it around him, which was very sweet except then he only had one hand to steer so... I had to yell at him to use both hands while driving.
Two days ago (I know, its been a while since my last post) we were also up early to teach a class at 7.30am. We were also in to teach that evening so in between we wandered around the French Quarter as we were looking for this Italian restaurant which we passed like 25 mins before we actually arrived there (whoops!) but really nice, overlooked the Cathedral and everything and quite good pizza actually. Then we had a little western indulgence at the cinema and saw Madagascar (pretty solid). For dinner we went to what is now my favourite restaurant in the universe, called Quan an Ngon--this is the place Benny first took us to but they were out of food. Its mostly outdoors and have food from all over Vietnam and people that specialise in a given dish have like a stall along the perimeter so you see it being made, etc. Definitely something that would be warmly receive in London or NY (as would the price of £4 for a 3-course meal for two with drinks). Ok well I think thats enough information overload for now! Check out my new photos and videos on my album (click on the photo of the donkey in the upper right corner). Also!! I have a Vietnamese mobile which you can call or text me on anytime. The number is + 84 936 016614. So give me a call!!
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