Day 15 – The Last Leg
I have to say, saving a very tourism-heavy day for the last
full day of the trip is an odd move, but to some degree it helped motivate me
to actually do things and venture out instead of wallowing in my own self pity
that my trip is ending. I have to say, doing two week trips might be a perfect
length as by the end of it, you are a combination of tired and content enough
to actually be ready to go back home. But before we get to the going back home,
there was one last city to explore, a few more meals to consume, and one more
night to enjoy.
I had a set list of places to visit, hoping to time things
to factor in avoiding the heat, the ever-present mid day torrential rain. The
first was the Tran Quoc Pagoda. This was the first of three pagodas I would
visit today, and I can safely say after two weeks chock full of pagodas and
temples, I have seen my fill. What was nice for Hanoi is many of the temples
are built on the edge or inside the many lakes that fill the city. This one was
off the edge of the main West Lake, with a very nice little bridge leading from
the road to the temple. The pagoda itself was small, but nice, with a lot of
bonzai trees and drums and it was really nicely built into its ecosystem. The
ones in Hanoi were more touristy than those in Ho Chi Minh, but when the
setting is so beautiful, it is hard to blame people.
My next stop was the Ho Chi Minh Musuem – named after the
President and leader of the Vietnamese rebellion. The museum was housed inside
a giant park that was very hard to navigate, and I didn’t want to spend any
more time outside than needed given the quickly escalating humidity. I don’t
know of Hanoi is more humid, but I definitely reacted to it more, strangely
getting less used to the humidity as the trip went on.
The Ho Chi Minh Museum was quite well made, but in a weird
way I didn’t know what a lot of it was about. There were a few exhibits that
were quite easy to follow, such as one about the whole revolution and another
on the rebuild of post-war Vietnam (that one in particular was quite
interesting as it was an angle I hadn’t seen before). Then there was a large
open room in the middle with a giant statue of Ho Chi Minh. Other than those
two, I wasn’t quite sure what the main floor was about.
There were randomly assorted artifacts and sculptures and
recreations of homes and villages and farm equipment, with no real discernable
pattern or theme. It was all very well staged in a long room that encircled the
open hall with the statue, but I was not sure what I was seeing. Some of them
got even stranger, like one art piece which was a giant table with fruit on top
of it (not real, but made of something), and no explanation on what this was
supposed to be showing.
Even if I couldn’t follow it, being inside the well air
conditioned building more than made up for any potential issues. I was actually
sad to leave this little place of the unknown.
After the museum, I went to the next pagoda, which was
called in English the Temple of the Jade Emperor pagoda, which has a completely
different name in Vietnamese and so was almost impossible to find in the ‘Grab’
app – Southeast Asia’s answer to Uber. I did find it, but it was also by an
area that was closed to cars so I had to be dropped off a few blocks away. This
area near one of the smaller lakes at the edge of the Old Town seemed like it
was being set up for some event later in the day.
The temple was similar to the first pagoda, but a little larger
and more ornate. There was a really grand entrance gate which led to a long
bridge to the main temple. I was really impressed at how many dies of the temple
had, all with different aspects, be it a lot of trees or the main area with the
statues of Confucius and other deities, or ornate carving. If it wasn’t
oppressively humid, I probably would have stayed longer.
After this, and with the sky getting increasingly dark, I
went for lunch hoping to time it well to avoid rain. The only restaurant left
on my list that I really wanted to check out was Cha Ca Tuch Long, deep in the
heart of old town. This restaurant basically serves one dish, a fried lemon and
cumin spiced fish cut into pieces grilled on a plate in front of you. This isn’t
like a Korean bbq place, as the wait-staff does all the cooking. Before
bringing the pan with the fish, they bring out various bowls, with basil, green
onion, rice noodles, chili and peanuts and a fish sauce, and then a large bowl
of beans which get put into the pan. They do all this for you the first time,
putting a chunk of the rice noodles into your smaller bowl, add a bit of the
basil and green onion and others into the dish, and then after a while will
take some of the beans and one piece of the fish and tell you to pour some
sauce and eat. Honestly, this was all a great show, but the taste was truly
incredible.
After lunch, I went to probably the most interesting of my
stops during the day, the Hoa Lo Prison, which has now been turned into a
museum showcasing the very real horrors that took place in that building.
However, what made it interesting was the first two-thirds of the museum detail
the tortuous conditions the Vietnamese prisoners were put under when the French
Colonials ruled and were fighting to stop any revolutionary concerns and the
final third was showcasing the use of the prison during the Vietnam war, when
the Vietnamese took US soldiers prisoner – but of course that half was, rather starkly,
white-washed. There were photos of US soliders being tended to medically,
paying volleyball, cajoling with their captors.
Now, I can definitely believe the US soldiers were kept in
better conditions relative to the Vietnamese prisoners decades earlier, in
large part because there is more to gain by portraying better living
conditions, but these photos and memorials (including unsurprisingly a lot about
John McCain) clearly show a very biased view of how it all went down.
From the prison, I went to the Temple of Literature, a giant
temple complex in the middle of the city. I have to say, when you get outside
the masked thumb of the Old Town, Hanoi is quite wide open and developed, much
like Ho Chi Minh. The Temple of Literature is a large complex of first
greenery, then a long pond, then two temple areas with the one at the end
requiring legs covered and no photos and all that. There were some tour groups
getting long tours of the temple – a good sign of how large it was that it
could require a full probably 30 or 60 minute tour.
After this my final stops were shopping related, wanting to
pick a few random wares from the various street market and craft stores that
all sell stuff made by regional tribes in Vietnam. All the stuff is fairly
clean and decent, and haggling becomes a nice little game. Other than a few
roadside wares, I went to a couple stores that sell local handicrafts straight
from villages – I did a bit of Googling to ensure this is true and not a ruse.
The first was Craft Strip, which was nicely located right next to the Temple of
Literature. The more effective one, if a place that had a whole host of random
stuff, was Emporium, which also nicely had their outlets in Tay Ho near the
hotel. Prior to the Emporium, I checked out Furbrew, one of the few fully Hanoi-run
craft beer spots in Hanoi – most as mentioned are Western owned, and some that
aren’t are transplants from Ho Chi Minh.
Furbrew was quite good, with a really large selection for
such a small shop. I do wonder if it may struggle as it was fairly empty
despite it being near 6pm on a Saturday. The final beer bar I went to, which
was after dinner, was at Standing Bar – this place served a collection of Vietnam
craft beer on tap, including some from Pasteur Street and Furbrew itself. The
place was small (though there was a second floor which I didn’t see), but
really nicely set-up with large oil-cylinders as tables and a very metal-heavy
theme. I’ll say that Ho Chi Minh may have overly commercialized the craft beer experience
where the places are known more for the hang or the food, but both Hanoi and
Taipei have it down lock.
For dinner, I went back in a time a bit, going to Hanoi’s location
of the HOME restaurant chain which I went to in Ho Chi Minh. The décor was different,
instead of a more modern look, it was built in an old style colonial home, with
an outdoor area with the famous Vietnamese lanters on top. It was far more crowded
than the Ho Chi Minh version, so I could only get a seat inside. Surprising to
me, the menu was quite a bit different. I got a mango, pomelo and seafood
starter which was great, though a bit sad as the only seafood were prawns. For
my main, I got a grilled duck breast, minced with lime, mint and other herbs.
It was amazing, a preparation of duck I hadn’t had before, and though it is too
early to place it in the context of the overall trip, it was a great capper for
my last meal in Vietnam and further cemented Vietnam in my mind as a culinary
goldmine.
My final stop in Vietnam was Savage – I will say part of the
allure is it is walking distance from the Sheraton. But also, the atmosphere is
just really strong there. Tonight there were more locals than yesterday, and
the crowd was more into the back room heavier EDM stuff than the house mix out
front, but it was another great time where even as I stayed until about 2:15, I
was leaving squarely in the middle of.
As my time in Vietnam comes to an end, I have to say I enjoyed
everything aside from the oppressive humidity, but I think that is something
more at issue with me than with the country. Aside from that, everything else
was strong, be it the food, the beer, the culture, the sights, the ease of
getting around the cities (way less traffic than say Bangkok), and I was
continually surprised at how developed it was. Because of the timing of my
trip, I missed out on the middle chunk fo Vietnamese tourism – Hoi An, Hue,
Danang, etc. – so I probably will be back one day. I just hope when I do, I can
sneak in a day or two at Ho Chi Minh and Hanoi to take in a few balloons, get a
craft mug, see a temple, and eat some truly damn good food.
