Apocalypse, then…
A cacophony of horns continuously sounds as I walk purposefully across the road. Motocycles whizz around me in all directions as I pass a woman in a conical hat balancing two large baskets of tropical fruit across her shoulder on a pole. She catches my eye and gestures towards the fruit hopefully but I shake my head; I’ve just eaten a big plate of beef luc-lac for dinner.
Collections of plastic chairs and stools spill out onto the uneven tarmac as more conical-hatted women pour glasses of Bia Hoi from a pile of kegs on the pavement. A motorcycle arrives with a fresh beer keg balanced on the back, and drives off again with an empty. Apparently this is the cheapest street bar in central Hanoi; a glass of about 330ml costs just 2000d (About 8p or 17c US). Suddenly an open-backed vehicle with red and blue lights pulls up and a man in uniform shouts at the bar in Vietnamese which results in some frantic shouting and plastic stool collecting. It seems that sitting around on the tiny pavement drinking Bia Hoi is fine, but crossing the threshold onto the road is objectionable.
Vietnam has slowly improved for me as the last week has progressed. The first day was a personal apocalypse, after the struggle at the border I ended up spending the night in the wholly unwelcoming city of Vinh. After the relaxed serenity of Laos, Vietnam seemed hot, unfriendly and expensive. I stayed in a crumbling communist-era concrete bunker of a hotel and ate tofu, rice and unidentifiable vegetables with chopsticks and beer before I collapsed in my shabby room through sheer exhaustion from an early start and a long journey. Thankfully things began to improve when I arrived in Hanoi the next day.
“Where the dragon descends into the sea” is the literal translation of “Ha long”, a stunning bay of 2000 islands some 200km east of Hanoi which is undoubtedly one of Vietnam’s top attractions. It is a heavily touristed area with thousands of junks carrying sightseers around the polluted waters day and night, but it is still an incredibly beautiful sight.
The wonderful people at the British embassy had my new passport ready in no time at all so I’ll be heading eastwards into China shortly. Over in the gallery, the Laos album is now complete.
