If you ever get an opportunity to travel to Vietnam you'd be crazy not to take it! Jake and I LOVED our time there. Okay technically we have never travelled anywhere in Asia before, so we don't have any experience to base it off of, and yes, it is the birth country of our daughter, so we perhaps were on a bit of a high that trip, but still. Go.
We left Vancouver on a Thursday, and arrived in Hanoi after a quick stop in Seoul, on Friday evening. We were so wise and did not sleep a wink on the 26 hours of travel. Okay I didn't. So we were exhausted and ready to fall into bed. It also made me a tad easy to overwhelm, so the first evening I may have shed a few tears (I think it was exhaustion combined with culture shock). My youtube preparations on how to cross the street however did come in handy when our driver dropped us off half a block and a street away from our hotel. I crossed the street as I had learned, keep a steady pace, eyes on where I wanted to go, mopeds swerving around me in front and behind. I'm not joking there are seriously youtube videos showing you how to cross the street in Vietnam. Jake unfortunately didn't watch those and had a slightly more fearful street crossing (think more closed his eyes and ran). Okay not that bad, but what you need to take away from this is 1. the traffic is insane, and 2. SOMETIMES (rarely) I am more prepared than Jake. That was the only time on the trip so I had to mention it.
I am thankful that our agency recommended giving ourselves a few days to get our bearings, we actually really enjoyed Saturday and most of Sunday walking and exploring. I believe we walked around 26 kilometres worth of streets in the old quarter in Vietnam and saw so many interesting and incredible sights. Every road is named after what is sold on that street, we made a mistake and walked down the meat one (not recommended), but there were so many people and shops packed into small areas it was incredible.
We quickly found our favourite restaurants and coffee shops (and discovered a Starbucks about a twenty minute walk away which felt like home!). Jake was thrilled to find that an average beer cost around $1USD, and all the food we had was delicious. Until we made the mistake of trying to order pizza while feeling homesick. The Vietnamese make delicious food, but the pizza is bland.
We aren't big on museums, we much preferred getting a feel of the country by walking around and exploring, but Sunday morning we checked out the Women's museum. I'm glad we went, it took us a little over and hour and gave us a good idea of what life is and was like for women in Vietnam. We watched a video on Vietnamese women from mountain villages that have left their families to work in Hanoi, only going home on holidays, in order to pay for their children to attend school. It made me want to stop trying to barter (which I wasn't good at anyway) and let them have the extra few dollars.
It turns out there are a few things travellers in Vietnam talk about, and judging by the t-shirts on sale, the traffic and the power lines are two hot topics. There doesn't seem to be much in terms of building or electricity code, and what people fit onto a moped is very impressive especially considering how traffic works there. We actually were amazed at how well it seemed to work, and I THINK I got the main idea. Stop at red lights (if there are any lights at the intersection), unless you are going straight through, turning left or turning right. Then don't stop just honk your horn and keep going. Go one direction on all one way streets, unless where you want to go is against the flow of traffic, and if so, by all means go whatever way you want down whatever street. Again, just use your horn. Finally, if you are approaching a busy intersection and want to turn left don't slow down or stop just use your horn well before even approaching the intersection, and just weave your way through.
