If you can't beat them, join them
A ciclo, Hanoi
The Citadel, Hue
The Citadel, Hue
The Old Quarter, Hanoi(see below for video)
Crossing over from China into Vietnam, by bus, is as visually contrasting as crossing over from the USA into Mexico. From spick and span Chinese PR into potholed, seedy and chaotic Vietnam. Yet, Vietnam seems more open, friendlier, as well as cheaper.
The houses are now tall and skinny, which, i suppose, can be expected from a small country which has a population approaching 90 million, most of which live along a coastal plain.
There are no electric bikes in HANOI, which has little electricity, instead the country seems to run on mopeds, millions of them. Pavements seem to be for parking upon, or for running a stall, the roads are a free for all between pedestrians, mopeds and cars, the mopeds win hands down, spooking one, from all directions, in the narrow streets of the Old Quarter, which is where i stayed on my last visit in 1993.
A further bus journey to HUE, which is a UNESCO World Heritage site. Formerly it was the political capital under the Nguyen dynasty and maintains its position as a cultural, religious and educational centre with a sedate pace of life along the Perfume River. Older tourists also seem to like HOI AN which is famous for its range of restaurants.
Beaches, fringed by waving palms, with all sorts of resorts, stretch all along the coast as far as SAIGON in the south, (which is a far nicer name than Ho Chi Minh City) (HCMC), this conjures up the French colonial past and where one still eats baguettes, drinks coffee and views fine mansions hidden behind the avenues of massive tamarind trees, which line and shade the streets. If the British had been the colonial power they would have left cricket and rules and regulations, which is still more than the Americans, who left bad feelings, munitions all over the country and a heap of soldier's dog tags heaped into a pyramid behind a glass case in a Hue museum.
No comments:
Post a Comment