3.5 weeks traveling north to south
Hanoi > Halong Bay > Hanoi > Sapa > Hanoi > Dong Hoi > Paradise Cave > Hoi An > Nhatrang > Dalat > 4 day Easy Rider > Ho Chi Minh
And in addition, an assortment of thoughts and revelations I had while traveling the country:
Traffic & Transportation- The traffic in Vietnam might just be the most hectic in the world. Motorbikes are by far the most favored form of local transportation and the rush hour traffic in places like Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh are swarming with these vehicles. I heard early on that in Vietnam, the horn is more important than the brakes, and as you walk down an urban street, the honking is near constant. Sometimes the traffic is so heavy, simply crossing a street on foot is a mission. I also learned early on that the best way to cross a street is to just walk slow and steady and not to make eye contact with the drivers and they will (hopefully) drive around you. So essentially, just close your eyes and walk. It’s also amazing that I never saw an accident. There would be 4 and 5 way intersections with bikes crossing from every direction. I sometimes thought that the traffic was like a living organism, moving and honking constantly but always avoiding disaster. Another interesting fact about life on the road in Vietnam is that bikers don’t bother to yield or even look both ways before turning onto a busy road or intersection - this was the source of a close call my first day on a motorbike, as a bike pulling a carriage pulled out of a small road on to the highway right in front of me without thinking to look or even honk. Similarly, it is not out of the ordinary for motorbikes to start by driving on the wrong side of the road before crossing over to the right side of the road. Sleeper buses & trains are an inevitable part of traveling Vietnam on a backpackers budget. I took a sleeper train from Hanoi to Sapa and back. Besides arriving at the miserable hr of 5 am, the actual journey is quite pleasant. Typically, the sleeper train is divided into many private cabins that each have 2 bunks and air conditioning. Sleeper bus is an even more budget option and I used this method from Hanoi to Dong Hoi and from Hoi An to Nha Trang. A sleeper bus typically has 3 rows of beds going front to back, and with each row double stacked with an upper and lower bunk. The comfort of these tends to vary by company. Some seats recline far enough for you to nearly stretch out completely, others are much tighter so that you can only sleep in the fetal position. While the 2nd ride wasn’t too bad, my first experience was quite unpleasant, especially because there were several bugs crawling around in the crevice between my bed and the wall. There is also no such thing as a multi-lane highway in Vietnam, so passing trucks around blind corners is the norm.
Food- The cuisine is one of the highlights of being in Vietnam. One of the most popular dishes, called Pho, is a rice noodle soup served with veggies and typically your choice of chicken, beef, or pork. While I enjoyed the dish several times for lunch and dinner, pho is the typical breakfast dish for the locals. Nothing like starting off your day with a steaming bowl of noodle soup. Vietnam also serves up some damn good coffee. However, since the coffee is usually quite strong, the portions are small and might not satisfy someone used to large dunkin donuts iced coffees.
Face masks- One of the more obvious cultural differences is that many people (though especially women) wear face masks. Jess and I were perplexed by this and heard a wide range of answers from the people we spoke to. The first main reason is that the locals wear the masks to avoid breathing in pollution and so not to spread illness when they are sick. However, after seeing many local women walking the beach while wearing a face mask, we were still perplexed. So the second main reason is so women can keep try coloring of their face more white. Whereas many Americans will go out of their way to get a nice tan, having lighter skin is apparently more desirable in Vietnam and women will wear the masks to keep the sun off their faces.
Sitting and seats- The way the Vietnamese sit might be the strangest cultural phenomenon from my American perspective. First, the tables and stools used at most street side restaurants and bars are ridiculously small. Imagine that little play table your parents got for you when you were a toddler with seats no higher than 2 ft off the ground. This is what grown adults in Vietnam use to eat their dinners. Took a little getting used to before I was comfortable while sitting to eat. An extension of the normal table and stool is how the Vietnamese typically sit when they do not have a proper seat. I would think that in America, people might sit in the butterfly position, or with their legs stretched out, or maybe find something to lean on like a wall or a fence, or simply stand. Not in Vietnam. Instead, they squat down similar the position that you would use to stretch your groin, but an important addition is that both feet are always flat on the ground. Piling out of a 4 row minibus at a rest stop, every single local sat this way on the ground, while having a smoke or a drink or just chilling. Maybe I’m not that flexible, but when I try to do it I nearly fall over.
North vs. South- Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi are polar opposites and in some ways capture the differences between the north and the south. Ho Chi Minh is loud and stylish, with young adults partying at nightclubs into the early morning, whereas Hanoi is old and conservative, all bars have a mandatory closing time of 11 and the local commerce seems as if it hasn’t changed much over the past few decades. Ho Chi Minh is glitzy with new skyscrapers and flashing advertisements. Hanoi, on the other hand, has a timeless feel to it, especially in the old quarter that has tight windy roads with beautiful flowers and blossomed trees. While I had quite a pleasant time in he North, it was interesting to here from locals living in Ho Chi Minh that they do not always feel welcomed in the North - they are charged higher rates for food and goods when they travel north and are not always greeted warmly. The only time I lied about my nationality was when speaking with a man in his 40s at a bar in Hanoi. Turned out he hated the Communist Party and had only good things to say about America. And while most of the country has undergone a dramatic change over the past few decades as Vietnam’s economy has opened up to foreign investment, there were still times when I could notice the difference of living under a Communist Party. For instance, it is illegal for any citizen to own a gun (no guns, no rebellion). Also, locals tread very lightly when talking about politics. For example, easy rider guide Hong spent 3 yrs in a ‘re-education camp’ after being a cpt in the south Vietnamese army, and while he spoke a bit about this experience, he never once bad mouthed the communist party.
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