Asian Walkabout

We did a quick 5-day jaunt into Vietnam for a look at Hanoi and the epic Halong Bay. It wasn’t nearly enough time to do the country justice, but the dose we did get was tantalizing.

Vietnam didn’t exactly embrace us from the getgo. We landed at the airport and found out the hard way that only one out of ten ATMs in this country actually give you money. The rest of the time, they come up with excuses ranging from ACCESS DENIED to SORRY, THIS MACHINE IS OUT OF CASH. None of the eight ATMs at Hanoi Airport worked, so we had to beg a tour salesperson to give us a cash advance.

Things improved after that.

After a decadent night in an air-conditioned real hotel (as opposed to guesthouse or lodge, the Southeast Asian pseudonym for “cheap”), we took a van to beautiful Halong Bay, a UNESCO World Heritage site containing nearly 2,000 limestone islets on 1,500 square kilometers. The bay is 500 million years old, and was used as an international trading port before someone figured out that its beauty might prove even more profitable.

These days, thousands of tourists in hotel boats modeled after Chinese junks cruise the main channels of the bay. The scenery is dramatic and surreal, like thousands of Thailand’s Ko Phi Phi islands thrown into the same emerald waters.

We spent two days on a faux Chinese junk with a white-coated waitstaff and carved wooden interiors designed to make you feel like an old-school Asian aristocrat. The scenery was enchanting, and our fellow tourists some of the most diverse and interesting people we’ve met on this trip: a French-American lesbian expat couple with two kids living in Singapore, two family doctors from Spain, a professionally trained Japanese singer, a Chilean couple, and a handful of others representing countries around the world.

When you’re floating on a big comfy tourist boat, you rarely get to penetrate the essence of a place. Instead, you breeze through several highlights, then spend the rest of your time focusing on self-indulgent pastimes such as drinking cold beer, eating fried food, and basking in the sun.

One of the highlights were fishing villages floating on bright blue bouys, a phenomenon typical of Vietnam. The people inside them make their living off the water. Instead of walking from place to place, they use wooden pedal-powered boats. The poverty was shocking—family homes were often tin shacks with laundry hanging on the family boats parked outside—but the unique lifestyle preserves a cultural heritage barely seen anymore in today’s rapidly developing world.

Another highlight was a cliffside cave deep enough to support a Broncos game. The stalactite-rich innards produced a scene akin to a sci-fi special, with heart-pounding bay views at the top.

We also enjoyed local seafood that was nothing short of glorious. The Vietnamese are known for flavoring their meats with herbs, resulting in unique and scrumptious cuisine that leaves you surprised—and craving more. Mango leaves and peppermint add culinary life to fresh prawns. Salads containing lotus seeds and green mango go well with fried fish caught just half an hour ago. Sea snails and boiled bananas in chicken stock comprise their hearty winter soup. Absolutely amazing. Exotic delicacies like swan and dog were also common, but we didn’t go there.

We spent two nights on the water, in an oiled mahogany boat cabin. The first day was excellent; the second, a welcome and relaxing addition. We headed back to crowded, high-energy Hanoi to spend the final day. There’s so much motorcycle traffic in the city that you basically have to walk into oncoming traffic to cross the street. The trick is to step slowly, so the mopeds have time to swerve around you. Running across the street is more likely to get you hit. And crosswalks…well, they might as be invisible. Hanoi needs signs saying “Cross At Your Own Risk.” Then, in small print, “People’s Government will not be held responsible for injuries caused by high-speed mopeds carrying three people and a dead pig on rear.”

It’s a busy, stuffy, nonstop, upwardly mobile city with a burgeoning middle class. Vietnam in general is on a strong economic upward swing. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s as developed as, say, South Korea in the not-too-distant future. And the population has its eye on culling every resource their bountiful land has to offer. Environmental protection is not a priority. It’s a beautiful country, and probably one that must be visited sooner rather than later, before old-school fishing families go big industry, and verdant hills are flattened to support additional development.

After a whirlwind 5 days, we’re flying to beautiful, sweltering, and refreshingly laid-back Cambodia for some ancient temples and a hard lesson in one of history’s worst genocides…