Jackie & Andy Steves Blog Southeast Asia — Part 3
Stunning Halong Bay
Halong Bay, one of the seven natural wonders of the world, can't be missed. And there's an overwhelming number of ways to experience it. We opted for the two-day, one-night cruise on a medium-sized boat with 20 passengers.
These limestone isles, 20 million years in the making, were well worth the eight-hour roundtrip bus ride. The bay is the kind of place that looks amazing in pictures, but is an entirely different visual experience in person. Andy couldn't stop saying "beautiful!" I'll let my photos try to speak for themselves.
We kayaked through a hundred-year-old fishing village consisting of quaint little houses the size of a small broom, floating atop styrofoam garbage on the water. I hope the fishermen didn't feel like zoo animals, with curious tourists peering inside.
We spelunked through a massive cave using our imaginations to spot Buddhas, monkeys, turtles, and dragons among the stalactites and stalagmites. It broke my heart to hear that this precious bay was pummeled with bombs during the American War, aiming to obliterate the hundred Viet Cong hiding out inside such caves as this.
Diving off the boat and happy houring on its sundeck were fabulous. Meals were a glorious eight courses family-style, offering chances to try a wide variety of meat and seafood preparations, all of which seem to have plenty of added sugar. The night wouldn't be complete without really bad karaoke. I tortured everyone's poor ears with a Spice Girls number.
— Jackie
Posted on July 10, 2015
Videos: Hanoi Cooking, Stormy Weather, and Street Dancing
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— Videos by Andy Steves for Weekend Student Adventures
— Additional filming and narration by Carey Carpenter for CareBear Abroad on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.
Posted on July 9, 2015
Home Cooking in Hanoi
We spent our Sunday morning in the intimacy of a Vietnamese grandmother's kitchen learning to prepare spring rolls, chicken pho, and sautéed spinach. Why is it that cooking the food yourself makes it taste so much better?
First we met our chef and our 30-year-old, lovely, sharp translator/facilitator at the market to pick up ingredients. Vietnamese often visit the supermarket twice a day, before breakfast and before dinner, aiming for ultimate freshness. What a contrast with my American lifestyle of grocery shopping just once every week or two to save time.
The focal point of our host's dining room was a shrine to her deceased ancestors. Several plates of carefully prepared food sit in offering to departed family members, whose stoic faces look out from picture frames. Great-grandpa evidently liked cigarettes and whisky, while great-grandma fancied sparkling wine and cookies.
Our host was a precise, painstaking cook. We Americans, on the other hand, struggled to cut the mushrooms and onions itty-bitty enough. Andy packed the spring rolls like Chipotle burritos bursting at the seams.
We prodded our facilitator for personal information. She grew up in Ho Chi Minh's hometown. Pressured by her mother to always be first in her class, she suffered from depression and longed to study abroad. Unable to afford studying in the States, she ended up at the "Harvard of Vietnam," studying international business. Unbeknownst to her parents, she lived with her now-husband for two years before they married. He was shy, so she did the pursuing. She hopes to start her own fruit export business soon. I loved getting the down-low on social norms and issues concerning young adults in Vietnam.
Vietnam and Seattle both experience tremendous amounts of rain, but in opposite ways. Seattle's is a constant mist, while Vietnam's is a spontaneous downpour like nothing I've seen. A storm that downed trees and parts of buildings didn't seem to faze Hanoi, who picked up her streets quickly right after.
I enjoyed a taste of Vietnamese Catholicism at a Sunday evening mass at St. Joseph's Cathedral. I've never witnessed a congregation who sings so loudly and with such broad participation. Five stars for Vietnamese Catholics!
— Jackie
Posted on July 8, 2015
Videos: Exploring Hanoi & A Night Out
Complementing Carey's video of our first full day in Hanoi, Andy's videos take a deeper dive.
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— Video by Andy Steves for Weekend Student Adventures
Posted on July 7, 2015
Video: Hanoi, Vietnam
Carey Carpenter of CareBear Abroad met us for our time in Vietnam and joined Andy in filming our trip. I'll let her introduce herself:
"Andy and I met in Prague, Czech Republic where I currently reside as an English Teacher when I'm not traveling. We quickly hit it off, both being very like-minded travelers using Prague as a home base for European travels. So, a last minute invitation from him and Jackie was hard to turn down to join them for a leg of their trip! With their help, I booked a flight and obtained a Vietnamese visa all within 24 hours and was on my way!" — CareBear
[We're sorry, the video(s) are no longer available.]
— Video by Carey Carpenter for CareBear Abroad on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.
Posted on July 6, 2015
Ho Chi Minh's Waxy Body and "The American War"
Someone had the brilliant idea of connecting tourists to Vietnamese university students studying English, who volunteer as guides and ambassadors. I met up with a third-year male student to visit the Ho Chi Minh complex. Never have I seen such a long line. It outdid the worst lines at the Vatican and the Louvre: ten blocks of Vietnamese, many of whom had journeyed from far-off provinces to pay tribute to "Uncle Ho," the leader of Vietnam's communist movement from the 1940s through the 1960s.
Ho Chi Minh's waxy body is preserved in a glass case inside the mausoleum for all to see. (He jets off to Russia for two months each year to be spruced up.) In northern Vietnam, criticizing Ho Chi Minh in the media can still land you in jail. Some believe HCM was gung-ho communist, while others believe he employed communist values only to promote the overthrow of French colonial power and rally the masses to the cause. Apparently whether he was actually anti-capitalist is still a matter of debate.
HCM borrowed from the American Declaration of Independence when he declared independence for Vietnam — the part about rights to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." I learned that the Vietnamese and Americans fought for independence based on very similar beliefs. They were just packaged and labeled differently, according to the political principles in vogue at the time. We borrowed from Locke and Rousseau. They borrowed from Marx and Lenin. But we both wanted freedom, equal rights, and autonomy. You know that American list of heroes and freedom fighters that includes the likes of Gandhi, Mandela, and MLK? I wonder if Uncle Ho would belong among them if he wasn't — gasp — a communist! I got to see the presidential mansion that HCM avoided, Pope Francis-style, opting instead for a small, simple wooden house.
At one of the most important temples, I saw the Hanoi professional football team praying for victory. I made sure to rub Buddha's foot for good luck myself.
I saw the lake Senator John McCain was shot down over. He was tangled in his parachute and nearly drowned, but ended up getting arrested as a POW. The Vietnamese supported him more than Obama during the 2008 election because he had paid a special visit to see the sights and make amends with his former enemies. This goes to show the poignancy of soft power: face-to-face human interaction and dialogue.
As a teacher of literature, I couldn't miss the famous Temple of Literature. In Vietnamese culture, literature is synonymous with education. The Confucian Chinese brought down education with an emphasis on reading, writing, and memorization. If you passed your examination, your name was engraved on a stone plaque atop a tortoise — the symbol of intelligence. The temple included the university from the seventh century, a beautiful, long, wooden building with dormitories on either side. To this day, students come here to pray before their version of the SATs, which determines so much of their future.
We visited the Hoa Lo Prison, built by the French to incarcerate the native rebels they had trouble controlling. In the 20th century, it held Americans during what we call the Vietnam War (and what is called the "American War" around here). The most powerful part of the exhibit for me was a room of photos of anti-Vietnam War protests from all around the world. I didn't know anti-war sentiment at the time grew strong in so many different countries.
The room that portrayed the years this prison held American POWs was suspiciously propagandistic. It showed pictures of cheesy smiles on soldiers' faces, jovial soccer games, and happy chess playing. Was life here for them, including Senator McCain, really so peachy?
The personal space bubble of Vietnamese is definitely smaller. My sweet, nerdy, third-year university student kept running me off the sidewalk. I didn't mind, because I was grateful and impressed that he gives up his Saturdays to volunteer as our guide and ambassador, in efforts to improve his English.
Our favorite nightlife spot here is the "beer corner." Little kiddie plastic chairs and tables spill out into this intersection, populated by a blend of Vietnamese and tourists drinking local brews. When the police roll through every 30 minutes, we're instructed to stand up. Drinking beer while sitting on the street is illegal, but apparently trouble with the fuzz can be averted by standing and hiding your beer until he leaves. They do a great job of playing dumb.
We also visited a traditional liquor bar. From what I gather, the Vietnamese soak any number of things in their firewater to infuse interesting flavors. But no matter whether it had been spiced with ginseng, honey, or even snakes, it all tasted like nail polish remover to me. The locals enjoyed observing our pathetic, intrepid attempts to sip the stuff. Try the bird liquor. Yum!
— Jackie
Posted on July 5, 2015
Video: Singapore to Hanoi
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— Video by Andy Steves for Weekend Student Adventures
Posted on July 4, 2015
Trip Planning, Street Food, and Pedestrian Survival in Hanoi
As a traveler, beware fatigue and hunger. Andy and I got along better than most brothers and sisters would throughout our time in Indonesia. But by the time we got to Hanoi, we wanted to bite each other's heads off. Sleeping — or rather not sleeping — in a hostel dorm with six strangers and saving our appetites for pho can be dangerous.
After reading about all of the scams and rip-offs that lay in store for us in Vietnam, I was skeptical of everyone. Men pointing at our feet, trying to trick us into thinking we'd dropped something, did not help my lack of trust. But at the same time, I felt bad for the many people trying to make an honest living who have to deal with paranoid tourists.
We spent our first afternoon in Hanoi on the hotel's computers planning our trip's next steps. Some well-traveled friends had advised against planning our Southeast Asia trip too much; they said we'd want some flexibility to follow the suggestions of travelers we meet along the way. So I resisted the temptation to pre-book everything, except for our first leg in Indonesia. Now I wish I'd gone ahead and planned everything, for two reasons. First, I trust my guidebook, written by experts, more than a backpacker with limited knowledge. (I wonder where this pro-guidebook bias comes from?) And second, I hate spending precious time during our trip stuck inside on a computer.
I'm a sucker for TripAdvisor rankings of the "best" tour and the "best" restaurant in any city. I know this is silly, because the options are often apples and oranges. I also feel bad that this approach might make me miss some of the little, newer guys who haven't yet gotten the chance to amass 1,000 reviews. But I still use crowdsourcing sites because it satisfies me 99 percent of the time. We have definitely seen the effects of this with all our guides and accommodations gently asking us to write a nice comment about their service on Trip Advisor.
A street food walking tour served as our orientation to Hanoi and its cuisine. Our guide had enough charisma and humor to be on stage. Between bowls of noodles, spring rolls, and sweet drinks, she entertained us with funny stories. She explained how her dad drank snake's blood and heart, hoping for a son, and when he got her, he stubbornly gave her a boy's name. Her mom pressures her to marry, warning that soon only the 50-plus-year-old men will be within her reach. Chopsticks should be picked up in pairs, like husband and wife. It's bad luck to drop one — a spouse might drop out of your marriage as well. Be careful taking a meaty dog as a pet, because he may be snatched up and served for dinner at a local restaurant. It's safer to have a small, skinny dog. The same goes for cats!
Forgive me for not remembering the names of the dishes we tasted. I can only describe: Crispy fried eel with glass noodles. Spring rolls containing crunchy chicken pancake and fried fish. Cane sugar smoothies. Noodles reminiscent of phad thai, but with Vietnamese flavors. Coffee mixed with rich egg white and condensed milk. Hanoi Tiger beer. I'm a big fan of all of the above!
I was grateful for the chance to watch and learn from a pro how to cross these perilous streets, where pedestrians never have the right of way. The key is to walk calmly and slowly into oncoming traffic. The motorbikes will go around you, but watch out for the more headstrong taxis and buses. They aren't so considerate. A green walking man means nothing. You've got to have your wits about you at all times. Sidewalks are used as motorcycle parking lots — forcing pedestrians to walk in the street. Our guide was so unconcerned about the crazy traffic around us that she would lead us into the center of a major intersection to stop and point out some sights around us, fully trusting that the motor vehicles would go around us. And they did.
— Jackie
Posted on July 3, 2015
Video: Last Days in Bali
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— Video by Andy Steves for Weekend Student Adventures
Posted on July 2, 2015
Bali Video: Ubud to Gili T
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— Video by Andy Steves for Weekend Student Adventures
Posted on July 1, 2015
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