rainy Hanoi

Arriving in Hanoi. Its gray, so gray. And it will be gray for the next three days I"m in this city. After the calmness and the peace of my retreat is the city like a shock therapy in any sense: noises, people, rudeness and fraud and cheating. So to survive I had to wake up and face this madness. Its difficult and I ended up being cheated two times by taxi driver. Now I've learned. First ask the price and never ever trust the meter! Well, it is much more fun to take the bus, anyway. The bus is conducted by a dream trio: the driver, the girl who sells the tickets and number three the DJ. He is responsible for changing the music according to the wishes of the passengers or is own mood, I;m not so sure about that. Anyway the bus ens up being a jolly good ride. Also fun is taking a motor bike. You get a dented old helmed and just jump on and then you pull out into the traffic and ride along. I love it. some breeze, some speed ....

I had good food, saw a water puppet show, which was quite boring, listed to classical Vietnames music, which was difficult to understand. Went to the ethnology museum to learn a lot about all the different tribes in Vietnam.So, I started my Vietnam cultural understanding program. ;)


HO Chi Minh Mausoleum

I saw him! I saw HO Chi Minh. Lying there in his sagrophag smiling. I was lucky to see him because within the year for three months he goes of to Europe to the people of Madame Tussuad to get a refreshment. After quoting for about 1 hour and moving along with hundreds of Vietnamese I had about 30 seconds to see the old man. There were lots of guards who were very keen that you keep on moving. With me there were two old ladies in wheel chairs who got sooo emotional, they started to cry and wave their hands in prayer. I wish I had known what connection they have with Mr. Ho Chi Minh....