Hanoi

There is no question Hanoi is the cultural center of Vietnam. From music to architecture, art in the streets, community flower projects in the park, government buildings adorned with preparations for their 2010 millennial celebration...this is the thriving metropolitan heartbeat of the north.

Our hotel is centrally located so we began our day walking around the large Hoan Kiem Lake and first stop-a buddhist temple. From there our long day journey through the streets began...mainly through the old district in the northern section.

It is hard to imagine the bellowing warnings of US aircraft about to bomb the city. I don't know much about the targets sought after in those days. I may just have to visit the real Hanoi Hilton to bone up on my history here.

This has been a relaxing day and we have made plans to travel to Halong Bay tomorrow. This will be a long day journey. We almost talked ourselves out of it but our travel sense tells us to not miss this geographical phenomenon.

A brief story here. I messed up when locking our safe this evening therefore nullifying our combination...the safe now was inaccessible. No biggy...we call room service so they could send someone up with the master combination access device. Instead they sent up a maintenance worker thinking the AC was malfunctioning...the wrong guy. A young man named Choug who has been here 10 years. As our conversation dwindled while waiting for the real guy to arrive I break out my few photos from 1970. His intrigue was immediate. He begins to relate in very broken english that his father was VC and he had served in the Saigon area during the war. And after that war culminated in 1975 he fought in the Cambodian war. His father is still alive and after several minutes of conversation he takes leave...bowing and thanking me profusely for sharing with him my story. He was anxious to share this chance meeting with his father when he arrives home...over an hour away.

The Vietnamese are about as gracious a people as I will ever encounter. We never cease to enjoy each encounter no matter how trivial.

Capping our evening after some great cuisine of prawns and scallops we stroll back near the hotel and encounter a fellow we had briefly engaged when we arrived yesterday. A tall gentleman, shoulder length hair and seemingly travelling alone. We ask him to join us for a drink. He is an acting consultant from the UK, hired by the United Nations, working in Hanio to evaluate Vietnam's current economic dilemmas and will provide potential avenues for future growth for the nation. He comes from a family with 5 brothers and one sister and he is the number 2 son. Well ...that took the cake with Nancy... who is from a family with 5 sisters and one brother and she being the number 2 daughter. Bernard, with his charming english accent, stayed and chatted a good while before calling it the night. I'm sure we will encounter him again.

Tomorrow...Halong Bay.