8/09 Ha Noi's Saturday

It's a very long trip from Hue to Hanoi, since Ha Noi was one of the Vietnam cities in the North, I had been taking the bus from 5 o'clock last night till 11 this morning. I was aching all over the body, and the bus was again leaving us at strange spots rather than the front door of the office. Since it was not very far from the Golden Moon Hotel that I was going to stay, I made few complaints this time.

The clerk was feeling a little bit embarrassed by the time I arrived at their front door, since they were still doing the cleaning and my room wasn't ready yet. She asked me to sit at the couch for a while, asked whether I would like to have a banana, and started introducing me about some of Hanoi's most popular sights.

The room was still not ready after about half an hour, so I started on my research about Hong Kong: where people recommended to stay, all the hot spots, and finally booked a small room that costed about 1000 NT, which was the cheapest I could find.

At last, my room was available and I moved in, it was a pretty big room for such a low price, and the facilities were really new and sweet. I stripped off all the equipment, watched the Animal Planet for a while on TV before finally going out for some exploration.

It's Saturday here in Hanoi and the roads were cramped, with people and vehicles. It felt like swimming in the crowd! Skin and skin were touching with one another for the whole time, and with the heat and humidity, I'm feeling a little weak and dizzy. I was just leaving by the famous Sword Lake, which was located at the center of Hanoi City. However, there were no Big C or Co OP super center here in Hanoi, for I had looked them up earlier in the hotel, but I came across with a supermarket called Intimex, where I could buy all the food and stuff I need. Lucky!

What's special about Hanoi was that there were 36 streets surrounding the Sword Lake, and each of the streets sell its own special items. For example, one of the sweets would only sell coats, like Gore-tex and North Face, while another will only have shops for souvenirs. It's all organized and made it very easy for tourists to shop and make bargains. I was starting to fall in love with this kind of arrangements.

I was thinking about what to get for my parents as souvenir when I encountered a small booth that sold soccer jerseys. Jerseys were popular and cheap here in Vietnam, and it was also the World Cup year. I bargained with the lady for a while before finally making a purchase of 3 jerseys, one Argentina for my mom, a Brazil one for my dad and one Germany for my girlfriend. I was feeling pretty cheerful after finally locating their souvenirs.

(My chest and stomach area had gotten worst from all the walking and skin-brushing with the cloth, blisters were starting to come off the skin...yuck)