One more quick check-in before we head out for the three day tour. Marjorie is (again) blogging at the same time so there might be repeat information.

We checked out the Temple of Literature today, which was mentioned, infamously, by Jane Fonda in her radio address to American troops as a place she visited here in the north. It was a beautiful, peaceful respite from the hectic pace of Hanoi. I'm used to "history" in America that dates back at most a few hundred years; this place was founded a thousand years ago. Hard to fathom.

Everything here is cheap, and the people are poor enough that you don't want to haggle. Still, I bought another warm sweater for our Sapa trip today; priced at 120000 dong, I offered 100000, and she accepted. That's about $6.50. We also bought groceries at the first grocery store we've seen (it was still tiny). We got a number of things -- two cans of Pringles, 9 bags of cashew nuts, some chocolates, toothpaste, a toothbrush, two bottled waters, some Chips Ahoy, and one or two other things. The total: 84000 dong, or a little more than $5. One could live here very cheap, if one could take it.

There is no McDonald's in Hanoi! First city of any size I've even been where that was the case. Plenty of Western products though.

Better Day We went to the Temple Of Literature today, which was very nice and got us away from the old quarter in Hanoi and into some nicer/cleaner areas of town.
As Mark said we'll be in Sapa for the next few days. Night train tonight, then trek for four hours tomorrow, spend tomorrow night in a "house stay", then trek two hours Sunday, then a free afternoon and spend the night in a hotel. Monday morning will be free then we'll take a night train back to Hanoi for one more day in Hanoi before flying off to Hue. Sapa's supposed to be fantastic so hopefully we'll enjoy ourselves. We're slowly starting to get over our initial culture shock, and therefore more likely to have a good time. We've discovered ways to take little breaks from the insanity and intensity of the streets so, unlike yesterday, I think we'll be able to manage three more weeks here. Yesterday I wasn't so sure.

Cripes, is internet access here slow. Good thing it's only something like $0.33 per hour. Don't think we'd even be able to upload pictures anyway at the bandwidth we get here.

Change of plans -- we're taking a tour of Sapa for the next two (maybe three) nights, starting with a night train out tonight. The tour is through HandSpan travel. We're going to sleep in a villagers house! At least, that's what they tell us. It will likely get changed around. We'll also be trekking for four hours the first day, two the second. Most mountain villagers don't have internet access, I think, so we won't be checking back in for a few days. Wish us luck!

For visitors to Hanoi, I offer the following words of advice:

Advice #1: When at a restaurant, ask to use the restroom (WC) first, because it will usually involve you going through the kitchen, which you can then scope out.
Advice #2: Ignore Advice #1, or you'll go hungry.

Actually, we found what seems to be a rather nice travel cafe, that seems to go all the others one better -- HandSpan travel. Clean, spacious, and friendly. And with full-sized seats -- nearly everywhere in town uses kindergarten-sized chairs, for some reason. Must have something to do with the fact that squatting seems to be the official Vietnamese stance (and I'm not just talking about the toilets). For some reason, you see people squatting around everywhere.

We've decreed today to be Casual Day. We're off to do some more casual things.

Things are brighter by the light of day Even with a hangover (due to a bottle of french bordeaux last night), things seem better today. We're getting better at ignoring the constant street attention (people constantly coming up to you trying to sell postcards, fruit, travel guides, anything) and have mastered crossing the road without flinching. We found a lovely place to eat brunch today (banana pancakes for me, french toast for Mark) and plan on booking a tour out of town today (maybe to one of the nearby national parks). We realized, after I put down the crackpipe, that we are not flying out on Monday, but are leaving Wednesday (the 18), so we have more time here than we realized.
For anyone interested the practice of serving up dogs as dinner is still ongoing in Hanoi and the surrounding area. Apparently they breed the dogs, keep them as pets for awhile, and then eat them. Look out Beau and Sadie! Dog meat is Thit cho or Thit cay. Also on the menu in many places are snakes, bat, muntjac, and frog. Unfortunately I don't know the Vietnamese words for these items. Comfortingly we've found a nice vegetarian restaurant in Hanoi.
Our hotel last night was rather nice and only $12. However the owner is a bit pushy and keeps trying to get us to book tours with him, but after our Halong bay experience, we'll be sticking to the tour bookers highly recommended by Lonely planet.

The reality fails to meet with the fantasy as things often do in real life. Ha Long bay was rather nice but Vietnam so far is largely disappointing (and frankly the dirtiest place I've ever seen). I imagined that by going here, Mark and I would automatically graduate into a "higher level" of traveler. That's partly true and largely not... we've experienced a third world country now, and somewhat uncomfortable travel, but I don't see myself going out of the way to be this uncomfortable again.
The discomfort is hard to pinpoint as well: You constantly feel as though someone is trying to shake you down, and often you are correct. You worry about your bags when you leave your room, and rightly so. You are constantly inundated with startling sights, sounds, and smells, it's sensory overload to the full extent possible (minus the sniper though Dad). This said it's not all bad either: It's amazingly easy to meet really interesting, very friendly people, often other travelers (we kinda stand out in the crowd), and you have an immediate bond with these people because it's so crazy all around you. Also, you attain maximum alertness most of the day simply because you need to be in order to cross the road without dying. You feel ALIVE, because you are so alert, but it's exhausting after awhile and honestly if we don't find some respite here, it will be a very draining experience.
We've heard from a couple of different people that Hoi An is really nice, so the plan at the moment is to fly to Hue on Monday, then slowly make our way down to Hoi An, stay there until the 27 or 28 and then fly to Ho Chi Minh city for the last few days of our trip. There's supposed to be a pretty nice beach in Hoi An, and it seems to be better (by reputation) then Nha Trang of Phan Tiet.
Keep the comments coming. We love hearing from you all

Ha Long... Ha Long must we sing this song... Back in Hanoi now after spending last night in the Ha Long Bay vicinity. We had signed up to sleep on a boat on the bay, but we were informed -- after we were on the bus on the way there -- that for some police reason or other, that would not be possible. Uh huh. This sort of thing is apparently par for the course with tour companies in Vietnam. They would have to put us up in a hotel instead.

The bay itself is just magnificent. We took lots of pictures, and even some short movies, but unfortunately, the internet cafes here have ancient computers without USB connections, so I won't be able to upload any until we get home. Disappointing.

They took us onto one of the islands in the bay that had a gigantic cave inside, with countless formations of dripped limestone. Very cool. And (for a small extra fee) some young boys from the local floating village (!!!) took us on their boat through a tunnel into a small basin where we were surrounded on all sides by 500 ft cliffs.

They put us up for the night in on Cat Ba Island, a seedy island town that's about how you'd expect a tourist resort run by communists to be. Our hotel room had the following nice features:

A sopping wet roll of toilet paper.

A used and very dirty comb.

Leftover food wrappers from the last tenants.

A door of lightly frosted glass, which I guess eliminates the need for Soviet-era spy cameras.

We had a number of drinks with some fellow travelers at the Flightless Bird a few doors down from our hotel, then passed out. Today we breakfasted (baguettes with cheese, a banana, and tea), boated back (even more magnificent in the sunlight after the trip out with overcast skies), lunched (some fish dish; some chicken dish; steamed bok choi, tomatoes and cucumbers [avoided], french fries, spring rolls, rice), then took the van back into Hanoi. Tomorrow we have a relaxing day, then will probably do the Perfume Pagoda on Saturday.

I cannot stress enough what a chaotic place Hanoi is. The dust, the dirt, the waves of people clogging the streets, the smells (good and bad), the sounds. The other day we hung out our hotel room and listened to see if we could hear a full second without a horn beeping. We gave up after a few minutes. We have adjusted, however, and can now cross the street like old pros.

Back in the same place this evening for another entry... We just walked around much of the day; just soaking it all in is tourism enough. We did go see water puppetry tonight, which was pretty cool. I thought the accompanying band was amazing. It's not every day you see Vietnamese water puppetry.

We continued a tradition tonight, by having Indian food. We've now had Indian food in six countries!

Disturbing sight of the day: I knew they cut people's hair out on the streets, but I was not prepared for... STREET DENTISTRY! I kid you not.

Tomorrow we take a tour to Ha Long Bay, where we'll be spending the night on a boat.

WE ARE NOT IN KANSAS ANYMORE. Holy jeez... In an internet cafe in Hanoi now. This place'll totally make your head spin. Marjorie's next to me blogging so some of this information may be repeated.

We got off to a bad start when checking in on the plane. I convinced Marjorie not to check her bag -- just to take it carry-on -- not realizing that she had a Swiss army knife and a pair of scissors. So they tried to confiscate them, until we convinced them to let us check the bag anyway.

We stopped over in Ho Chi Minh City on the way to Hanoi, where we went through customs and changed money. The airport is pretty chaotic. It's 15,300 dong to the dollar, so when I changed $100.00, I ended up with a huge fat wad of money. That might come in handy if we find ourselves somewhere without toilet paper...

The drive into town from the airport in a minivan took a year from my life. Well, it's not really that bad, once you realize there's a system to it, but the drivers here pretty much honk their horns constantly, and bikes and mopeds are ubiquitous and dart in and out constantly. Often you'll see them just going the wrong way, against traffic.

Our hotel room is Western and comfortable, except for the bed, which is hard enough to bruise you if you jump in too fast.

We walked around the block last night after we arrived, and realized that one block of culture shock was plenty enough for a first night. Just down the street a woman was selling some sort of birds stuffed in discarded beer cans, their little feet being the only thing sticking out. We bought a few beers from a vendor with black teeth, presumably from chewing betel nut.

This morning we passed a woman with one of those over-the-shoulder "scales of justice" sort of carriers, with a half-dead bloody duck on it. Vendors and minibike cab drivers accost us pretty much constantly. More to follow soon...

WE'RE IN VIETNAM!!!! It's crazy here. Every guidebook printed warns you about the roads, but you've just got to experience it yourself to believe it. Horns honking constantly, mad chaos all around. A walk across the street is a blind leap of faith everytime. The hotel's okay, except for an extremely hard bed, but nice hot water tap.
Hanoi is totally intimidating. We got in after dark last night and wanted to explore, but got about a block in each direction before wimping out, buying some tiger beer, and retreating to the room to watch MTV Asia (foo fighters in Hanoi).
Thanks so much for all your comments!!!
We miss you all. Sorry if I haven't replied to an e-mail (mom, jen...) you pay by the minute for internet access and we're going for the maximum audience. No time for spell check either, so I apologize.
We're at a travel cafe now, we'll probably book a tour for Halong bay. Maybe go to Ho Chi Minh's Mausoleum and water puppets today.
We'll write more when we can.

Leaving for Vietnam tomorrow. I think we're mostly ready. I'm a little apprehensive, about the corruption, scams, and squat toilets that we'll encounter, mostly. We'll deal just fine though.

Despite a tentative offer to stay where we're at in Singapore for a while, we've decided to start looking for a place of our own when we get back. We'll be making less money, and housing is expensive, so we're probably going to have to settle for less. Working to our advantage, though, is the fact that most Singaporeans don't seem to like older apartments, whereas we have no problem with that. We'll see. You can't swing a dead cat without hitting a high-rise apartment building around here, but we're not really interested in those. Something like 70 percent of the population lives in one though. That's crazy.

We're just running odd errands around the city. It's very easy to get around, once you get the lay of the land. It's rainy season, but that's a good thing here, because it's a good bit cooler. We miss the old posse. They had a party here the other day, and the next day, there was still beer left in the fridge. We thought, the posse'd never let that happen...