Hanoi

I know this hole in the wall place where you can get the most fabulous
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The Kathryn Lipkis family is met in Hanoi with a bunch of flowers so intricately wrapped with twine, cellophane and tissue, that it takes ten minutes to prep it for a vase. We’ve hit Hanoi during the week of the Communist Party’s Five Year Meeting so we have the perfect excuse not to “do the sights” as many are closed to the public, including the viewing of the plasticized Uncle Ho. Instead, the city is a sea of red and yellow as each house displays the flag.

Ah! We’d better get money. We withdraw 150,000 dong from the ATM. Big spenders! That’s 10 bucks! The sumptuous lunch that followed at Quang An – the hole in the wall - cost half our cash!

“It’s bitter, very bitter. I don't know anyone who likes it.”

Spot the paranoid chickens in an avian flu world
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The rain pours from the sky. The cyclo drivers want to whisk us away under plastic, the umbrella saleswomen want us to buy one or, if not, maybe a raincoat? We demur. The rain feels good.

Our guide takes us to the market near her house to buy the ingredients for a dinner she and Andy will cook tonight at her home. “What’s that?” asks Andy. “Bitter melon,” replies Diep (pron. Seap.) “Are we having some tonight?” “Would you like to?” “What’s it taste like?” “It’s bitter, very bitter. I don't know anyone who likes it.” From pig intestine to pig heart (expensive because it’s small) to a million different greens, to tiny crabs being scooped live into gunny sacks, bay bugs, silkworms, baby eels wriggling with heads above water, snails, and round bins full to seething, flip-flop overflowing with every type of imaginable fish … and rain. I stand beneath an awning, avoiding the dripline and the dozens of bikes, scooters and mopeds that inch along the 5 ft. wide alley, smelling the smoke from the satay fires mingling with exhaust. This is not the Venice Farmers Market! An enormous half-a-fish lies on a slab, its gills working rapid-fire. Its back end is gone. It’s enough to turn a vegetarian vegan. A string sack of live frogs hangs from a hook. Next to the roasted chicken feet – barbecued dog meat. The women joke with and about us. “If you know a rich American looking for a wife, I’m available!”

"It's bitter, very bitter. I don't know anyone who likes it."
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Before dinner, Diep deposits us behind the steamy fragrant Central Acupuncture Hospital for a therapeutic massage. For $7, we’re ushered (separately) into a shower recess and our feet plunge into a bucket of hot ginger water. We operate a valve that shoots steam into the room through a coriander-covered vent. After 15 minutes, and a glass of sweet hot ginger tea, we’re subjected to a punishing hour of naked cracking, pressing, slapping and flipping and being stood on, followed by hot mugwort towels. It was brutal but the next day, we’re still tingling.

Shut up Andy and take notes.
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The breakfast buffet is a riot of thick, chocolatey-strong Viet coffee, exotic cut fruit, croissants, sweet and sour pork, sautéed bok choy with garlic, congee congee with all the trimmings, pho – likewise – chef-prepared waffles or omelettes and, of course, the ubiquitous cereal bar and bacon/sausage/tomato. Similarly mixed, it’s fun to watch the guests assemble their own ethnic food fusion.

We strike off around Hoan Kiem Lake, cameras at the fore, happy our kids aren’t here to be mortified by how we look. But hey, they should be grateful. A grown woman is walking her elderly mother when, out of the blue, the pair leave the path and mum is assisted in hoisting her skirt, dropping her pants and squatting against a tree FACING THE ONCOMING TRAFFIC. That was a moment for the journal, not the camera. A quick negotiation and, for 50 cents, a couple of excited, smiling, flirtatious young motorcycle taxi-drivers are zipping us with smooth accomplishment through a sea of Honda Dreams to a vegetarian oasis where we recover from sensory overload.