Saturday, January 5, 2008 (evening)We wearily disembarked the Halong Bay bus back at the Kangaroo Cafe but were pleased when Jill and Steve began to coordinate a dinner with our fellow travelers. We thought it would be a great way to end our stay in Hanoi so we exchanged numbers and planned to meet at a restaurant owned by an acquaintance of theirs named Festa that fortunately happened to be near our hotel. This meant we had time to nap and do some souvenir shopping before rendezvousing with our friends. Charles had been eyeing a propaganda poster shop since we had arrived in Hanoi so we decided to pay a post-nap/pre-dinner visit.
Prior to getting to the Propaganda Poster shop we entered another souvenir shop. Most of these shops have families that live in the back or on the second floor. While looking at backpacks Charles suddenly felt someone grabbing him. It was a Vietnamese man, who, instead of saying, "excuse me" or grunting or -- god forbid -- trying to walk around, simply grabbed Charles' arm. Startled, he moved back. The guy -- probably the owner, gave no eye contact then
did the same thing to Laura. "Pardon me -- COMRADE!" Charles said in a loud voice. The guy stopped for a split second as if contemplating his next move, then kept walking to the back where a table was set up for his dinner. Complete jackass. We mention this not to be obnoxious but to point out that a lot of the writings in the guidebooks and on the travel websites give out information that is completely contrary to what we and many of the travelers' we met on our journey encountered. Here is something we found completely off base:"By and large, the reaction an American receives is more along the lines of, “Hello, American! We beat your ass, now, didn’t we? Welcome back, all is forgiven. Have some rice wine, it’s on me.”
Yeah, right! While we found the Vietnamese in Hanoi better behaved than the ones in Saigon we still found most of them incredibly aloof and unfriendly. In the wretched Moon Handbooks Guide to Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia (4th ed.) the author goes on about how to mix with locals in the old quarter at the "fresh beer stands" on many corners:"Parking yourself over a bia hoi will serve a number of useful purposes: Mainly, you get to mix with the locals, and you get ringside seats for watching what goes on along the street."Not to say that this does not happen, but, personally, at no time did we see any tourists "mix with the locals" at these beer stands -- the locals were just not that friendly.
Much more friendly were our compatriots who we met up with at Festa. The tall, narrow 4-story (more?) restaurant reminded us of something out of San Francisco's Mission district. Very bright and clean. We were among the only people there and the hostess seemed to know exactly who we were as she ushered us up to the top floor where everyone was gathered. Over tasty Italian food and plenty of wine (we made up for not having any on the boat!) we shared our stories and future adventures. Since Steve had just written a book on Macau he and Jill gave us some tips on where to go. The Amsterdam couple, Brigitte and Arnold told us some entertaining stories about their city, explaining that "90% of the hash bar patrons" are from France and England -- it seems the locals rarely partake! As we had also been deprived of sweets on our previous night in Halong Bay, Charles and Laura suggested we partake our dessert-fix at the excellent Cafe des Arts nearby. This idea was championed by all and we trouped over. Once we reached the street Steve mentioned how this area had been a drug addict hangout just a few years previous. Ah, the wonders of western-style capitalism and gentrification...
Happily, we had the same friendly waitress as from our first night in this city. She remembered us and took several photos of our party. The French owner showed up and greeted us as though we were long-lost friends. We cannot recommend this restaurant highly enough -- in a weird way it reminded us of the "French Plantation" scene in "Apocalypse Now Redux."
Anyway, the desserts were first rate and we went our separate ways, our sugar-fix finally sated.
Now we had to pack for the next morning's trip back to Bangkok...
No comments:
Post a Comment