Scenes from our last day in Hanoi.
The bartender at the Odeon offered a favorite view of the city.
The days have fall into a simple pattern
here.
We sleep, enjoy a long breakfast, a
conversation about the dreams, the day before and a plan for what’s to come, hit
the streets, walk as long as we can until we stop at the Odeon Brasserie to watch the scooters.
Walking through the Quán Thánh Temple a few days ago a painting caught Caroline’s
eyes.
We chat about it
a bit every night.
A painting of Hanoi
in the rain.
Let’s try to
haggle a bit about the price, we thought.
Yesterday, I woke
early and make my way to Quán Thánh Temple to inquire about this painting by Nguyen Minh Thanh hanging in the
bottom left corner of the small gallery adjacent to the temple.
The owner was not there when I arrived.
Her young daughter was there.
She said her mom would be right back,
calling her to confirm.
I walked about the Temple,
A women praying.
A man lighting a fire,
Burning currency for his elders.
The light made
its way through the age old 11th
century Taoist temple,
I look around.
It’s a wonderful
place.
I walk in a circle.
Feeling the place.
The peace.
The owner
arrived.
We haggled a bit.
And I bought the
painting.
Success,
I text Caroline.
Leaving the hotel
Say goodbye to
our German friend on the way.
No strikes today.
Flights are
leaving Hanoi.
And walk to Lunch.
The Hanoi Social
Club, “provides things for your tummy and live musical vibrations for your ears. Good
food, good space, good music, good people.”
The Social Club
is gorgeous.
Full of travelers.
A quirky vibe
fills the colorful eatery.
HS clubs are
graduates of the KOTO school of hospitality training for disadvantaged youth.
We sit dreaming of living away
from the crazy USA.
“Can we take a little break and
not rush off?” says the little one.
“Thanks for bringing me,” says Caroline.
There is so much to explore, learning
about the way the world has changed.
We’ve had a thousand conversations
here.
How has Hanoi changed,
we’ve asked everyone we know here.
Many answer by looking back a
thousand to the Chinese years,
when it became capital.
Then to Uncle Ho in 1949.
’54 the French liberation.
And then the American War.
When Nixon had an extra secret
plan to get us out of Vietnam,
By bombing Cambodia.
Disrupting and laying the ground work
for the Rhmer Rouge.
Kissinger belongs in jail.
1979 Vietnam invasion.
Stops the bleeding.
And then and only then in 1986
peace.
After generations peace in
Vietnam.
We walk to the museum of history.
A banyan tree outside must be twelve feet wide.
Three hundred years old.
The city builds around its trees.
Remembering its roots.
The dragons stretch and wind
through history.
Twisting and turning like the illuminations
in the Book of Kells in Dublin.
Ageless images of history outside Christianity.
Buddhas and Shivas.
Archeology of ages.
Between narratives of thousands of
ethnicities,
Intermingling before nation states
or borders.
Stories of dynasties.
Struggles between happiness and unhappiness.
And how we can be ok and at peace
with what life is.
The little one is becoming
slaphappy.
School kids laugh during their tour.
Dragons look like grumpy old
men.
Elders watch, avoiding the heat.
And we make our way through the
ages.
Back through the streets, past the
lake, through the old quarter.
Back to the ODÉON Brasserie,
Our favorite Wine Bar,
Looking at the train street,
Leading
to Ho Chi Minh City.
16
hours.
The
cycles and cars and people intersecting.
People
with their kids on scooters.
Wearing
masks to protect from the air pollution.
Waiting
for the train.
Drinking a beer.
A
woman selling her snacks.
If
this was New York people would kill themselves.
But
instead they yield.
Everyone
yields to each other.
Energy
blurs.
Andrew X Pham describes the dynamic in Ho Chi Minh City in Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the
Landscape and Memory of Vietnam:
“Nobody gives way to anybody. Everyone just
angles, points, dives directly toward his destination, pretending it is an
all-or-nothing gamble. People glare at one another and fight for maneuvering
space. All parties are equally determined to get the right-of-way--insist on
it. They swerve away at the last possible moment, giving scant inches to spare.
The victor goes forwards, no time for a victory grin, already engaging in another
contest of will. Saigon traffic is Vietnamese life, a continuous charade of
posturing, bluffing, fast moves, tenacity and surrenders.”
Snapping
photos.
We thank the bartender.
And
bid adieu.
A
hot pot and bed.
Peaceful
people who live with a nightmare of memory next door.
Thinking about Cambodia and genocide, war and peace.
And
the next step on our journey.
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