Day 1 of North Vietnam Trip, Hanoi on January 8, 2018

We started our tour of Vietnam in Hanoi, the capital city that's hugely characterized by historic Vietnam, but also greatly influenced by communism through its independence and civil war.

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Walking the streets of Hanoi, my biggest impression was, how similar this city was to the ones in China. The traffic-light-less streets of its Old Quarter were reminiscently chaotic, the sound of horns evocatively irritating, and its pavements commonly annexed by storefronts along. From time to time, I came across temples and shrines with engraved couplets praising their ancestral endeavor, and I wouldn't be surprised should some old lady tearfully approached me as the only person she'd met in days that spoke her native tongue. That's why, I never expected this day in Hanoi to offer much other than an opportunity to book tours of Ha Long Bay the next day. But it turned out to have quite something to offer for a culture guy like me.

So after breakfast, we made our way to St Joseph's Cathedral, which due to its daily mass time wasn't open to the general public in late afternoon, so we decided to make it our first stop of the day.

St Joseph's Cathedral

A Neo-Gothic style church built by the French in 1886 that serves as the cathedral of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Hanoi to nearly 4 million Catholics in the country. The cathedral conducts and broadcasts mass several times during the day.

 

It's said that the Cathedral was made to resemble Notre-Dame de Paris, well, it looked much less imposing. And since its windows were mostly on the ground floor surrounded by walls, it felt somewhat dusky inside. Nonetheless, it did add some Western freshness to a city overwhelmed in Chinese culture.

After that, we booked a tour of Ha Long Bay for the next two days in a travel agency nearby (it has been quite some time that I forgot the details...), and headed for Hoan Kiem Lake as our next stop. Along the way in the Old Quarter we passed temples and shrines together with artist shops.

Ly Trieu Quoc Su Pagoda

Ornate restored 12th-century shrine dedicated to a Buddhist monk revered for his healing practices. See www.vietnamonline.com/attraction/ly-quoc-su-pagoda.html for reference.

After some online search, I found that Ly Quoc Su was actually a very significant monk, and the name meant "the Breat Monk and Merit teacher of the whole nation". The street in front of this Pagoda and St Joseph's Cathedral was named after him. However, nowadays the pagoda in memory of him was sitting unnoticeably among residential buildings and enjoying few visitors.

After that, we continued heading for Hoan Kiem Lake.

Hoan Kiem Lake

According to the legend, in early 1428, Emperor Lê Lợi was boating on the lake when a Golden Turtle God (Kim Qui) surfaced and asked for his magic sword, Heaven's Will. Lợi concluded that Kim Qui had come to reclaim the sword that its master, a local God, the Dragon King (Long Vương) had given Lợi some time earlier, during his revolt against Ming China. Later, Emperor Lợi gave the sword back to the turtle after he finished fighting off the Chinese. Emperor Lợi renamed the lake to commemorate this event. Tháp Rùa (Turtle Tower) in the center of the lake was erected in memory of this event.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ho%C3%A0n_Ki%E1%BA%BFm_Lake

Our first (and arguably only) stop by Hoan Kiem Lake was Temple of the Jade Mountain, besides buying ticket for this evening's water puppet show.

Temple of the Jade Mountain

Being built on the Jade Islet and dedicated to Confucian and Taoist philosophers and the national hero, Trần Hưng Đạo, the small temple was expanded in 1865.

Temple of the Jade Mountain was rather miniature if one considered price of its ticket. But a lot of local Vietnamese were visiting and congregating around it, showing just how important this Temple was in their culture.

After that, we continued our ramble along Hoan Kiem Lake.

It was starting to rain so we figured it's time to leave Hoan Kiem Lake and head for Ba Dinh Square. Our first (and probably only) stop in Ba Dinh Square was Diên Hựu tự(One Pillar Pagoda).

Diên Hựu tự(One Pillar Pagoda)

Diên Hựu tự (延祐寺) was the formal name of Chùa Một Cột (One Pillar Pagoda). According to the court records, Emperor Lý Thái Tông was childless and dreamt that he met the bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara, who handed him a baby son while seated on a lotus flower. Lý Thái Tông then married a peasant girl that he had met and she bore him a son. The emperor constructed the temple in gratitude for this in 1049, having been told by a monk named Thiền Tuệ to build the temple, by erecting a pillar in the middle of a lotus pond, similar to the one he saw in the dream. The current pagoda was reconstructed in 20th Century.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Pillar_Pagoda

The name "One Pillar Pagoda" was very deceiving. The pagoda itself may only rest on one pillar, but it couldn't survive without those stairs leading to it, which, technically was on another foundation.

Just next to the tiny One Pillar Pagoda on the water was its true self, Diên Hựu tự, which wasn't lavishly gorgeous but did afford space for monks to practice their doctrine.

Ho Chi Minh Museum was just next to Diên Hựu tự(One Pillar Pagoda), but on Mondays it's closed, and we'd had enough political propaganda, so we skipped it and continued our ramble around Ba Dinh Square before heading back to our hotel in the Old Quarter.

Just next to Ba Dinh Square there were an array of (seemingly unoccupied) villas painted in what I would call "Vietnam-Communism yellow", guess those were once reserved for high ranking officials of the Vietnam state.

From there on, the street leading back to the Old Quarter was lined with embassies from different nations, I believed many of which were converted from colonial period villas.

If I look at the bright side, the Old Quarter got its other name "Thirty-Six Guild Streets" because each street in the Old Quarter used to be occupied by merchants of a particular walk. I definitely felt that as we headed back to our hotel passing lighting shops, electronics shops, bakeries and tailors. It's just like traversing through all walks of life of Vietnam and it's always exciting.

Before arriving at our hotel, we find a roadside restaurant and, expectedly, ordered arguably the most famous Vietnamese food, pho.

My conclusion: An important feature of pho (and later I learned for every Vietnamese dish) was the magical ingredient cilantro that's contributing 99% of the taste.

After that, we got back to our room and took some rest for the afternoon, before heading out in the evening for a water puppet show.

Thăng Long Water Puppet Theater

Water Puppetry originated around 11th Century during floodings of rice fields in the Red River Delta, roughly where Hanoi is nowadays, that farmers would entertain each other using puppetry in the fields. These days, different from conventional puppetry where puppeteers hide behind a screen, in Water Puppetry the puppeteers submerged themselves in water while using a bamboo pipe to breath and manipulate the puppets.

Conveniently located just next to Hoan Kiem Lake, Thăng Long Water Puppet Theater was probably the only channel for foreigners to experience this form of Vietnamese art. I believe the 14 shows on display were heavily excerpted for an international audience, but nonetheless impressive for first-timers like me.

After that, we headed back for hotel and called it for a day.
END