It's all true, Hanoi is great.

We arrived in Hanoi yesterday after a 15 hour train ride, which we thought was 10 hours...ugh. Big surprise, communication error...in Asia? Never...ha. So after probebly the worst and scariest train ride ever, oh man it smelled so bad, we arrived. Not excited about going to another city, craving quiet and nature. After a search for the right hotel, a shower, and a faux thanksgiving meal (french/vietnamese food) we started to enjoy Hanoi. We heard it was french colonial, charming. On first impression it's just another Asian city. Loud, dirty, congested. On our way to find food I looked down at this girl squatting in the street (as people are always doing). Only she had a really funny look on her face, she must have been about 10. Lauren was a few feet ahead of me and kept looking at her and suddenly realized that she was deficating in a small bowl! Right there in broad daylight in the middle of the sidewalk! I was so shocked and distracted that i almost ran right into a motorbike, which isn't hard to do in Vietnam! We were laughing for blocks...nothings should really shock us here, but it does. Manners don't really exist here, i bet there isn't even a word for manners in vietnamese. Everyone picks their nose all the time, right in front of you! Lauren was buying new tevas at a pretty nice shop in Saigon and the saleswoman was talking to lauren and picking her nose at the same time...i mean diggin! It's so strange, totally not tabu at all! I hope in writing my laughter is coming through, because the small cultural differences are so entertaining...why else would you take such a painful flight across the world??

Anyway,enough of the newounces. Hanoi has loads of cute little cafes and a fanstastic lake,but it really came alive at night. They have these little outdoor beer stands with organic beer for about 10 cents each. So everyone sits out on these little plastic chairs and table drinking beer and eating the delicous street food. The whole city is out and it seems like a big party. We met these 6 Cuban men at a Gyro stand that came here to work on the roads. Vietnam and cuba a very tight and help eachother out apparently. Makes sense, i mean, how many countries are actually communist anymore. The whole communism thing is another entry, too much energy. All i have to say is taht it hasn't been the prevelant except for this tour guide we had in Hue who was a total ass. He was preaching misinformed propaganda and started talking trash about americans. He was a terrible tour guide too. But we have been truthful about where we're from to everyone and everyone has been very nice otherwise. Noone else is holding a grudge or cares..actually they're all like "oh, bush was just here."

Speaking of this. I should clarify about something, the anti-american sentiment i described earlier in my entries. First off, we haven't experienced this since thailand, and in thailand it ONLY came from other westerners...never from the thais. We have realized that the tourists that go to southerns thailand are very different from the ones who explore beyond that. There are a lot of arrogant people down there that just want to party. It's a good thing i checked it all out so i don't have to take alex to those places. So anyway, in cambodia all the locals loved that were american...but of coarse immediatly said "american, lots of money." And here, no response that's unique, it's really not a problem...except for the dumb tour guide. But he doesn't count.

Oh, finally, i officially changed my ticket today. YEAH!!!! Finally, what a pain! Thank god american airlines has an office here or i would have gone crazy! So Lauren leaves Jan 9, Alex flies in on the 14th, and we both fly out on the 27th! I'm really excited to take him to the islands, it's gonna be fantastic. It felt like he should have beent there so much the first time, i can't believe i get to go back with him.

Whew, long blog. Props to anyone who actually reads this. Sorry i didn't go into much detail about the other places i went..maybe later with some photos. That's all for noW. Happy turkey day!