"In a room all full of Chinese Lamps..."-- "Frank Sinatra", Cake

We had two farewell dinners… the first the official, and the second the day after w/ those of those who were left. Both days were in rooms filled with Chinese Lamps… a rather appropriate atmosphere for ending our time together. The last day involved driving back from Haylong Bay. A few of us went to see the water puppets… which while kinda corny, is a lot of fun too… as long as you don’t have little children standing in your way. Water puppets are a form of entertainment developed in the countryside to entertain people during the wet season. A screen is built, and puppets are at the ends of bamboo sticks that are moved under the water from behind the screens… making it look a lot like the puppets are walking on the water. And of course there is singing and music and things as well… stuff gets lit on fire, and water gets sprayed and splashed places. It was good family fun. Then there was dinner in Kyoto restaurant… which is a place where they take street kids and train them to be chefs. Pricey, but good… there’s a lot of places like that throughout asia… and I like supporting them as much as possible… cooking is a great skill… people always need to eat. I remember having pumpkin and cashew ravioli… it was incredible… that’s why I mention it… its so completely random… but it really was good. And above us were a bunch of big white Chinese lamps… probably about 2-3 feet around.

Then it was time to say our goodbyes… At first I made an attempt to get pics for my wall… above you have me w/ Rachel, Helena, and Thinh… I then just gave up, and realized the wall will just have to do w/out my traveling people.

The next day Me, Rachel, and Helena did a little bit of touristy stuff. Here we are on the Bridge of the Rising Sun overlooking Hoan Kiem Lake—this lake is pretty famous. Legend has it this king asked the gods for help to defeat the enemy and they gave him a sword… which worked… so after winning the battle, he returned to the lake and a giant tortoise came up and took the magic sword back… Reminds me quite a bit of king Arthur and Excalibur.

We then had lunch at the cyclo Café… which is a French café full of old fashioned cycloes… which you see us here posing in.

Its around this point that we had to get back b/c Rachel had to fly out, and we were storing all of our stuff in Helena’s room b/c she was staying at the same hotel for another night or so. After Rachel left, we went to go find my hotel… Oh adventure… we get to the hotel… and the guy is like… we thought you were a man? Now this is something that’s happened quite a bit since I’ve been here… they just can’t understand that Robin is both a girl and boy name. I don’t even know how many times I’ve gotten the “Why you have boys name?” question… and don’t even get me started on what happens to hotel arrangements when they think you’re a boy… so you get paired up to room w/ a boy… *this always gets fixed once they see I’m clearly not a boy… So it took a few minutes of them comprehending that no, I wasn’t meeting my husband/father there, that there was only me, and they had gotten it wrong. Next thing they tell me is that I don’t have a room… which nearly makes me loose my temper b/c I’d booked it a while ago. The reason they didn’t have my room…. b/c in the storm the room was flooded and everything was wet and water damaged…. So, they decide to put me in their sister hotel around the corner. Decent room, somewhere near the top… creepy sketchy staff that liked to walk up behind me and creepily whisper “hello… robin” in my ear. Yeah, craziness…

The next day I had to myself, so a bit tired out from touring, I grabbed my book, and I just sat and read by the lake. I did take a couple of pictures though…

This here is some Communist propaganda telling people to vote… b/c it was Ho Chi Minh’s birthday on the 19th, followed up by elections on the 20th… everything was super propagandized. Tons of posters, flags, and stages set up where there was live “music” and “entertainment”.

This here is the view from where I was sitting and reading… its of Ngoc Son Pagoda.

And the best thing ever… Doner Kebab stands… while not quite the same as the ones in Austria… still highly amusing to see here… but you couldn’t pay me to eat it… its food poisoning waiting to happen here.

So I had some time to kill, so I went and got a massage… my first one in Asia… Picked what seemed to be a pretty legit spot, in the most popular area of town. Worst massage experience. First… they didn’t use any oil… which can be fine… but not w/what she was doing… it was just painful… and left bruises up and down my arms in rows where she dug her knuckles in. but even before that they had me sit in a sauna for a while… which was ok… until the large asian men came in and joined me… *I’m only in a towel… not cool. And then no one told me when to come out… so about half an hour or so later I rolled out of there for the evil massage… but it doesn’t end there. First… the key to my locker broke… which kinda sucked… so after the got it open, the girl just stayed, so I figured she was waiting for a tip… so I grabbed my wallet and went to giver her a couple of dollars… she goes… “no, more”… I’m like… no, I already paid. And she’s like, “I don’t get any of that”… but then she stood between me and my clothes… one hand on them… which is quite possible the most non violent threatening gesture I’ve ever run across. So I ended up paying her some ridiculous tip… but made it out w/ my clothes.

I then met up w/ my group for drinks at a bar above where the massage place was *yes… it seriously was in the biggest most visited area in all of Hanoi. Drinks were followed up by our last dinner… all together again… minus Rachel and Thinh… we ended up back at the cyclo café… in a back garden patio area… once again, all filled with little mini colorful Chinese lamps.