The white view outside the window offers no visual clue to
where I am as I rub the sleep from my eyes. The screeching of tires on tarmac
alerts me to the fact that I am on the ground. Beneath the layer of white, I
can make out the emerald green of rice fields. I gather my things, stepping
into the isle and pushed along with the sea of Thai
women who are part of a tour group. They push me down the isle, down the
stairs, passed the military personnel who met our plane on the runway, and on
to the shuttle bus and into a seat. I settle in, listening to the women chatter
excitedly, picking up various words in their conversations.
At immigration, I get
separated from the Thai tour group and for the first time in awhile feel truly
alone. I pass through immigration and security with relative ease, and find
myself in the arrivals hall surrounded by a mob of touts with signs. I my name and
as I make my way through the crowd, I pass a group of backpacker girls looking
tired, scared, stressed and confused. As my driver picks up my backpack and
heads to the car, I am grateful that while I have no real travel plans in Vietnam, at least
I have made hotel reservations for the next two nights. I hate stressful
arrivals.
We pull out of the airport, and while the highway is
surrounded by giant billboards in English, Vietnamese, and Chinese, they are
the only development visible. The rice fields stretch as far as I can see,
dotted with the faint specks of woven hats. Along the road, people on bicycles
try to cross the busy road. Giant baskets filled with greens are strapped to
bicycles carefully hugging the small shoulder. Motorbikes with pigs, chickens
and geese in cages, baskets, bags of flip flops, ice blocks, stacks of rice
bags, drums of cooking oil, and buckets filled with smoking coals fill the gaps
in traffic.
As we get closer to Hanoi,
the variety of items strapped to motorbikes gets more interested. 10 foot long
metal poles, plywood sheets the size of queen sized mattresses. I cringe,
convinced that the traffic has no rhyme or reason. It is only compounded by the
fact that I am no longer use to riding in a car and I am now used to being on
the left side of the road.
The car turns off the main road and the cement buildings of
recent urban sprawl start to become fewer. We are in the old quarter of the
city marked by crumbling colonial buildings and giant gnarled trees lining the
streets. I am struck by how green this area of the city is. The car pulls over
and the receptionist from my hotel meets me, picks up one side of my backpack
and directs me down a lane.
The morning market is in full swing. Baskets filled with
green vegetables, red fish, chicken, blocks of tofu, unrecognizable meat parts,
French bread, and tiny plastic stools line the street. Exhaustion is not enough
to keep me from exploring the city, after receiving some suggestions from the
front desk and grabbing a business card, I find myself out on the street.
I instantly fall in love with the blocks named for the items
once sold on them, the meandering streets, the crazy traffic, the noise, and
the vibrancy. I love that I don’t understand anything said around me, I find it
relaxing that I am not straining to understand bits and pieces of conversation,
and instead let the wave of ignorance flood over me.
Hanoi.
