Vietnam

We are home and getting back into the swing of things. Well, we are awake at 3am because of the time difference but that’s basically the same thing.

For the last couple of weeks, we have been lucky enough to explore Vietnam, from Ho Chi Minh to Hanoi. After a pretty full-on year, it was wonderful to do something that felt like such a break from the norm. We met some lovely people, had incredible food and the sights we got to see, god, I wish you could have been there.

Starling out in HCM/Saigon, we had a wonderful dinner as soon as we landed. I had Vietnamese steak and eggs (bò né) which were out of this world. The name literally means “dodging steak” because it’s served on a hot skillet and spits at you.

The next morning, we went for a bike tour of the city. We then had lunch at an experimental organic restaurant that trains kids in the service industry, teaching them to cook and serve food. Everything we had was exceptional.

We also got to tour the Cu Chi Tunnels, used by the Viet Cong to defend their land against Americans. As someone who is very interested in 20th century history, and previously studied The American War (as it’s quite rightly known there), it was a deep stare into how difficult that life must have been and the casualties from the period. Their use of tunnels and traps was fascinating.

Next up was Hoi An where we had our first banh mi – one of Vietnam’s most famous foods, a baguette (thanks colonial French rule) filled with beef, pate and fresh greens, that blew us away.
We had a tour of the old town including visiting a traditional house and several temples before finding ourselves getting measured up in a tailors. I’ve never had anything tailor-made before so the opportunity was much appreciated.

For lunch, we visited Oodles of Noodles, a project that takes kids from disadvantaged backgrounds and teaches them to cook. They taught us how to make different types of rice noodles and we had an incredible lunch with the students there.

We then went on another bike tour of a nearby organic farm where we were able to have a go at watering the crops with the traditional setup. The herbs were fresh and smelt incredible. It’s easy to see how Vietnamese cuisine is amongst the best in the world.

Later, we got taken out on coconut boats across the river. In recent years, these have become mandatory for any backpacker looking for an Instagram post. It was fun but very heavily driven towards tourists, which I recognise that we are. It had the integrity of It’s A Small World.

The next morning, we visited a yoga studio and coffee shop (because this is very much a busman’s holiday) and then visited the Banh Mi Queen for lunch before a bus ride via the cold water lagoon where pearls are collected and on to Hue.

For dinner, we turned to Anthony Bourdain for advice. In 2017, he visited Hue as one of his cities in his series, Parts Unknown. In particular, a woman working in Dang Ba market who makes bún bò Huế – a dish consisting of rice noodles with slow-cooked beef shank, crab meat dumplings, pig’s feet, and blood cake. It was absolutely out of this world. We made friends with the locals who were dining on low chairs in front of this incredible woman who has been making the dish since she was twelve-years-old.

The next morning, we got up early and went for a run. What struck us (during early morning outings and bus rides in and out of cities) is that a lot of people were up between 5am and 7am, exercising and enjoying their local open spaces. It’s normal for people to go for a run, use the free gym equipment in the park or join a tai chi class. In the west, we could never. Maybe we don’t deserve nice things. It wasn’t a massive distance but we had a good run along by the water.

After breakfast, we biked out to the citadel and then visited a pagoda for a vegan lunch, which again, was incredible. I’m going to run out of adjectives for the food we had. After going shopping for supplies, we then got the overnight train to Hanoi, sleeping in bunk beds and making ourselves bowls of ramen and being gently rocked to sleep with Robert De Niro and Al Pacino (in Heat) on in the background.

The train got into Hanoi at 5am and we then got a bus into the mountains for a home stay in Mai Chau, a village of 350 souls, plenty of dogs and infinite rice paddies. We went for a hike that ended in a wonderful downpour, prompting us to sing Natasha Beddingfield on a loop. That night, the grandmother of the house cooked a wonderful dinner for us. We had the most stressful Thai massages of our lives and fell asleep happy and fulfilled, with the triple threat white noise of a fan, rain and crickets to contend with.

Took a bike ride out to the next town and had a lesson in using a traditional loom, used to make blankets and clothes. We also learnt some traditional dances, and laughed a lot. The hills and mountains were impossibly green which made cycling as far as we did a feast for the eyes. It was like living in a desktop background.

After a bus back to the city, we had a food tour with a local guide which included bun cha, a sweet pork broth with rice noodles, banh mi, coconut ice cream and an egg coffee. Some may be sceptical about egg coffee but until you try it, you don’t understand how close to a tiramisu it is possible to get a coffee. We finished the night on Train Street, a garishly-lit influencer nightmare of a place, where beer is at least three times the cost of anywhere else and you’ll be put in the back row if you don’t pout hard enough. Saying that, it was another must-do and when that train came by, you know I was pouting and flying the peace sign like my contemporaries.

After a drive to Halong Bay, we spent a night on a converted junkboat, sailing out amongst the nearly 2,000 islands. We took a kayak out to explore further.
After an incredible dinner came the karaoke. With the sound bouncing off the water, I hope my versions of Sweet Home Alabama and Country House made it far and wide. Slept like a baby.

The next morning, we went swimming in the sea then back to Hanoi for our last night. Stopping in a bar, we asked the barman for his recommendation on places to eat. He sent us to Phố Tống Duy Tân where there were a number of street food places. We sat amongst locals and tried different dishes – a black chicken with medicinal herbs, crispy crab spring rolls, pork dumplings and then a post-match banh mi for the walk back to our hotel.

The more we saw, the more we wanted to see. It felt very whistle-stop but inspiring at the same time. The people of Vietnam were so warm and welcoming. Given how “developed” we consider our part of the world to be, it’s interesting that the majority of life at home can seem so overwhelmingly fraught and drab when those we would perceive as not having a lot seem much happier. It was a lesson in gratefulness and the limits that abundance gives. While I appreciate we were there as tourists, it was a refresh of what is important. What a gift that is.