hanoi….live!

It is a great feat, negotiating the streets here, crossing and criss-crossing, avoiding every ,obstacle in your way,every few feet. All while concentrating on the pavement, cobblestones, which seem to be heaving out from the soil beneath, dancing to the din from the streets. and to add to that, one must constantly wag your head back and forth to say no,good naturedly of course, to the hundreds of smiling requests,”Ride, Madam?” or “You buy,Madam?” or the saddest,”Please,Madam..” a shriveled hand held out.
Eli went to the USEmbassy this am to somply get a stamp on his background check that is the third one we have had to send from the US. It is all a part of the protocol of getting a work visa for Korea and it is the University’s fault that the last one was sent in too late.
Eli is used to these delays and bureaucratic logjams, and just makes plans with backup plans and backup plans for the backup plans.
While he was gone to the embassy, I wandered around the area, counting how many times I turned right or left, still managing to end up not where I started but found me way back to the hotel anyway. Every street, w have discovered, has a “theme” of the same kinds of shops. There is the Hardware Street,(our favorite), the western clothes street, the cloth street, the oriental kitcsh street, the basket street, the porcelain street, the watch street….etc. If we get fired up tomorrow after taking care of the embassy and visa stuff, and booking our tickets for Halong Bay, we will try to do some picture taking of each of these and Eli can help me finally post them.
We also decided that this city is exhausting, but fascinating. There is a lovely lake nearby, park like surround and Islands in the center. The French influence is woven into many of the older buildings…and the daily habits such as coffee and baguettes every morning.
I have looked up HoChiMinh to better understand the waves of conflict that have swept across this lovely country. what i thought was so simple is much more complex, crossing decades of time, political agendas with the people the greatest losers as usual.
HoChiMinh lived a very complex life, traveling extensively, living in France and Englnd, the US and Russia. To read that he appealed to our government for help in making Vietnam an independent country, twice, I believe, then to find out he was ignored for the attempt, informs me again that what is political is not what is necessarily good government and hence not really for the people’s benefit….even under the most ideal sentiments.
Perhaps like the perpetual motion machine, a sustainable,healthy government that works in the people’s best interests, is not possible.
I hope I am wrong.

Day after tomorrow, we go to Halong Bay. I love the salt water for swimming. It helps me feel light, though if where I swim is too close to the open ocean and there are swells, I am discovering I always get sick!
Just before we left Nha Trang, I went out with Eli’s crew again, snorkeled in the surf, got sick, tried again in a more protected area and loved it. Fish schools swam around me in clusters of sparkle and flash. Others went about their day, eating from the tops of the coral, or snortling their way on the sea bottom throwing up clouds of sand. every conceivable color and size and shape was represented.
On the first Island we stopped at, madonna Rocks, there is a tiny shack where men stay, protecting the swallows nests from thieves with rifles, as the nests fetch a pretty penny,(or dong, as the currency is called). these shacks sit precariously perched on the side of cliffs above seething seas and the men go about their lives fishing,( illegal as this is a national park!), and travelling back and forth between islands by a pefectly round basket boat or corricle. It is big enough to hold two, is covered n the outside with some sort of resin, and the oarsman is literally just that…using just one paddle to make it go. And they move quickly and expertly, by just swishing the paddle back and forth from the front. An amazing sight.
So, here are these men, entrusted with the protection of swallows nests, in a national park, fishing…..but I doubt they would have much to eat otherwise.
hope you all are well.