HANOI

MA in HANOI:   At the Temple with recent graduates

A main thoroughfare.  This street is pretty clean.  Can't see the electric power lines very well here, but Marty, our electrical engineer, would have apoplexy if he saw them on many of the other streets.

Lots of cooking is done on the sidewalks.  Actually, this is really a side walk town.  People cook, shop, and eat on the sidewalks--and then leave the trash there.

Part of the motor bike/scooter herd

Hanoi gals love their heels, even on motor bikes.. 

A plaque in the Hanoi Hilton.  Sickening.  Check that third paragraph.

After Hong Kong we sailed to Halong Bay which is more or less close to Hanoi, like about three hours by bus.  We were supposed to take a helicopter ride over the bay and then on to Hanoi, but some weather forecaster thought the weather would not be propitious, so we had to go by bus.  An eight hour day.Turned out to be one of the most beautiful days we've had on the entire cruise.  Anyhow, we got to Hanoi finally, and found it to be probably the dirtiest city we've seen so far.  I mean, the other Asian cities have all been remarkably clean, but Hanoi, no way.  And the motor scooter traffic was truly frightening.  Crossing a street was something you just didn't want to do.  One of the sights we were taken to was the notorious Hanoi Hilton, where the American POWs were held, where John McCain was held for, what?, five years?  They had big blow up photos on the wall of Amrican anti-war protesters with captions making them out to be wonderful, enlightened people.  And one large sign, for want of a better word, was on the wall in both Vietmanese and English that said how well the prisoners were treated even though times were tough in North Viet Nam.  I wanted to throw up.