The Water Puppet Theatre

When in Hanoi, save time for the Thang Long water puppet theatre.  It may sound somewhat strange, but it’s well worth the visit.

Water puppet theatre in Vietnam is traditionally derived from the Red River Delta in the north. It dates as far back as the 11th century when rice paddy farmers used water puppetry as a form of entertainment.

Lacquered puppets are maneuvered through water on long poles by puppeteers hidden behind a screen camouflaged as part of the set. The puppets are gracefully brought to life in a series of short folk tales depicting harvest, festivals, fishing and mythical spirits. Traditional Vietnamese folk music and songs accompany each skit, resulting in a fascinating cultural respite from the motorbike madness outdoors.

Check out the video! (I confess to not paying the extra photography charge. shhh.)

Vietnam Journeys – days 4 & 5

Day 4 – Hue

We survived the 12 hour overnight train journey from Hanoi to Hue having seen only 3 cockroaches in the end. My music and a couple text exchanges  with friends keeping my spirits up along the way and reminding me the real world was still out there. The experience reinforced my dislike for overnight trains and reminded me I would NEVER take a train in India (ironically another train crash in Pakistan the same night-12 dead.) My active imagination playing up as we trundled through the jungle in the dark of night. We were glad to finally reach Hue the next morning at 8 am and even more glad our hotel rooms were ready so we could have a shower! Though we all felt we were ‘rocking’ (like when you get off a boat) for the next 24 hours.

There seems to be no clear response to the question, ‘what is the best season to visit Vietnam?’ The reason being the country has two monsoon seasons, and well, what was hot in the north a couple days  is now wet in the middle of the country!

We saw Hue in the rain-remnants of Typhoon Mirinae but were lucky to not get caught in any major downpours. We started the day with a walk to the famous market across the Perfume River bridge. Covered in rain slickers, we meandered through fruit and vegetable stalls, watched a whole pig being cut up in chunks, analyzed the different kinds of mangos we saw and marveled at the amount of rice and spices for sale. On our way back across the bridge we saw a woman cutting up pieces of chicken on the filthy street as she prepared her midday meal. Mmmmmmm. Nevertheless, the market was a fascinating  place as it is in every country and well worth the visit.

Afternoon trip to visit one of the seven king’s tombs in the region. This was the fourth king, he was very short in height and despite 150 wives was unable to have any children having suffered from mumps as a child. His sorrows aside, his ‘resting place’ was absolutely beautiful among the fir trees, frangipani, moated brick walls full of water lilies. A refreshing change from the big city of Hanoi. A pagoda stop closed the day as we learned this particular
pagoda had 7 layers-each representing a decade of the queen mother’s life.

We ended the day with fabulous massages- a mix of Thai, aromatherapy and some serious hand pummeling. 1 hour each for 9.50 USD or 6.00 EUR! Heaven!

Day 5 – Hue and Hoi An

This morning started with a visit to the Hue citadel constructed in 1904. Home of Vietnam’s largest flagpole, constructed on three ’layers’: heaven, the people and earth. Entering the main gate we walked to the ‘Forbidden Purple City’. Once a huge, elaborate maze of buildings and gardens much resembling the Forbidden City in Beijing, a lot of it has been destroyed be typhoons and war, with the Viet Cong most recently using it as a basecamp for guerilla attacks on American
camps nearby. Only 30% of the Forbidden City has been restored so far with the rest in progress. It was great they let us wander across the tattered grounds and through scaffolding to imagine what it was once like and see all their work to restore it. We watched several Vietnamese painstakingly sanding columns and re-varnishing intricate wooden shutters. There is no question this will be a tourist gem with the beauty and draw of the Forbidden City in Beijing one day. We were
glad to see it now ‘before’. Maybe one day we will see the ‘after’!

A four hour bus ride later through beautiful mountains, and past flooded rice fields, we visit an impressive marble temple high on “Marble Mountain” near Danang. (I couldn’t resist a marble jade bangle-my negotiation skills in top form) apparently if ‘I am tired, I must rub the bangle against my forehead and I will be tired no more’. Hey, why not…

4 pm

Arrival in typhoon drenched Hoi-An. The typhoon since gone but a lot of flooding in its wake. So much so, getting to our hotel was a challenge as our ‘bus’ minivan could not go across the bridge to the ’island’ we were staying on. This meant we were picked up and taken across the bridge individually by male hotel staff on none other than the famous motorbikes we have been so in awe of in this country! Yes, we have pictures to prove it, and it was FUN for the 3 minute ride as
we honked and beeped down the road and across the bridge dodging pedestrians! For once, it was fun to be on the OTHER side! As for our baggage? It arrived by rickshaw! Only in Vietnam!

Our hotel is nice! We even have a pool if it would stop raining. We have spent the evening drinking ‘ba ‘ba ba’ or 333 local beer with our travel comrades, managing to manoeuver  across locations between torrential downpours. We also checked the internet to read about this typhoon since we received a lot of questions from concerned parents on the other side of the world. Indeed, 40 people killed in this province just yesterday and another 12 missing. The rice paddies are completely flooded and the rivers and lakes  our brimming over. But as they say in Jamaica, ‘no problem man’. We are well, we are on high ground and in addition to hearing the wind whistle through our windows, and the outside gutter overflowing, we are getting quite used to power outages on this trip between Bali and Vietnam.

Advice item #10 from the guidebook: ‘Bring a flashlight’. Hmmm, yes. Fact: On this trip? my little flashlight has been more useful on this trip than sunblock!

Vietnam Journeys – Days 2 & 3

8 AM departure from Hanoi to Halong Bay (and 3 hr mini bus ride)

Our overnight stay in a junkboat in Halong Bay was surprisingly delightful. I was looking forward to the Halong Bay part but had low expectations about sleeping on the boat and was pleasantly surprised to see we had a very nice stateroom with clean duvet and silk pillows and toilet that worked! There was a shower to boot!

We had three outstanding fresh seafood meals prepared by our Vietnamese chef. Explored a famous cave and went sea kayaking. The limestone islands jutting out of the water were reminiscent of those we had seen in Krabi, Thailand with the locals likening them to every animal under the sun- lots of big and small islands likened to chickens, turtles, monkeys.

Mass tourism creeps into Halong Bay, Vietnam

 

Established by UNESCO as a world heritage sight in 1994, Halong Bay is indeed a natural wonder but there is no  doubt commercial tourism is taking over. Go now. We even saw a jetski and the hotels are sprouting like mushrooms.

Following a 3 hour return bus ride to Hanoi, we had a couple hours to take in more of this bustling metropolis. We decided to head over to the notorious “Maison Centrale”, ‘Hanoi Hilton‘ or today as it is known, Hoa Lo Prison – the huge prison constructed by the French that would notoriously house Senator John McCain after he was captured by Vietnamese forces when his plane went down in the war. It was interesting to see some of the pics they had of him, including his flight suit, helmut and parachute. It is very unclear if he was tortured like he said he was, or well-treated as the Vietnamese portray the American prisoners as being able to celebrate Christmas, plant trees and raise chickens for decent food. It was an interesting visit though and I am quite certain the truth lies somewhere in between the lines. I’m glad we made the visit.

Where is a Marriott when u need it?! I am closing day 3 onboard an overnight train from Hanoi to Hue. Thank god I have my sarong for a ’sheet’. We are sharing a four person bunk room that looks like a prison cell with two of our really nice new travel mates, Spring from San Jose and Mack from the UK. We passed a couple hours playing rummy and go fish which helped. Having since accepted the toilet is a hole in the ground but so far clean, with paper! And getting rid of only one cockroach so far, I have found peace with my iPhone and Coldplay. Will I sleep? I doubt it. But the door is locked and I have my sarong and Chris Martin, and my husband as guardian. All will be well. There is still much to see in this friendly country.

Vietnam Journeys – Day 1

Arrival in Hanoi, Vietnam, 12.30 pm

All that inconvenience and the expensive! (60 Eur each!) visa paid off as a gruff customs officer stamped our passports with a bang and a fleeting smile. Having carefully followed ‘Lonely Planet’ guidebook advice to ensure we got the right taxi, our adventure really began with our introduction to the Vietnamese motorway. Complete with a mad craze of motorbikes carrying everything from cartons of eggs, live chickens, fresh produce, baguettes, bamboo, 20 kilo sacks of rice. You name it, they carry it, often with the whole family piled on. This is a country where motorbikes are king and the eco-friendly, peaceful image of a country full of people riding bicycles is but a dream of the past. We quickly deposited our (now) small, 15 kilo bags (having left the rest at the office in Singapore) at our modest but clean hotel and took to the streets of Hanoi.

With only an afternoon, we followed the Lonely Planet instructions and started at Hanoi’s famous Temple of the Rising Sun on the lake (exact name escapes me at the moment as I write, will look it up!) Alas, we did not see the mythical 250 kilo golden turtle but we saw one in lacquer. We then picked up some tickets for the 9.15 pm water puppet show and headed into the maze of the Old Quarter.

Formerly occupied by French Colonists, the Old Quarter today is a mindboggling array of shops selling everything from shoes, silk, refrigerators to Vietnam travel tours. Heeding my boss’ advice (having recently visited Vietnam herself), we took a deep breath and crossed the streets with confidence, silently praying the swarm of motorbikes, rickshaws and minivans would maneuver skillfully around us. Horn honking is aplenty and pedestrian crossings a rare occurrence and even then, the motorbike seems to have priority! I wonder who buys all of these things. Mobile phone covers by the hundreds, belts, hair clips, t-shirts in poorly written English, sunglasses…. People from outside the city squatting on a corner bbqing skewers of… chicken? Selling bowls of jelly, tofu and fresh poultry. Lots of tiny ‘keylime’ like limes. The amazing dichotomy of filthy streets, electricity poles overloaded with hundreds of wires, laundry hanging over the streets of what must have once been beautiful old French colonial buildings, now blackened by age, war and pollution. And then the bounty of fresh flowers. Roses, lilies, pretty tropical red ones I remember from the Virgin Islands. Elderly and young women carting a newspaper bundled bouquet home on top of their wares.

The famous folkloric Vietnamese Water Puppet show where the 3.00 USD ‘premium seats’ gave us a middle, second row view of this traditional puppetry artform on water. It was beautiful and well worth the time and tickets.

Day 2 on our way to Halong Bay on a 3 hour bus journey. Having seen many in the villages we pass washing their motorbikes, I can’t help but look forward to getting out in the fresh air. The glimpses of countryside I have seen so far promise the beauty many tell about their travels to Vietnam. A flock of white ducks walking hurriedly single, file along the road as if they are late for a very important date start my morning with a smile. They are living life, quite fully I’d say.