Catch-Up

You may have noticed a slight disconnect between these blog posts and pictures I've been posting on Facebook. That's because I am trying to catch up on our Vietnam adventures, but we're already in Sri Lanka. This post will attempt to bridge some of that gap. 

We left Vietnam on March 6th. This was earlier than anticipated but (for boring reasons) we weren't able to easily extend our visa. Our plan was to spend a few days in Ho Chi Mihn and further south with our Kingston friend Johanne Wagner and some of her family who we know through the boys' school, Madeleine de Roybon. Johanne has a long relationship with Vietnam both as an adoption coordinator, and as the adoptive mom of four children from Vietnam. Johanne's two youngest children, Bihn and Phuoc, have Alagille Syndrome and both underwent liver transplants a few years ago. Once the girls were healthy, Johanne started Twins For Hope, along with Chris Chung, who was the liver donor for Bihn. The charity supports children and their families in need in Vietnam and has worked with disabled children, helped build a school, brought support to Vietnamese people living with AIDS as well as supporting with several vocational centers for disabled adults. We had hoped to help Johanne out with her charity work for a few days, but unfortunately that wasn't to be. You can read more about her work at twinsforhope.org 

With a week to fill before our flight to Sri Lanka, we decided to take an inexpensive flight to Thailand. Both Rob and I have great memories of Thai beaches, as well as Bangkok. We spent five days on Ko Jum, a

lovely, and very uncrowded beach in the Krabi area. We walked on the beach in the morning, explored various restaurants for lunch, and bobbed in the ocean using coconuts as floaty toys. Our lodge was a step-up from our previous Thai trips where we stayed in thatch-roof huts on the beach and we also ate well. Although Ko Jum wasn't the most beautiful Thai beach Rob and I have ever stayed at, we really enjoyed the relaxed pace of the island. 

Bangkok is, of course, very different from any beach. It's big, loud and has amazing things to see. It was also VERY hot when we were there, over 37 Celsius.

We chose one place to to take the kids - the palace. I'm pretty sure when I went to see it back in 1997 with my friend Aileen, we were one of a few tourists,
and the hall which houses the emerald Buddha was a calm place open to meditation. Not so now! There were thousands of tourists, and many of them were comically (at least to me) wearing the cheap elephant pants you can by in SE Asia, (or rent at the temple) because you have to wear long pants or a skirt, and cover your shoulders. You'll see in the photos below, that our boys wore sarongs. 

The boys were fascinated by the palace and its ornate decorations and withstood the heat well. I won't try and describe it as it is really something, but just let the pictures speak for themselves. 

So now we are in Sri Lanka, and I'll have lots to stay about that in a latter post. For now I'll let you know that we are loving this country and having a great time. We are all in good health, and not a day goes by where I don't say something like, "Omigod, I'm doing yoga outdoors and there are birds calling," or "I just washed an elephant," or "HOLY SHIT- THOSE ARE COBRAS!" Also, not a day goes by where I don't turn to Rob and say, "I am so glad I'm not in a classroom." 

Having said that, our travels have not been without some minor mishaps, and I thought I'd share those for a balanced view of our trip. 

We have experienced: 
-many mosquito bites (Rob, and especially Dassa)
-one infected mosquito bite (Makaio)
-multiple spider bites (Dassa)
-one tick bite (Rob)
-one jelly fish sting (Leanne)
-one fall onto a bicycle (Leanne- I tripped on my bicycle while backing out of traffic and fell on my arm)
-one fall on the beach by being knocked off my feet by a dog who misjudged where he was going (Leanne)
and
-a whole lot of 'funny tummy' (Leanne, and Dassa, but mainly Dassa) 

You'll notice that most of the stuff happens to Dassa and me. Poor Dassa, as noted before, has inherited my very sensitive tummy, although he has finally figured out that certain things are a poor choice- ie anything fried. We've also noticed that Dassa has the same tendency as me to flush bright red when hot. I'm convinced this also makes you feel hotter, then you flush more, all in a vicious circle. 

Where is Makaio in all this? Having a fantastic time and eating his way through Asia. Just this week I thought he was going to break down in tears of joy when he had his first thali. I even suggested we might have to say "a shechichanu,"  a Hebrew prayer to mark this special occasion. He ignored this comment.

For those of you not familiar with Indian cuisine, a thali is a meal usually served at lunch on a metal tray that includes many small dishes. This particular thali had ten different curries, pickles, yogourt, dessert etc. He was adamant he was going to eat the whole thing. Below are the before and after pictures. 

Makaio is excited to continue eating his way through Asia and also to write about his first experience taking the train in Sri Lanka, which was in his words, "the craziest thing I've ever seen." 

More adventures to come!

Cat Tien - with guest blogger Dassa

Dassa as a female gibbon

Today we have guest blogger, Dassa, who is going to write about our trip to Cat Tien, an animal rescue center in Southern Vietnam. He is going to write in French, but a translation will follow. 


Bonjour, on est dans Cat Tien. Cat Tien est très interessant. Il y a beaucoup de chose a voir. La première journée on est allé à la lac des crocodiles. 


En premier on est allé sur un jeep, après on a fait une marche à la lac. La deuxiéme journée, nous avons fait une petite marche dans la foret, et après on est allé au centre sauvetage des animaux. On a vus des Loris et des Gibbons.     
 


 Des faits interessants sur les Loris:

-ils sont nocturnes

-ils ont un mord toxique

-il sont en danger de disparition parce que les personnes les chassent pour les vendre comme animaux de compagnie.

-ils sont petits (et très mignons)

-ils ont un deuxiéme langue pour brosser les dents

-ils laichent leur bébés pour les protéger.

On a aussi vu des gibbons. Ils étaient très interressant. On les a entendu crier tres fort. On les a vu a sauter arbre à arbre. Il sont aussi chasser et en danger de disparition.

Gibbons- this picture is from the internet

And now in English. We went to Cat Tien, a national

No, we didn't shrink Rob.

park. The first day we did a hike to a crocodile park and saw crocodiles, (and a giant tree). The second day we did a small hike and then went to an animal rescue center. We learned about kinds of endangered primates, loris and gibbons. 



Some facts about loris    are: 
-they are nocturnal,
-they are small and cute
-they are endangered because they are hunted for the pet industry 
-they have a toxic bite
-they eat tree gum
-they have a second tongue they use to clean their teeth,
-they lick their babies with a toxic substance to keep predators away while they are away hunting. 

We also saw gibbons, another kind of primate. We heard their cried and saw them swing from trees. They are also hunted and in danger of extinction. 

Thank you guest blogger, Dassa for sharing the bare bones of our Cat Tien experience. I have to add a few more details about the animal center, because it was my ABSOLUTE favorite place we went in all of Vietnam. The Dao Tien Endangered Species Animal Center (www.go-east.org) rescues endangered primates and helps them return to the wild, when possible. We actually didn't see the loris because they're nocturnal and sleeping, but while the guide was talking to us about them, the gibbons, who were in a nearby cage, starting whooping it up, making these incredible cries. Usually the gibbons only make these noises in the morning, around 5am, but they also get worked up when one of the males gets too close to someone's female. I can't tell you how loud and intense these noises were! You can see a video of this above, although this isn't one that I took, as we were not close enough to interact with the animals, as this was not a zoo-like environment. 

The boys were a little subdued during our visit. It might have been the heat, or it might have been their super-geek parents. Rob had a million "I'm-a-science-teacher" questions, and I was translating for a French couple who spoke no English. I've actually had lots of opportunities to practice my French while traveling as there are many French tourists in Vietnam. This translation experience was particularly interesting because the husband of the couple I was translating for kept interrupting to make the kind of sexist comments some old men still seem to think are funny ("Oh those females, always screaming about something!"), until I started giving him the stink eye and only explaining the animals to his wife.

Some of the gibbons were in a large cage as they weren't ready to be released, or can't be released due to poor health condition. Many of the rescued animals suffer from rickets because they were so poorly fed as pets. Yet, there were a few younger gibbons doing the most amazing acrobatic leaps and drops in a tree area that kept us all mesmerized. These animals will eventually be released.

I could have stayed all day at the center, despite the heat, and despite some of the sad facts facing primates in Vietnam: loss of habitat, an exploding population, as well as hunting for the pet industry. Despite all this (and the MANY bug bites Dassa experienced in the jungle), I was completely taken with the animals, their beautiful environment, and Marina, the amazing British scientist who started the foundation and took time off from her research to tour us around. 

The next morning when I woke up and sat by the river outside our bungalow, I heard the birds, but also from 2km away, I could hear the gibbons freaking out about something, or just making their morning cries.

Boating on Crocodile Lake, Cat Tien Park

Exploring the jungle

Waiting for the bus

Bus Selfie: when the only seats left on the bus are at the very back!

Spa Day

Nha Trang was one of those places we had to go to, as opposed to somewhere we had planned to visit - a necessary transportation hub on our way South. Although it was another big city, it was luckily on the beach. 

Nha Trang is a big, brash, ocean-resort kind of place. High-rise hotels line a long stretch of beach popular only with Russians. This seemed unusual to me, but a quick google search informed me that there was a Russian naval port there from 1972 to 2002, and that Nha Trang continues to be a popular vacation spot for Russians. There were signs in Russian at many of the bars and restaurants, and the ice cream vendor at the beach announced his arrival with a Russian military-sounding song. Almost every Russian had the same white beach cover-up with a hood, which makes me wonder if Canadians or Western tourists all appear the same in a way I don't realize, or if this beach uniform is a communist thing. 

I took the kids to the beach in the morning and let Rob sleep off our overnight bus ride (third and final one of the trip). The waves were not quite as fierce as in Hoi An, and the kids enjoyed bobbing around. While arguing with the beach attendant that I was not going to pay 20US$ for an hour of lounge chair time, I met Fong, an American/Canadian/Vietnamese who now lives in Pittsburgh. I got to hear about his work in IT, and how he escaped Vietnam in 1981 with his aunt and uncle. We also talked international travel and about Pittsburgh. It was nice to have a conversation about a city I've never been to that didn't involve anything about the recent shooting.

The kids and I made Rob get up to join us on our afternoon adventure: a trip to the spa. That's right, a spa. Since Nha Trang wasn't really our scene and we'd had a long journey to get there, I decided we needed to splurge. At this point I'd also walked by endless massage and nail places without stopping, and a spa sounded like it needed to be part of my Vietnamese experience.

We took a taxi out of town to a place called I-Resort, where we signed up for a mud bath. This was even more disgusting than it sounds. The four of us piled into a large tub filled with a warmish muddy slurry. Then we sat for half an hour. Actually, Rob and I sat, and the boys slithered. "I feel like a snake" Dassa said. Since the tub was slippery the kids were incapable of sitting still. It was an odd moment of family togetherness, (Stop touching me! Please sit still!) but probably one we won't repeat. Or as Rob said, while sitting up to his chin in mud, "I think this is a one-off."

We enjoyed the spa much more after the mud tub. We showered off in various hot and cold pressurized fountains, and then found a pool with a waterfall. I

had read online that the spa had many pools, but I hadn't realized how many. Each was beautifully landscaped and surrounded by gardens. Just when I got comfortable in a warm pool with a jet, the kids would discover a cute little stone water slide, or a beach with a wave pool. It was a lot of fun, but also exhausting.





 

Unlike most of Vietnam, the spa was also relatively uncrowded. There were a few other Russian tourists and a large group from China, including some young women who took a shine to Dassa. This has happened a few time during our travels. Dassa has been asked to pose with total strangers, always women, in a few places. And Dassa is always happy to comply. Luckily for everyone, no one ever asks Makaio to do this, as he despises this kind of attention.

 

Back in Nha Trang we found the city had erupted into a party-town. Buildings that had been shuttered during the day were open and filled with Russians (and Vietnamese too) drinking and eating. To continue our eating adventure we had Nem muong Ninh Hoa. This consisted of platters of grilled meat, lettuce leaves, fresh herbs, rice vermicelli and garlic that we rolled in rice paper and then dipped in a sweet-spicy fish sauce. This was both delicious and fun to eat. It was also slightly more up my alley than

breakfast which was a tad too adventurous for the early hour. We had Bahn Can, little rice pancakes cooked in individual clay pots. Since we were close to the sea, these had squid in them. Dassa refused to have anything to do with these. Unlike his brother who has the Smith-gut-of-steel, he has the sensitive tummy of most Liebermans and prefers to stick to food he can identify to play it safe. Dassa has been working his way through every bahn-mi stand we've seen as part of his dedication to eating carbs.

Lieber-Smiths -- the deeply unkosher version

Warning: If you are sensitive to descriptions of un-kosher food, you may want to avoid this post. If not, please enjoy. 

Makaio so enjoyed eating in Hoi An, that he is our guest blogger to describe what we ate there. 

Hoi An has a indoor market with about 20 to 50 stalls selling food and drinks. You could class the stalls into 2 categories, drink stands and food stands. All the food stands served similar dishes and the drink stands all sold smoothies and a drink called che. 

before prepared with sauced and fried shallots

At a food stand we ate a dish called Banh Bot Loc that was rice paper stuffed with pork and shrimp topped with a delicious sauce and dried onions that were to die for. We also ordered something called Bahn Beo. It was sort of like a pancake topped with crispy fried shallots and a sauce that contained shrimp. 

Before prepared with sauce and onions.

agar and fruit used to make drinks

 After, me and Dassa had mango smoothies, Rob had coffee, and Leanne had che, which was cubes of agar (which looked like jello cubes), coconut milk, condensed milk, and topped with crushed ice.

After we visited some museums, saw a traditional dance, and visited some old houses we went back to the market for lunch. After walking around the market we chose a spot to eat. I ordered rice noddles topped with fried onions a dipping sauce pickled vegetables and assorted herbs.



Makaio isn't interesting in writing anymore at this point, but I'd like to add that we also ate mango cakes, coconut cakes, these little agar coconut jello-like pods, as well as Cao Lau noodles, (so good) and

Mango and Coconut cakes

something called Com Hen, a combination of cold rice and tiny mussels which was served with roasted peanuts, sesame and roasted pigskin. I did not, despite the urging of our Kingston friends and foodies extreme, Meredith and Michael, try the Bun Bo Hue, a spicy noodle soup because it was served with coagulated pig blood cubes. Maybe in another lifetime.  

This is us ordering in the market.

I was a little worried when my fancy che drink arrives, but it was delicious. although very sweet!

Hoi An!

The title of this blog post had to have an exclamation mark, because if I had to recommend one place to visit in Vietnam, it would be Hoi An. This small city has something for everything: amazing sights, a beautiful beach, incredible food, and endless shopping. I have a lot to say about Hoi An, so the food will have to wait for a second post, hopefully with some guest bloggers. (I may have to bribe them with serious ice cream treats for this.) 

Lots of travelers think Hoi An is a pretty amazing place too, and I was initially concerned that we had brought ourselves to the Main Street Disneyland of Vietnam. Our first evening we walked to the old town through narrow alleyways only to find ourselves in possibly the most crowded tourist attraction I've ever visited. The streets close to the river were so choked with tourists that it was impossible to take pictures without other people in the background. We also set up a meeting place in case we got separated from each other or the kids. 

I can understand why Hoi An is so popular. Set on the Thu Bon River, it used to be one of the biggest trading ports in Vietnam. Lucky for the tourist industry, the river silted up in the 18th century, and now all that remains is the river and the amazing old buildings the traders built. It wasn't only Vietnamese who came here to trade. The Dutch, Japanese and various Chinese groups set up shop here. Many

of them built traditional houses with inner courtyards, thick wooden walls painted a deep ochre yellow on the outside, and tile roofs. These buildings reminded me a lot of some old Japanese structures fro the 19th century back in Kanazawa, where I used to live. Some of these buildings are still private homes, but many you can visit as small museums or shops. 





The different trading groups also set up associations and built communal halls. We visited the biggest of these, the Fujian People's Assembly Hall. It has the structure of many Chinese (or Vietnamese) temples:

an outer gate, a courtyard filled with pots of bonsai trees and other flowering pots, a outer building with an altar, another smaller courtyard, and then a final inner pavilion or building with a second altar. The building is more of a temple now than a meeting place, and I was most fascinated with the giant spirals of incense that hung from the ceiling and filled the air with slow burning spirals of incense. (Yet another thing to trigger Rob's incessant cough-poor guy.) Throughout the old buildings of Hoi An, I was fascinated by the many different floor tile patterns, and the various gates. I've been trying to draw many of them, with various degrees of success.

The secret to visiting in the old town of Hoi An is to get up really early in the morning before the crowds. I managed to pry the kids out of bed with the magic words "street food walking tour," and after plying them with mango smoothies and rice noodle treats, they were game to visit old buildings. The only building that was crowded, even at the earliest hour, was the Japanese covered bridge built in the early 17th century. It's a cool little structure, but perhaps not worth the crowds. 

Hoi An is also a great place to buy silk and to have clothes tailored. You can also get custom shoes, leather jackets, purses, bamboo dishes and a million other things. It's a good thing I didn't know about the leather possibilities, as I might have indulged. Instead I focused on getting one thing here: a bar mitzvah suit for Makaio. He will be called to the Torah in October where he will chant his Haftorah (a section from the prophets) and say a special blessing over the Torah. He has been studying hard while we travel and I give him extra points for being willing to learn with me. He's actually a better reader than me, but I know how to chant the trope, or cantillation, so we're a good team. 

Although Makaio is extremely disinterested in shopping or consuming material goods, he did a great job of sucking it up to be measured, and fit . He is now the owner of a long, very slim suit with extra wide hems for the growing he'll probably do in the next six months. It is now being shipped back very slowly to Kingston. We may very well arrive home before it does. 

Oh yeah, I got a dress made too. I'm not sure I enjoyed this experience. Somehow the picture I had in mind doesn't quite match up with the dress. This has less to do with the quality of the tailoring, and more to do with the fact that the model wearing the dress was at least 5"11 and no more than 19 years old.

In Hoi An, we also spent a glorious day at the beach. We rented bicycles from out hotel (slightly better quality than our previous rental, but still all too small) and biked about 4km out to a beach. For the price of a few beer we got to lounge in the shade. The kids did not lounge. I hadn't realized this, but they  hadn't ever been to a beach where they could jump in the waves. They absolutely loved it. The surf was rougher than I anticipated and they were pounded into the sand many times, which they loved. This was a little nerve-wracking to me, but we are soon heading to Thailand, where we will have more beach experiences, most likely with calmer waters. 

So are we having fun? Absolutely!  

 

Hue

Sometimes a place surprises you. None of us were particulary excited about visiting Hue in central Vietnam, but it was a necessary stop in order to get south. When Rob and I planned this trip, we anticipated staying in Vietnam for five weeks and slowly making our way south. A few roadblocks prevented this. We were unable to extend our visas, and distances in Vietnam were significantly farther than we anticipated. So it was with some trepidation that we found ourselves on an overnight sleeper bus from Hanoi to Hue. This bus also had terrible brakes that screeched all night. 

Hue, located in Central Vietnam is home to the Perfume River and the Imperial Citadel of the last Vietnamese dynasty. I imagined them both to be crowded and polluted. While the river wasn't terribly scenic, the Imperial Citadel was truly lovely. There were a million tour buses outside, but the complex was so large, it didn't matter.  

Built in the beginning of the 19th century when the Emperor Gia Long founded the Nguyen dynasty and moved the capital from Hanoi to Hue, the citadel has thick walls, long moats and orginially housed 148 temples, palaces, and an area called The Forbidden Purple City. Most of it was destroyed during the French and American wars, but we all enjoyed exploring the ruins, as well as the preserved parts. The complex has fairly poor signs and most of the tour groups didn't seem to make it past the first few buildings, so we were able to wander the gardens, ponds, moats in a haphazard way, as if we were discovering them. This, despite being a little rocked from our bus ride, made for an amazing morning. We stopped for photos at a series of beautifully painted red doors, checked out altars to the leaders of the Nguyen dynasty swathed in incense and surrounded by offerings of fruit, drinks and more gold items, posed with a golden dragon, fed koi fish in a pond, listened to birds singing from a small island covered by trees in the moat, and had drinks in a small courtyard overlooking another lotus pond.

Hoi had another amazing surprise for us: the food. I had heard that the food in Central Vietnam was good, but I had no idea how extraordinary it would be. Our hotel had recommended a restaurant, a large, un-fancy place (think garage) filled with both locals and foreigners. The main decoration in this restaurant was a series of glass cabinets filled with intricately made action figures made out of clay by the restaurant owner's ten-year-old son. 

Unlike the pho and bun of the north that we had been enjoying, here we were introduced to Hue cuisine, including the cutest food, Bahn Beo. This is a kind of very small rice pancake or crepe served with little shrimp on adorable saucers. You add some sweet/spicy sauce and scoop them up with little

We are now people who take food pics.

spoons. We also tried (and loved!) Bahn Khoai which is a savoury fried pancake stuffed with pork, shrimp, and green onions, and Bahn Cuon, which had pork and cilantro in rice paper and was served with a sweet and sour fish sauce. One of these dishes also came with a plate of lettuce and fresh herbs and a delicious peanut sauce. And of course, there was fish sauce too. Many foreigners aren't fond of fish sauce, but I happen to love it. I had a huge bottle of it at home that lasted me forever and was much giggled about since my friend Erin pointed out that it was labelled 'cock sauce.' 

It was at this point in the trip when I asked Makaio what he wanted to do that his answer was always the same. He replied, "I want to eat."
     

A Little Education, A Little Shopping

Our travels have mostly kept us too busy to do a lot of home schooling. Sometimes we pull out some math questions or make the kids write in their journals while waiting for lunch or in the evening in our hotel room. Our English writing lessons have not gone terribly well. Makaio insists on writing the least amount possible, and declaring himself finished. He also insists on starting each entry with 'Dear Diarrhea Dude,' but he hasn't mastered how to spell 'diarrhea' or 'dude' yet. Math lessons with Rob have gone better - the kids think math is a puzzle that must be figured out, and enjoy the challenge. The kids have surpassed their DPA (daily physical activity) goals. Most days we walk A LOT, unless we're biking or swimming. Both boys have been interested in drawing things we've seen, including some of the sacred animals of Vietnam: the water dragon which is said to bestow good luck and rain, a unicorn-like animal called ky lan, which is merciful and loyal and is often seen guarding temples and pagodas, the turtle, a symbol of strength and longevity, and the phoenix, a symbol of beauty and nobility. We've seen representations of these animals all over Vietnam in temple art, gates, ceramics and graphic design.  
 
While I am certain the kids are learning all kinds of things in our travels, sometimes our lessons are more explicit. While in Hanoi (last week? the week before?) we took a sweaty walk through thick traffic to the Temple of Literature. This sounds like a place I should make a pilgrimage to, right? 

The Temple of Literature was founded in 1070 by Emperor Ly Than Tong, and dedicated to Confucius. It honours Vietnam's scholars and literary accomplishments and was also the site of Vietnam's first university in 1076. I had this idea that this complex would house books, but instead there were stelae (stone tablets) on the back of giant turtles with the names and accomplishments of scholars. There was also a fancy tiered gateway, shady ponds, including one called the 'pond of heavenly clarity', formal gardens and a pavilion. While I imagined Vietnam would have more similarities with neighbouring countries Laos and Thailand, the Chinese influence is visible from the dedication to Confucius, to the style of the buildings and the red tile roofs. This makes sense as Vietnam was ruled by the Chinese from the 2nd to the 10th centuries, and then again in the 15th century.

Bonsai details outside one of the temple buildings

Rob and Makaio were happy to pose in the shade by one of the pools.

A giant bell to the side of the main pavillion

Before heading out to the temple we had a short lesson about Confucius. The kids learned that he was a philosopher in ancient China and that he emphasized personal and governmental morality. He followed many of the common Chinese beliefs in ancestor worship and respecting elders. He was also big on "do unto others as you would have them do unto you." After touring the temple complex we sat in the shade and read out some Confucian quotes, like, 'It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop," and "the man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones." These might seem a bit like empty platitudes now, but they were written over two thousand years ago and I could appreciate their universal and on-going appeal. My favourite Confucius quote is, "I hear and I forget, I see and I remember, I do and I understand." This seems to me the heart of Piaget's theory of education, that we learn through doing, rather than being told." (This is the only useful thing I learned in Teacher's College. I kid you not.) 

Shortly after we were done appreciating Confucius, and the kids were onto asking for mango smoothies or ice cream, a small tour group moved into our shade and an English-speaking Vietnamese tour guide started talking about his opinion of Confucius. This was a way more interesting lesson that I had put together. The guide explained that he thought Confucianism was responsible for creating a docile society that followed leaders too blindly, and that was the reason communism had come to power in Vietnam and China. He also added that the Vietnamese were a largely un-religious people, even before Communism. I hadn't thought of this before, but it made sense that we were at a temple to literature and not a deity. The guide also added, 'in school if I ask the teacher a question and the teacher doesn't know the answer,  the teacher will become angry with me and call me a troublemaker." Although this stands in contrast to the quote I liked above about learning through doing, I don't doubt this guide's experience of education. This resulted in a long discussion amongst our family on political systems and how they work. Makaio in particular is fascinated by twentieth century political movements, especially the difference between political ideals and political reality.  

While Vietnam is a one-party Communist state, it has one of the fastest-growing economies and a scarcity of material goods is not a problem here. This leads to the other activity we did in our second stop in Hanoi: shopping.  If this topic bores you as much as it pains Makaio, please skip this paragraph. Although I agree with Makaio that yes, most shoes are a 'want' not a 'need' I did explain to him that in my entire adult life I have only owned two pairs of heels and that both were hand-me-downs from my mother. The first pair I wore to my brother's bar mitzvah and my prom thirty years ago, and the second pair I wore when my friends got married twenty year ago. I tried hard to convince my mother to give me a pair of heels she had recently bought in Singapore, but she found the same store in Vietnam and told me it was time to buy my own heels. So, we made a pilgrimage to the Charles Keith store in Hoan Koan. Since I dragged my entire family of extremely disinterested co-shoppers, there wasn't a lot of time for checking out other stores, or hemming and hawing. However,  Dassa tried on a few pairs of heels too and helped me decide between two pairs. Unfortunately I do not have photos of this.

The problem with shopping, is once you start, it's hard to stop, especially when you discover a street called Silk Road. A few other purchases were made in Hanoi, and not only by me. 

The best place I saw textiles in Hanoi, was the Vietnamese Women's Museum. It has a great display of clothing worn by Vietnamese minority ethnic groups, as well as a display on marriage rites of ethnic groups. I loved both the clothing (indigo! batik!) and the video displays of guests bringing gifts to the bride or groom's family depending on whether the ethnic group was matrilineal or patrilineal. The museum also had tools used for agriculture in a display on women's work, and a section on babies. (The boys were fascinated by pictures of breast feeding moms- boobies!) 

Dassa checked out this women's basket carrier, but wasn't quite tall enough to left the baskets.

Although we skipped most of the floor on revolutionary women, in a small room of the main annex was a display I found particularly moving. Dang Ai Viet, an artist who traveled around Vietnam for 3 years starting in 2010, drew more than a thousand portraits of women who had lost their children, or husbands in the Vietnam War, or as they call it here, the American War. The display had a video showing the artist drawing one of the women, as well as the old motorcycle she used to travel the country. You can read more about her here. As I travel around I don't see much evidence of the war, although the guide book we have routinely warns us about straying off paths for fear of unexploded ordinances. This small display on heroic mothers was a window into a huge part of this country's history that we can't politely ask about.
 
On a cheerier note, there was a massive display of pigs in a room off the museum's courtyard. Yes, pigs. Everything from European piggy banks to Chinese pottery pigs. The museum put on this display in honour of the year of the pig. Apparently the entire collection, over a thousand pieces, belongs to a well-known Vietnamese historian, who also is in the government. Some of his collection is from a friend of his, a Spanish chef, which makes sense to me since Spain is the only other country I've visited that is as obsessed with eating pork. I'll have more to say on that in a future post about eating in central Vietnam. 

Dassa prefers dogs, but he was happy to pose (as always) with this ceramic pig.