with impressions...
right after the anticipated mass at the st. joseph's cathedral in hanoi, we saw a massive crowd surrounding the image of the virgin praying the holy rosary. their display of faith is quite inspiring.
the
non la is usually donned by women who are peasants, fisherfolk, peddlers and street builders. tourists and fashionistas are donning them, too. (note how neatly dressed these peddlers are).
the tube houses are a mix of modern and old euro-asian architecture. they are still narrow but bigger houses are starting to sprout -- two to three tube houses joined.
roadside dining is via plastic stool chairs. and the
pho ga is great and cheap. my son and i tried it.
i asked her how old she was. she said, "25."
and i said, " i swear you look 24." that ended the conversation.
she is a waitress at the elegant
moon river restaurant, hanoi. and she is gorgeous even without make-up. but she may not be considered beautiful by vietnamese standards.
i heard that vietnamese women are beautiful. and the vietnamese women are beautiful indeed and scandalously slim. above are dancers in
ao dai.
and the wife had a bout of gastroenteritis on board our boat at halong bay. she vomited until late in the evening during what was supposed to be a romantic overnight cruise. we suspect it was the yoghurt she had that afternoon. she kept it in her bag from hanoi.
i used up all 6 rolls of color film i had with me. developing in hanoi costs Php20 a roll of 36 shots! i just had to wash them again to remove the smell of the fixer. above are some of the rolls being dried in our hotel room.
crossing the streets is not for the faint-hearted. vehicular accidents are vietnam's no. 1 killer. the rule on the use of helmets got implemented the month after we left.
(photos taken with the epson rd1s using the cosina voigtlander 15/4.5, summicron 35/2, and summilux 50/1.4).
A small group of peasants were marching along the sidewalk bearing banners and posters of protest. 
two young vietnamese (the one in stripes crossing the street and the girl behind him) were driven out of their ranks by uniformed soldiers . they looked like students. there was a woman in her 50s ranting against the soldiers who did this. but the two kids just crossed the street away from the march. we were headed for halong bay on a coaster and i asked our tour guide what it was about. i could not tell if he didn't want to or could not explain. he just shrugged his shoulders. people on motorbikes stopped and looked and created slowdown in traffic. but the soldiers allowed the protesters to proceed with their march.
hardly seen, policemen and soldiers do appear within seconds of an incident. one occasion was a vehicular accident my son and i witnessed. a woman in her 70s was hit by a speeding motorbike in front of the ding xuan market. her head hit the pavement and a pool of blood appeared around the head. i did not intervene and decided to stay on the sidewalk with my son to observe. within minutes, a police car came. the woman was able to stand up eventually. the biker who hit her seemed to know what to do. he used his cellphone to call up authorities. after a while, visibly shaken, the victim walked to a waiting police car and was brought out of the scene.
there was a persistent light gray haze in the air, even in the suburbs. i suspect this comes from the coal plants, the ubiquitous motorbikes or a heating economy. above is a cemetery with a horse-driven carriage passing and the haze in the background.
