Hanoi (Vietnam)

Finally, we said our goodbyes to Hanoi. Forces seemed to be conspiring to keep us in the city, including lost luggage and our inability to book the trains or tours we wanted. All told we were there about 7 days and 4 nights. Our last night we ate on the street, at a place that was doing brisk business with probably seventy customers at any one time crouching at line after line of little plastic tables. Thanks to the kindness of the young Vietnamese couple sitting opposite us, we managed to get a copy of the English menu and our order actually delivered. I ordered what looked like one of the most popular dishes, roast pigeon (tasted like chicken, but greasy and not much meat on the bones). Rich went for the frog legs in a sweet and sour sauce (tasted like fishy chicken, but sticky and again, a lot of bones for the meat).

We had such a pleasant experience that Rich wanted to push our luck more so we stopped at the corner bia hoi (local fresh beer) place. There seems to be one on almost every corner in Hanoi. It tasted like Miller Light. Then we got charged the stupid foreigner price, which we thought was high but did not realize until later, it was 10x more. The guy even had the audacity to ask for an additional big tip, which we did not give. Rich is still fuming about it on principle. I would like to think that, of all the possible ways one can get ripped off in Asia, I am ok with a loss of what amounts to 2.50 USD, or the price of the odd PBR in the States.