Initial impressions

So my journey ends in Hanoi about 4:15PM Monday. Even though I had a struggle with Cathay Pacific since my visa letter from Vietnam was dated the 15th, it was a piece of cake in Hanoi. I gave them my 25 USD and off I went. I took a cab to the hotel which surprisingly took over 30 minutes. As we approached what appeared to be the Hilton, the driver pointed to a few buildings a number of times as if stupid ferenge knows better than a cab driver. He asked for 30 USD but I was wise as Tuyet had told me it should be between 14 and 16 USD. I gave him 20 and got a receipt. I did check with the doorman who said it should be no more than 20.

The Hilton is nice ... I want to watch World Cup after I settled and was told ll the seats were reserved for the 8:30 game. I watched a bit of the game then ran into Bruce from Canberra who turned me on to this work. A new guy named Ron from DC showed up and we went to an Italian place for a bite. I had wolfed down a pizza at the sports bar named after my sister-in-lay JJ :).

The place was great and I had a Pelli; it was nicely air-conditioned and we gabbed for a bit after they ate. Back at the hotel I did some internet stuff then crashed about 11PM. I had deliberately slept as little as possible on the flight from Toronto, hoping that would ease the 11 hour time change. I did not sleep well and got in about 4 hours all night. I was up at 6:30 to take my second cold shower. The first was when I arrived and I complained to the front desk that I had no hot water in my shower and they promised to fix. I proceeded into the shower Tuesday AM and ...

I noticed on the wall the indicator for hot and cold showed H on the right and C on the left, whereas the handle on the unit was the standard way around. Lo and behold, I pushed the controller to the right and had hot water. Stupid ferenge :).

Tuesday was a full day. I went with Ron and Bruce to the World Bank building after a levely full breakfast, arriving there about 8AM. We met Quyen who I am working for at the Bank and were driven to the Treasury for meetings. The meeting room was air-conditioned nicely but really not enough to keep me "happy". I stayed awake for the whole morning participating in a dynamic discussion with MoF people. We went for a traditional lunch chosen by Quyen and spent the PM meeting at the World Bank building with IBM then IBM/Oracle. I was back at the hotel by 6:30.

I watched a bit of football, then went for dinner again with Bruce and Ron. We went back to the Hilton, I called my Sweet Thing, then headed to JJ's for more World Cup. CIV and POR were playing; I proudly figure out POR was Portugal but was stumped by CIV ... Cote d'Ivoire I was told. Stupid ferenge. I retired about midnight and slept better.

Initial feedback ...

- very very modern compared to Africa
- people are lovely
- weather is challenging in summer (yes Vietnam has 4 seasons) as it climbs to a very humid 40 degrees sometimes
- food is a treat as long as I avoid the snake heads and snails
- traffic is bad but not as bad as Ethiopia
- there are 2-3 scooters for every car and they litter every thoroughfare
- most people work 8-4:30 here and the air conditioning goes off in most buildings at 5PM
- it is impossible to tell how old the natives are as they do not seem to age like we do in North America
- do not refer to the country using the last 3 letters of its name
- do not call North America the "west" as the locals see themselves as western in many ways, and would rather be associated with being a "highly developed" country

Cam oen for reading my BLOG :)