Aug 25- Off to Vietnam

We left for Vietnam today, and were on our way after a little misunderstanding at the airport. Little meaning our reservation was never confirmed! We had to buy completely new tickets at the airport because our online booking never went through. Nihal shouldn't be trusted to do anything.

After a short 2 hr flight we reached Hanoi, and were greeted by our tour guide Cuong. My dad kept referring to him as ET because he talked exactly like him and repeated everything we said. Really nice guy though. And I thought Hong Kong was hot, Vietnam is HOT. I was in a constant state of a hot, humid, sticky mess. August is NOT the right time to travel Asia.

We stayed at the Quoc Hoa hotel right in the middle of the bustling city. Just a little background of Vietnam. Vietnam has roughly 86 million people, and 80 million of those people own scooters. Hanoi is Vietnam's capital and largest city. So basically scooters run Hanoi. And there are no traffic lights or rules. So you basically have to cross the street like the game Frogger, one step at a time. Because there are literally THOUSANDS of scooters coming right at you, with no intention of slowing down. Ever.

I really like Hanoi because you'll find something different on every street. One street is silk street, where only silk items are sold in these outdoor bazaar style shops. Another street is handicraft street. I think my favorite is toy street, with every toy imaginable for sale. We had dinner at this amazing outdoor buffet style restaurant, and it only came out to $20 total for 3 people. It seems ridiculously cheap, but the average person in Vietnam only makes $8/day. The food was extremely fresh, and I think it was the best crab I've ever tasted. After dinner Cuong told us we had to see international corner. So we walked to this corner, which is four way cross-section, and apparently where all the internationals hang out. There were literally hundreds of internationals and expats just sitting on the corners of this cross-section drinking beer. And no one even looked happy. It seemed like they were all dragged there by their tour guides and were told that's where they had to hang out. It was the strangest thing I've ever seen.

Aug 24th- Reaching Hong Kong

After sleeping during most of our Cathay Pacific flight to Hong Kong (and eating some scrumptious fish) me and Nihal reached Hong Kong at 5am. The second we stepped outside we were hit by humidity so thick we were instantly sweating. And this was only 5am! We took a cab back to Kowloon Hotel where my parents already were, and took another 5 hour nap. When we woke up we were starving and went out searching for dim sum.

Today was the last day of Paryushan, a Jain holiday where we ask for forgiveness and give forgiveness in order to make terms with everything and everyone around us and have no bad feelings contained within us or for us. In observance of the last day we decided not to eat any meat, which is near impossible in Hong Kong. Almost everything is either cooked with meat or in meat sauce. But we managed to find something, which was still delicious. I could honestly just eat miso soup forever and be a very happy person.

After lunch I went to see the apartment that me and Mirella were hoping to rent, which turned out to be perfect. It's in Causeway Bay, which is like the Soho of NYC. The apartment itself is also similar to a NY apartment since it's tiny, but it's cute and literally right in the middle of everything. No mice which is great, but it's located right above a fish market. We're going to need a lot of incense.

After the apartment was settled we took a tram to the Peak, which is the highest point in Hong Kong. The view was simply amazing. And the nightlife is exactly like NY, but on speed. Aside from the cheesy pop music playing in every club, I think I'm going to like this town. They're not strict about illegally downloading music in Hong Kong, are they?