good bye hanoi

I'm leaving in 13 hours for the airport to get out of Hanoi and head to HCMC, where I'll be for a few days before shuttling to Can Tho and starting my teaching English stint. I am crazy sad to be leaving this city, which is sort of a hole anyway, but awesome. I feel very strongly toward Hanoi, toward its traffic and streets and lakes and food and people and buses and xe oms (motorbike taxis) and haggling and markets and libraries and restaurants and my friends, my very good friends I've made during the past almost-month.

I spent the last weekend in the provinces. Well, first on Saturday morning I gave a kickass speech to the American Center English Club at the American Embassy, then we motorbiked out to Bac Ninh, the smallest province in Vietnam just a bit out of Hanoi. Hieu is the slowest, most careful driver I've ever met. It's pretty damn terrifying actually. Passing on the right is the worst idea ever. Anyway, Bac Ninh, or more specifically the village of Que Vo (Huong and Hieu's hometown) is awesome! I learned to plant rice, plow a field with a water buffalo, harvest shrimp, pick rau muong (don't know what its English name is), and drive a motorbike. Oh plus we went to another village, Phu Lang, and I learned how to make do gom, or their traditional pottery. We painted ceramics, put stuff in a kiln, designed pots, and hung out. Oh and I got some tailored Vietnamese shirts for free. Villagers kick ass.

Tourist traps don't. Halong bay is beautiful, but I would've preferred going in an American tour group just so I could know exactly how much I was going to pay beforehand. Oh but we did go paragliding, which was awesome!

I don't fit the clothes here but I needed shorts to learn to motorbike so I now have a fantastic pair of boy shorts. Pockets are freaking amazing!

In sum, I am crazy sad to be leaving my friends from the American Center, IVCE, Duke, Princeton, the hotel, family, and the randoms e.g. library. I had an absolute blast here and my Vietnamese has improved like no other. I'm excited for the future, but sad to be leaving the past behind. Off go more sheets from my page a day calendar of life.