Freeman's Visit

I'm a bit behind on my blog posting, so get excited for multiple posts coming soon.

Let's begin with a couple of weekends ago with a visit from my family friends - Arlys, Becca & Josh. Since they only spent a couple of days in Hanoi, we were quite busy! So get ready for a lot of pictures... :D

One of our first stops was a visit to the Ho Chi Minh mausoleum and museum. Ho Chi Minh was a Vietnamese communist party leader. Apparently he desired to have his body cremated, but they decided to embalm his body instead. Tourists can see his body (or potentially a fake version for protection, but that's speculation...) and then tour his complex. One of the things we learned during our visit was that News of his death was withheld from the North Vietnamese public for nearly 48 hours because he had died on the anniversary of the founding of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. 

Mausoleum from the outside

We also got to visit "One Pillar Pagoda" - one of the iconic pagodas of Vietnam.  

We also got to visit many other temples and pagodas around Hanoi. The detail on the woodwork and metalwork was incredible. 

It was quite entertaining introducing the Freeman's to Vietnamese traffic. I've spent six weeks here so far, and now although I still think that the streets are absolutely crazy, I've come to expect it. Vietnamese people are pretty open minded about what is appropriate to carry on the back of their motorbikes. Here are a couple of examples...

Another stop was back to the political prison (see earlier post). That night, their tour guide took us to meet a couple who had been imprisoned in the prison. Despite being 85, this woman (on left below) had spunk and could barely wait for translation before tellings us story upon story of her time in the prison. For example, she told us how she met up husband in the prison due to their shared passions, songs they would sing for Ho Chi Minh/Vietnam, and the various torture devices used. It was incredible to hear her stories after we had walked through the walls of the prison just hours before.

We also enjoyed a water puppets show. The puppets are controlled through a combination of rods and strings to create a series of mini shows. 

And a visit to the Phở bò restaurant for dinner!

It was so great getting to see Becca, Josh and Arlys!