Now at the end of our journey we have plenty of time left and three days to say goodbye to Vietnam in Hanoi. Since we have already seen a lot of what Hanoi has to offer, we take the days very calmly and only go on smaller excursions. Yesterday, for example, while Andra was jogging, I spent most of the morning in the Harry Potter Café, where I tried more drinks from the books and slowly filled up my list of drinks I have already tried.
In the afternoon, we went to the "Museum of Fine Arts" and there we were able to experience several centuries of Vietnamese art, which was really interesting even for me, as I am not overly enthusiastic about art museums. Because there were really beautiful exhibits and the differences of sometimes only one century were very clear to see, we walked through the exhibition rooms with open eyes and enjoyed what we saw.
Beautiful old statues started it all......followed by statues of a completely different style, although there is only a century in between.Halong Bay as a lacquer paintingHo Chi Minh as a woodcutPost-war artEmbroidered paintingAfterwards we went to a small hidden café in a narrow backyard where we drank the typical Egg Coffee. For this, a foam made of egg yolk, sugar and condensed milk is added to normal coffee, giving the drink a taste similar to liquid tiramisu, so incredibly good. At this point, Vietnamese coffee must be mentioned and appreciated. Through a special preparation with a small "cup device" with a filter and the use of thick condensed milk (no comparison to the thin one in Germany), the coffee gets an incredible flavorful aroma and we will miss it in Thailand...Egg CoffeeAfter we finished our Egg Coffees, we went to Hanoi's night market where we bought some souvenirs and ended the day in a small bar with fantastic live music.The Night Market Today we went to the northern part of Hanoi. After a good one and a half hour walk and a closed pagoda on a lake, we arrived at a flower market that seemed to burst with colors and various shapes of the most beautiful flowers. Impressions from the flower marketAfter the market, the small pagoda on the lake had reopened and we took a quick look at it. It was very beautiful to look at with its white Buddhas in the red pagoda reaching into the sky, the bonsai trees, and the darker and more splendid interior of the small temple there. Tran Quoc PagodaThen we went back to the city center where we sat by the tracks of the usually abandoned train line for a late lunch - it was already 4 pm - and waited for the train there. It arrived on time and rushed past us closer than expected, so we were happy to have moved the table on which our coffees and my Pho were far enough away from the tracks. Food on the tracks and the approaching trainThe highlight of the day was a calligraphy course that we took together in a small and cozy studio by the tracks. In addition to calligraphy, the shop also offered courses on making a special paper, the exact recipe for which only three families in all of Vietnam seem to know, and the paper is made from the wood of a special tree and a specific glue. We first practiced different strokes and shapes, and then started putting words and letters on paper. After about two and a half hours, we were ready and had come up with a word and a script design. The challenge was then to put this onto the expensive and precious paper in one or two attempts and complete it with a red fingerprint. Studio and toolsI wonder what it says...The shape of the letters was predetermined, but you could decide how to put them on paper. For example, I had the idea to use the stroke of the "g" as the "l" of the second word - which I am already proud of. If you look at the picture above, it doesn't look that difficult, but it was a big challenge to get familiar with the brush and make the strokes and curves take the shape that we had in mind, and we really needed the two and a half hours. Now we are back in the best café in the world and are peacefully ending the day. Tomorrow is our last full day here in Vietnam, which may be sad, but I am already very excited about Thailand.
