Today was our last day in Vietnam. 🙁 We really have had such an amazing time here. The people, the food, the scenery, everything has just been awesome…though I could’ve done without the food poisoning. 🙂
We ended up with nothing specific to do today because my food poisoning messed up our tour schedules and what not. But we got to explore beautiful Hanoi some more so it was all good.
After a lovely breakfast, we hopped into a cab and went to the Temple of Literature and National University. The entire complex was surrounded by these amazing brick walls.
We decided to go there because we had heard that the grounds were beautiful. And they delivered.
One of my favorite parts (Clara’s too) was the lotus flower ponds that were all over the place. We had seen a bunch of them out the bus windows as we were driving to HaLong bay. And we had wanted to get a closer look. So, it was cool that we got the chance.
Lotus plants are actually quite large, much larger than I would’ve guessed. The leaves are enormous. We took the picture above in an attempt to give you a sense of the scale.
Clara had to be talked into smiling for this picture. Our poor kids were so incredibly sick of having their pictures taken, and I’m not talking about the pictures that I took. We’d be standing there, looking at something, minding our own business. And then, somebody would come up, grab Clara, and place her in the middle of a group photo. And then they would try and grab Juju. He ran off, every time. He refused to be in the pictures at all, and Clara started refusing to smile.
It makes me wonder what they do with the pictures they take of our kids? Frame them? Show their friends? Post them on social media? (#mewithcutegrumpywhitekid) Frame them? Jonathan and Logan got in on the action too. I waited around for quite a while as Jonathan and Logan were sitting on a bench taking pictures with people. A group of people would just gather around them and get their picture taken. And they’d leave, and then the next group would jump in. It was quite comical. So, I took pictures while I waited. Look, a pretty tree.
Ok. But then I took a picture….or two…rather creepily. But look how cute!?!?!
Ok. Another one… Look how beautiful their outfits are!! The slitted dress with loose pants underneath. They are called áo dài. I just learned that. This is what my Vietnamese friend Minh wore for (part of) her wedding reception.
Ok..last creeper shot. We think that this may have been a cute little preschool graduation. With the…uh…the valedictorian? Really?
It was stinking hot today. It was hot and it was humid. So, basically, it was like Manila. We bought some little hand-crank fans for the kids so they wouldn’t overheat. A minion for Juju, Hello Kitty for Clara.
And they loved those things. They were obsessed. They will be a recurring part of the pictures from here on out. See exhibit A, below.
At least they looked at the camera in the second one. 
We never quite figured out what the purpose of this place was… but it sure was pretty. And all the buildings were really cool.
After a bit, we took a break in a nice secluded, shady area. So we wouldn’t get heat exhaustion. And Logan took a little nap. It was very relaxing and peaceful.
And for 30 whole minutes, no one took our pictures. Honestly, that was the most relaxing part: we didn’t feel like we were on display.
By this point, it was mid-afternoon. And we had pretty much exhausted what we could see here, and we were hungry. We checked TripAdvisor and found a place nearby that we wanted to try, it was called Emm’s. It was geared toward the Western palate with lots of sandwiches and salads.. We’d been eating so much heavy food, that sounded really good to us.
According to some (insane) map, we were only about half a mile away from the restaurant. So we started walking. Jonathan carried Juju. I had Logan strapped to my chest and pushed Clara in the stroller.
We walked for over an hour! And we didn’t get lost, not even once…. I’m thinking it was definitely more than half a mile. Fortunately, the scenery was interesting. We got to see the downtown area, which was much less tourist-heavy.
When we finally got there, we were sweaty, thirsty and tired. Fortunately, since it was between lunch and dinner, there were no problems getting us seated right away. And the a/c was blowing right on us.
The food was delicious. Those kids POUNDED their spaghetti bolognese. All three of them. They devoured it. They were large plates and Clara ate every last bite, and the boys ate most of their plates. Initially when they brought out the food, I had thought to myself that they could’ve shared 1 plate. But, they were hungry enough to get 1 plate apiece. Jonathan and I had lovely paninis. And a blueberry smoothie.
Everything was delicious, and man, it hit the spot. We got to chatting with the guy that runs the place. He is a Frenchman. And his wife is Vietnamese, and he has lived in Vietnam for quite some. And he was just really fun to talk to. We chatted with him for probably half an hour.
Our kids were super tired. So, we made our way back to our hotel. Our driver hardly spoke a word of English, but he pointed out a bunch of different things that were significant and that we should take pictures of. Here are just a couple. Note, the picture on the right is not a mural. It is a MOSAIC. And it is LONG. 2.5 miles long. Guinness Book of World Records long.
So after our little impromptu city tour, we decided that it might be a good idea for all of us to go take naps since we had another late night flight. So, that’s what we did. But first, the kids played with their fans.
We had dinner at the restaurant on the top floor of our hotel. It is another one of the top rated restaurants in Hanoi. And the food was indeed awesome. Cashew chicken for the win.
Shortly after dinner, our shuttle arrived and we headed to the airport. Can I just say, the staff at this hotel was fantastic. They were just amazing. We loved them. They bought our kids little parting gifts. Can you believe that!?! Also, they had a koi pond under the stairs in the lobby area. The kids loved that.
Off we went to the airport. Everything went to plan until we got up to the ticket counter. To make a long story short, they weren’t going to let the kids and I back into the Philippines without proof that we had tickets out of Manila because we are in the Philippines on tourist visas. So, we had to buy tickets out of Manila. We were assured us that we could return as soon as we were in the Philippines. So, Jonathan ran over and tried to do that with Vietnam airlines, but they don’t take discover. And our other cards weren’t working for some reason. Finally, we got things worked out. At this point, we had been dealing with this for at least an hour (not kidding). And, the entire ticketing area had completely cleared out. Fortunately (??) our flight was delayed by two hours. Or else we would’v missed our flight. But then, it turns out that they still wanted Jonathan to have an outward bound ticket from Manila too (even though he had a visa, they just hadn’t gotten it verified). We were getting pretty frustrated at this point. And then we remembered that there are airlines in the world that would take our Discover card. And heck, we had internet in our pockets. So, Jonathan jumped on United and quickly booked a burner ticket. (I wish we had remembered that before because it literally took 3 minutes. But, you don’t think clearly when you are stressed…) Finally we were on our way.
We went through security, and waited. Fortunately (unlike American airports) there are no arm rests on the seats in the Hanoi airport, and because there were lots of open areas, we were all able to stretch out and go to sleep. At least, the kids and I did.
We waited until the end to get on the plane. But we still had to wait on the jetway. And Juju fell asleep right there. It was hilarious. Not terribly surprising considering that it was 3:30 when we finally got on the plane. Miraculously, Logan stayed asleep when I shifted him from the stroller to my arms. (Hallelujah!!!) And then, he slept for most of the flight. HALLELUJAH!!
We landed in Manila at 8 am. We took a taxi back home and proceeded to sleep.
Or in my case, I fell asleep with Logan in my arms in the taxi. And Jonathan took another really flattering picture of me. He loves to do that. #eternalmarriage
