(Disclaimer: I’m posting blogs late (again). The next few will be about our wonderful month in Vietnam, which covered the end of January to mid February. Prior to Hanoi we spent a week in Ho Chi Minh city, but I cannot tell you much about it except that we used a lot of acronyms. I’ll tell you about it when I come home and we get coffee. 🙂 I promise.)
02/02/11- Here we are in Hanoi. Currently our friends the Vietnamese
are ushering in the new year with fireworks and horn honking. It’s the year of
the cat. Angela and I learned how to butcher ‘Chuc Mung Nam Moi’ (Happy New
Year) and tried saying it to multiple people in the airport. The people here
are all very kind and friendly. Ready to laugh or empathize as we try to
communicate. The drive from the airport was surreal. The city is alive with
candles and lanterns and Christmas lights. Young people are everywhere on their
scooters, not paying attention to where they are going, just being young and
alive and free. People weren’t able to tell us much about Tet. Just that they
spent time with their families and gave ‘lucky’ money to each other. Everything closes down for 3 days. We
are not sure where we will eat or what we will do. It may be an interesting few
days. We have back-up noodles ready if needed.
Plus, it’s cold outside. It hasn’t been cold in years it
seems.
It’s colorful and glowing and reminds me of San Francisco or
Chicago.
Today I prayed I would see a Chinese dragon dance. Then we
left the airport (we were like 3 hours early for the flight) and walked across
to street to find KFC at the mall. KFC had already closed down for the holiday,
but on the way up the 4 flights of escalators to the food court, we saw 2
chinese dragons and the accompanying ‘band’ that follows them around with gongs
and drums. Most of the band was young and had dyed blond hair. The two dragons
meandered around the store and amused workers that were not busy working. I
wondered if there was a rent-a-chinese-dragon business or if this dragon was
made of department store workers. Either way, it was a tradition I was not
accustomed to and one I was happy to stumble across. Thank you Jesus for
hearing a ridiculous prayer request and granting it in the most unlikely of
places.
We walked a few blocks and found an open KFC and literally
shouted up praises when we opened their doors.
Two for two, Jesus. Thanks.
The next two days we walked around the city and greeted
people in the streets. They were all dressed in their best clothes, especially
the kids. They wore dresses or little suits with bow ties. Some of us girls
bought balloons and then found children to give them to. Businesses were
‘closed’ but since people live at their business we could walk by and see
families sitting in their shop spaces laughing and talking and sharing a meal.
It very much had the feeling of a family holiday like Thanksgiving or
Christmas. They even have trees for Tet. In south Vietnam they have trees with
yellow flowers, in the north trees with pink flowers. And then everyone also
has this tangerine looking tree up in their shop windows. A few days after Tet,
these trees lined the curbs. If this was Tallahassee, we would’ve picked them
all up in a truck and had ourselves a bonfire.
