Army Museum, Ancient House and Pedicure

Yesterday we woke up late again, I have to remember to keep my curtains open before I go to bed.  I'm on the 6th floor, and the window I have really isnt a window (hard to explain) but it does let the light in.  This is what I see when I look out my window, little boxes of fake flowers, white wall behind, and the daylight coming from up top.

 

We started off going for breakfast to, you guessed it, "The Gecko"  There are several around Hanoi. My plan wasnt to necessarily go there for breakfast, but as I was walking around  in the Dowtown area, I debated between going there or going to my little Vietnamese place I have been going to,.  As I walked in, the waitress from the other Gecko that I had been going to was working here also.  She was so excited to see us as she had talked to the ladies that work here about us and now here we are.  Just want to mention, everywhere we go, everyone loves babies, not just Jayda, but they just love babies, its almost like we have a built in babysitter wherever we are, they just take over, pick her up, feed her, they let her run around, its quite nice, and very different than home. Back to our waitress, she is such a sweet girl, she is 21 years old, her name is Pham and she studied Tourisim for 4 years and is working at this restaurant so she can improve her English.  She works at this one downtown from 8:00 - 4:30 and than goes to the other Gecko from 4:30 - 11:00, 7 days a week.  She is really busy, I asked her if she ever saw her friends,she said sometimes, but not very often as everyone is busy.  I talked to her alot, as we ordered our breakfast.  We enjoyed another bowl of Pho, or should I say Jayda enjoyed a bowl of Pho, wow, can this girl ever eat.  I think we might have to change the way we eat breakfast at home, scrambled eggs for Shae-lee and Pho for Jayda, she loves, loves, loves her rice noodles. I tried giving her Mr Noodles that I had in our room, but she 'DID NOT" like them, has to be rice noodles, so stock up Cliff!!!

I love my Pho'

Before

After

 

 

 

 

I had the Crepes with lemon and Sugar, and of course a Vietnamese Coffee   You have to try this at home. Sprinkle Lemon Juice on your crepe and than sprinkle a little sugar.  Delicious!!!!  The lemons here seem different than ours though, not quite as sour, they are green and orangy on the outside, more like a lime (which maybe it is, maybe they call there lemons, limes?)

I spoke to Pham and asked her for some ideas of what to do.  She suggested the Army Museum.  It wasnt a big interest to me, but she said you can climb the Black Tower (which is actually called Cot Co Watch Tower and is one of the few remains of Emperor Gia Longs mighty edifice, which means nothing to me, but those of you interested in History, there you go.)  I thought the climbing of the tower sounded interesting, as well, i was looking to get away from the area I was in and thought I didnt have alot to lose by going.  Pham told me not to pay more than 30,000 for the Taxi.  Of course I had tourist written all over me and ended up in the one that took advantage of non-vietnamese and ended up paying just over 90,000 (triple the price) still not alot, but I know I was being overcharged.  I should have known to check his meter before I went in, some start at 9,000 and others start at 15,000.  To figure out the $$ value, 1 USD = 21,000,

We made it to the Army Museum, admission was next to nothing, I think around 30,000.  Lots to see, lots of history.  Once again, I'm not a History Buff, but it was somewhat interesting.  Lots of Planes, memorabilia from the Vietnam war, it was a large museum that was inside and outside.   .

Would you believe me if I told you we climbed to the top of the tower???  I didnt, but I had the intention, you could only climb to up a part of it.

Memorbilia

Looking down from the tower

Looking up

These are the stairs we climbed up and down

Pilot Jayda

In the plane

We probably stayed at the museum for at least a couple of hours.  Jayda was getting tired, so I thought I would just walk back, probably at least an hour walk and than she could have a snooze in the stroller and we would grab some dinner on the way back to our Hotel. We just went to our favorite little place again.  Just so you have an idea, these are the stairs we climb up to get to our restaurant.

1st flight of stairs

2nd flight of stairs (I'm sure you find this really interesting, but though you might like to see)

After dinner, we walked back to our Hotel, Jayda had a bath, and read some books in bed

The next day we woke up early (I remembered to keep my curtains open) and made it down to breakfast for 9:00 am.  No big plans for today, but I wanted to check out the Ancient House that Pham had told me about.  They call it Heritage House on the outside sign, but everything you read calls it Ancient House.  Its a traditional house of the way people use to live and is an original structure.  It was quite interesting, we walked around and bought a few things.

These little birds in cages hang from everyones store or house

Vietnamese Bed, notice no Mattress

 After we left,  I decided to get a Pedicure at a place I had noticed a few days ago for $9.00 USF.  It was great, it probably lasted around 1.5 hours

Jayda waiting patiently for her Mama to finish

The Price included a meal for Jayda. She sat down with the staff and had lunch

And it also included babysitting.  What a deal!!!

 Now we are back at the Hotel, Jayda has just woken from her nap and we will head out to have dinner soon. 6 days and counting till we are back home!!!