Hanoi Activities

Ambassador's Pagoda

(Chua Quan Su). This stately prayer house once served the many ambassadors who called on the Le kings. A hall named Quan Su was built in the 15th century to receive these guests, mostly Buddhists, and a pagoda was built for them in which they could comfortably worship. The hall burned to the ground, but the pagoda was saved. The Ambassador's Pagoda escaped destruction a second time, as it was the only pagoda not burned or ransacked in the final chaotic days of the Le dynasty. This pagoda sees more action than most in town, as it serves as headquarters for the Vietnam Buddhist Association. Government elites often make official visits to the pagoda, and people commonly hold "send-off" ceremonies here for the souls of family members who have recently died. The pagoda is also in part dedicated to a monk who is said to have saved King Ly Than Tong from his deathbed, so many older women come here to pray for good health. Dozens of young monks reside on the south side of the complex and study in the classrooms directly behind the pagoda. COST: Free. OPEN: Daily 7:30-11:30 and 1:30-5:30.

Botanical Garden  

(Vuon Bach Thao). This 50-acre park behind the Presidential Palace was designed by French landscape engineers in 1890. After defeating the French in Hanoi in late 1954, the state rebuilt the gardens and opened the grounds and its extensive network of trails to the public. Athletes in search of exercise congregate here for pickup soccer games, badminton, tai chi, and jogging. Lovers looking for seclusion head to the sculpture garden on the east side of the park, or cross the bridge to an island in the middle of the tree-shaded, preternaturally green lake. Between dusk and closing time, this island retreat is definitely rated R. COST: 1,000d. OPEN: Daily 7:30 AM-10 PM.

commemorating the past and present glories of the Communist Party, and you'll invariably see propaganda posters and waves of dangling street lights consisting of blinking yellow stars and red hammers and sickles. On the square's northeast corner is a beautiful Chinese-style meeting hall, the courtyard of which serves as a gathering place for former high-ranking Communist officials who now spend their afternoons playing Ping-Pong and chess or just sitting around drinking tea. Closed to the public except for performances.

Once conveniently accessible by riverboat, this market, the oldest and largest in the city, has seen trading with the whole of Southeast Asia. The huge structure, to which the French added a number of features including a new facade, was destroyed by a massive fire in 1994 -- ironically enough on July 14, Bastille Day. The fire displaced 3,000 workers, caused millions of dollars in damage and losses, and took five human lives, not to mention the lives of thousands of exotic and endangered animals. The market reopened in December 1996 with a bit of a stir: hundreds of women, livid over unfair stall allocations, took to the streets in anger, inducing the prime minister's office to intercede. Today the market looks more like a concrete shopping mall but continues to sell all manner of local and foreign goods. OPEN: Daily 6-6.

Fine Arts Musuem  

(Bao Tang My Thuat). The evolution of Vietnamese art is sparingly chronicled in this musty three-story museum, which opened in 1966 after serving as a boardinghouse for French girls living in Indochina. The architecture, sculpture, drawing, and fine arts of Vietnam are displayed in a series of exhibits, mainly organized chronologically, starting with an impressive collection of Stone Age and Bronze Age artifacts on the third floor. Also here are examples of lacquer and wood sculpture, including a fantastical bodhisattva with 1,000 eyes and arms, a 16th-century statue from the Hoi Ha Pagoda.

Several stone statues and wooden sculptures lining the open-air hallways reflect the wide
range of artistic styles incorporated into Vietnamese art. Note the intrusion of the Soviet aesthetic on mid-20th-century sculpture: the martial, even superhuman, forms are a far cry from the elegance and lightheartedness of the Dong Ho village folk art or the centuries-old evocative lacquered-wood depictions of arhats from the Tay Phuong Pagoda. On the lower floors are oil and watercolor paintings by such Vietnamese masters as Nguyen Tu Nghiem, Bui Xuan Phai, and To Ngoc Van. The central exhibition rooms on the first floor contain some of Vietnam's most stunning lacquer painting, much of it excellent examples of socialist realism and so-called combat art.

Conspicuously absent are the most recent works of art from Vietnam's bold young painters. The unfortunate reality is that these artists are busy showing their works in stylish Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City galleries and selling to eager collectors, while the Ministry of Culture, which is ultimately responsible for the art museum, doesn't have the financial resources to buy their works. Note that many of the exhibits are in a state of perpetual rearrangement and may be closed at any time. COST: 10,000d. OPEN: Tues.-Sun. 9:15-5.

The Street of Fans now sells a stunning selection of religious paraphernalia, including beautiful funeral and festival flags, porcelain Buddhas, and lacquered Chinese poem boards. Giant plane trees shade the street, which is bookended by Strawberry Temple (Den Dau) and a traditional wooden house honoring Vietnamese soldiers (Nha Tuong Niem Liet Si). Shooting off the street is Tich To, an alley bursting with bright, lacquered water puppets, rattan and bamboo baskets, and porcelain and ceramics. If you can pull your attention away from all the eye-grabbing street-level sights, you'll discover the timeworn facades of several French colonial teahouses.

Perfume Pagoda  

Considered Vietnam's most important Buddhist site, the Perfume Pagoda (Chua Huong) is the largest of a cluster of shrines carved into the limestone of the Huong Tich Mountains. In late spring the trails leading up to the shrines are clogged with thousands making their pilgrimage to pray to Quan Am, the goddess of mercy and compassion.

According to a Vietnamized version of the Chinese legend, Quan Am was a young wife falsely accused of trying to kill her newlywed husband. Thrown out of her mother-in-law's house, she took refuge in a monastery, posing as a monk. A reckless girl one day blamed her pregnancy on the monk, not knowing he was a she. Without a word of self-defense, the vilified monk took the child in and raised him. Only after Quan Am died did villagers discover her silent sacrifice. In the past, pilgrims came to the grottoes to pray for Quan Am's help in bearing sons and in fighting unjust accusations.

From the shores of the Yen River, you are ferried to the site, 4 km (2½ mi) away, on sampans that seem to be made of flimsy aluminum. It's a spectacular ride through the flooded valley, past boats laden with fruit and farmers at work in their fields. You'll be let off at Chua Tien Chu. From there, follow a stone path uphill to the various pagodas and shrines. Three kilometers (2 miles) later you'll reach the Perfume Pagoda. A steep set of stairs takes you inside the impressive cavern, where gilded Buddhas and bodhisattvas sit nestled in rocky recesses. The air is misty from incense and the cooking fires of the Buddhist monks who tend the shrines.

In early spring, from just after Tet to the middle of the second lunar month, thousands of Buddhists make their pilgrimage to the Perfume Pagoda. This is an intense -- and sometimes stressful -- time to visit, as the crowds of Vietnamese faithful clog the Yen River with extra boats and make navigating the slippery stairs more of an exercise in caution than a journey of discovery. The atmosphere at this time of year is positively electric with thousands of Buddhists crowding into the cavern to leave offerings, catch a droplet of water from a holy stalactite, or buy Buddhist trinkets and mementos from the dozens of stall owners. Note that the climb up to the pagoda can be rough going, especially when it's muddy, and that local operators sometimes lead the climb at a very fast pace. Admission is 33,000d.

Presidential Palace  

Phu Chu Tich). This imposing three-story palace just north of the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum testifies to France's dedication to architectural elegance in Indochina. Constructed from 1900 to 1906, the bright, mustard-yellow building served as the living and working quarters of Indochina's governors-general. When Ho Chi Minh returned to Hanoi after the defeat of the French in 1954, he refused to live in the palace itself but chose the more modest quarters of the palace electrician. He did, however, offer use of the palace to distinguished guests during their visits to the capital. Today the building is used for formal international receptions and other important government meetings. You can view the structure from the outside but cannot enter the palace. Surrounding the building are extensive gardens and orchards, as well as the famed Mango Alley, the 300-ft pathway from the palace to Ho Chi Minh's stilt house.

One-Pillar Pagoda  

(Chua Mot Cot). The French destroyed this temple on their way out in 1954. It was reconstructed by the new government and still commemorates the legend of Emperor Ly Thai Tong. It is said that the childless emperor dreamed that Quan Am, the Buddhist goddess of mercy and compassion, seated on a lotus flower, handed him a baby boy. Sure enough, he soon met and married a peasant woman who bore him a male heir, and in 1049 he constructed this monument in appreciation. The distinctive single pillar is meant to represent the stalk of the lotus flower, a sacred Vietnamese symbol of purity. The pillar was originally a single large tree trunk; today it's made of more durable cement. An ornate curved roof covers the tiny 10-square-ft pagoda, which rises out of a square pond. Steps leading to the pagoda from the south side of the pond are usually blocked off, but if there aren't too many people around, a monk may invite you into this miniature prayer room.

Just a few yards from the One-Pillar Pagoda is Dien Huu Pagoda, a delightful but often-overlooked temple enclosing a bonsai-filled courtyard. A tall and colorful gate opens out onto the path leading to the Ho Chi Minh Museum, but the entrance is opposite the steps to the One-Pillar Pagoda. COST: Free. OPEN: Daily 6 AM-6 PM; 6 AM-9 PM on the 1st and 15th of every lunar month.

Address: Ong Ich Kiem St., Hanoi, Vietnam
Phone: no phone

Hoa Lo Prison  

There's not much left of the infamous "Hanoi Hilton," the prison that once housed captured American servicemen during the Vietnam War, including U.S. Air Force pilot Douglas "Pete" Peterson, the first U.S. ambassador to Hanoi. What does remain, however, is a small section of the old prison, which is now a museum, and the tree under which Do Muoi, the aging former general secretary of the Communist Party, used to sit while writing on the backs of leaves during his imprisonment by the French in the years of Vietminh resistance.

Hoa Lo Prison Museum is a blunt reminder of the horrors of colonialism and wartime imprisonment. Here, through the front gates of the old French Maison Centrale (Central House, or Prison), built in 1896, you can get a handle on what life was like for Vietnamese prisoners held during France's occupation of Vietnam. (The number of prisoners under the French grew from 615 in 1913 to 2,000 in 1953.) In the southern hall, beyond the grisly guillotine and body basket, are cells where death row prisoners, including Hoang Van Thu, Tran Dan Ninh, and Nguyen Van Cu (who escaped and became a powerful early leader of modern Vietnam), were held. These cells are dank, dark, and anything but welcoming.

On exhibit upstairs are Vietnamese propaganda photos of American POWs, including Senator John McCain and former Ambassador Peterson, cheerily shooting pool, cooking, and writing letters. You won't be able to see the building where the American pilots were kept since it has been torn down, as has the cell from which Do Muoi and 100 other prisoners escaped in 1945 through the maze of sewers that ran under the prison, parts of which are on display in the courtyard.

If you're looking for historical detail about the prison, you may be disappointed by the museum's guidebooks, which are far more inclined to talk about the size of the cells than reveal any nuggets about what took place behind the musty yellow walls. Note, too, that there's little information in English at the museum. COST: 10,000d. OPEN: Tues.-Sun. 8:30-11:30 and 1:30-4:30.

Museum of the Revorution  

(Bao Tang Cach Mang). Built in 1926 to house the French tax office, this cavernous museum opened its doors in 1959 and now has 29 halls, individual rooms that focus on specific events or periods in Vietnam's arduous road to independence. The focus naturally lands on the country's efforts against French colonialism, Japanese fascism, and American imperialism. The photographs from the August 1945 Revolution are particularly interesting. History buffs may do better here than at the Museum of History, just across the street: just about all the exhibits here have English and French commentary, so a few hours of exploration can be a great learning experience. On the other hand, it may be difficult to swallow some of the museum section titles, such as "The Peaceful Struggle for National Reunification, 1954-1957." English-language guided tours must be arranged in advance. COST: 10,000d. OPEN: Sat. 8-11:30, Tues.-Fri. and Sun. 8-11:30 and 1-4.

Address: 25 Tong Dan St., Hanoi, Vietnam
Phone: 04/825-4151