Hey! I can see my blog from here! There it is, way down there. Man, all those posts look like ants from this far away. I've just made friends with all the teens in this internet cafe, by giving them Chinese cigs. This place is far from the domain of the white man, filled with all those kids that beat you at Starcraft. Right now they're hitting on girls on the internet though. Hanoi is crazy and cool, filled with narrow streets that go nowhere and change names every 10 meters. And those streets in turn are filled with crazy pedicabs, motorbikes, cars, dump trucks, old people with yolks burdened by old newspapers, chickens, tourists, taxis, and kids with squeaky shoes. And in this old city, each street is it's own domain, filled with shops of one kind, so that there is the street of tombstones, the street of nylon bands, of shoes, of chickens, of wooden stamps, of cha ca fish, of travel agencies, of feather boas, of lady's underwear, of air compressors, bike parts, tin boxes, perfumes, small birds, the street of soaps, the street of small buddhas. I spent today wandering through them, or in a pedicab, sheltered from the rain, as the sights passed by.

All day yesterday was spent in a hard seat from Lao Cai to Hanoi, and the night before traveling from Kunming to Hakou, on the border, by night bus. Some people call them "sleeper busses", but this is untrue, for not once could I drift away, being constantly jostled and and violently shaken by the cruel driver. At one point all the men got out, and we had to push the rickety bus to a shuddering start.

My first impressions of Hanoi were from the back of a suicide death moto (xe om), which careemed through the lawless streets at break-neck speed and seemingly random direction. It was crazier than Phnom Penh, like watching the light cycle scenes from Tron in fast forward, with maybe the asteroid scene from Empire overlaid for good measure. The odds of survival were 3,720 to 1, but I arrived at my hotel, which was booked, safe and sound. No matter, the touts found me and I found a room, US$10, with air con.

Tomorrow the Perfume Pagoda, perhaps, then down to Hue.