Hanoi... mostly just the Hilton

Hello dear friends and family!

We are alive in Hanoi, Vietnam, and our first day has been a success.  By that, I mean that we accomplished two of the three things we planned on doing today. We woke up and found lunch, and then we went and visited the Hanoi Hilton. 

We landed last night and found the nice driver who brought us to our hostel (he had my name on a sign at the airport, as I was told by the reception people via email) and we went straight to bed, very tired after 28 hours of travel!  We slept in until after noon, then walked to a nice little restaurant that the hostel recommended to us for lunch.We felt very guilty not knowing any Vietnamese so I took out my Lonely Planet book and tried out a few basic words.  The young lady serving us found it quite funny to hear us try and fail to speak her language, but she was very nice and helpfully taught us the correct pronunciation.

After eating we walked through the middle of the city, around a beautiful lake and through some busy streets to the Hanoi Hilton, the prison that housed many American POW's during the Vietnam war, including Christa's grandpa Dave.  It was a surreal experience, very intense and Christa was quite upset by several things. The first half of the museum had pictures and artifacts and information about when the prison was used to contain and execute Vietnamese during the French occupation.  It was very sad, to be truthful, but in contrast to how it portrayed the time of the Vietnam American War, it was gruesome. What I mean to say is that the second half of the prison had pictures and artifacts of the American soldiers in the prison and they were portrayed to be very happy and well taken care of.  They were playing basketball and volleyball, celebrating Christmas and receiving great medical care.  Now, I'm sure that all happened, especially during the end of the war, but it was very unnerving to see that they completely ignored the atrocities that were committed against many American soldiers that were POWs.  The whole thing was to show how NICE they were to their prisoners... but Christa's grandfather has some intense and very saddening memories that prove exactly the opposite.  The museum had no mention of the torture that he experienced for three years, or proof of the cell used for solitary confinement that he was in for a year and a half...  I guess I shouldn't be surprised, most countries aren't too particularly willing to showcase how horribly they treat their prisoners, I mean the US has certainly been guilty of that.  It's just troublesome that it happened and was completely ignored in the memorial museum where it actually took place.

I'll put up pictures later, I think I need a nap right now though...  It's 4:30 in the afternoon here, and I think it's 5:30 am at home.. or something like that.  Anyway, tomorrow afternoon we fly to Kunming China and start the real backpacking adventures! Im glad we did the prison visit right away, now we know and have been there in honor of all American POWs from the Vietnam war.  Really, in honor of all pow's from all wars. Hope everything is going well at home! 

Lots of Love,
Maia Christa and Brooke