On a good day, Snow makes about US$6 (100,000 Vietnamese dong) – enough to pay for food and her son’s schooling. “Any day that I stay home and do not sell, we have little money to buy food,” she said. Hardships of Hanoi Snow’s story is common. <strong>The</strong>re are about 12,000 street vendors in Hanoi, 90% of which are from impoverished rural areas. <strong>The</strong> majority are women, and often the main breadwinner. <strong>The</strong>y leave young children behind in the care of relatives, returning to visit when they can and when money permits. Nights in Hanoi are spent crammed into a tiny room with 30 or 40 other women. Hanoi’s women are no strangers to hardship. Mothers and grandmothers fought side by side with men during both the revolutionary war against repressive French colonialism and in the Vietnam War. Snow’s heritage is endurance, perseverance, hard work, and a determination to survive. This heritage is recognised and honoured at <strong>The</strong> Women’s Museum on Ly Thuong Kiet Street. Five floors of displays pay tribute to the role of Vietnamese women in modern history. You’ll see many personal artefacts and possessions, made more poignant by the inclusion of photographs and biographies of the owners. Audiovisual presentations tell the stories of female street vendors, while a large section highlights the wartime role of women. A touching photograph shows young women cheerfully carrying supplies along the Ho Chi Minh trail, with the caption, “Shortly thereafter they died heroically.” A ponytail in a glass case belonged to a young woman – she cut it off as a memento before losing all her hair to dioxin poisoning. Scars of War On Ma May Street, a surly old woman insists I buy some strawberries from a basket on the back of her bicycle. She becomes irate when I start haggling, and I try to imagine this tiny woman shooting down American planes with a shoulder-mounted surface-toair missile launcher. A visit to the infamous Hoa Lo Prison (or “Hanoi Hilton”) gives further insight into the suffering of the Vietnamese during their decades-long struggle to throw off French domination. Women, some as young as 14, were incarcerated along with the men, often cruelly wrenched from their small children and placed into desperate conditions within its damp, dark walls. Many did not survive. <strong>The</strong> death row and solitary confinement cells are testament to the brutality and inhumanity of the French oppressors. Vestiges of French colonialism are evident in the handful of buildings that are distinctly French in style. <strong>The</strong>y lend an old-world charm to Hanoi’s streetscapes and street vendors ply their trade against the backdrop of their faded façades. <strong>The</strong> Grand Opera House, State Bank of Vietnam, Presidential Palace, Saint Joseph’s Cathedral, and the Hotel Metropole are the finer examples. I wonder if the Vietnamese view these buildings with the same pleasure as the tourists? In <strong>The</strong>ir Shoes How easy our lives must appear as we casually sip Da Lat wine in cafés along Hang Dao Street. It’s not hard to understand why some street vendors aggressively try to extract cash from tourists. If we stood in their shoes, would we maintain a permanent smile and polite demeanour despite our fatigue, our financial worries, and our homesickness? With the Hanoi sky darkening and the temperature dropping, we head back to the warmth of our hotel. Snow is there, still smiling, with her scarf wrapped tightly against the increasingly chilly air. It can get cold on Hanoi’s streets – but never too cold for Snow. TRAVEL TIPS Flights <strong>The</strong>re are no direct flights from Penang to Hanoi, but flights to KL are plentiful, from where Air Asia, Malaysia Airlines and Vietnam Airlines operate daily flights to Hanoi. Other regional airlines fly to Vietnam from KL daily but with a stopover. Visa Most visitors need a visa to enter Vietnam. Citizens of Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, and Laos holding valid ordinary passports are exempt from visa requirements and are allowed to stay for up to 30 days, while Philippines passport holders are allowed to stay up to 21 days. For those who require tourist visas, these are issued at Vietnamese diplomatic offices and consulates, and are valid for 30 days. Tourists need to ensure that their passports have at least six months’ validity. Penang International 27
Langkawi: <strong>The</strong> Jewel of Kedah BY TC GERRARD • WWW.THEISLANDDRUM.COM Langkawi: <strong>The</strong> Untold Story Malay house detail 28 Penang International