We arrived in Vietnam about five days ago and spent the first few days in Hanoi, the capital city, located in northern Vietnam.The minute we arrived in the Hanoi airport, Vietnam felt very different from any of the other Southeast Asian countries that we have already visited - perhaps more similar to China than to Laos, Cambodia or Thailand.The people that we have met thus far in Vietnam seem much more aggressive than any of the other Southeast Asian countries and this aspect obviously adds an element of stress and tension to travel.The people in Vietnam also seem more guarded than elsewhere we've traveled - as though their business may be tourism but that does not mean they need to make friends with tourists or go out of their way to be friendly.After the warm receptions in Laos and Cambodia we were a bit taken aback initially by the relative coolness here.We wonder if this aspect is a distant reflection of the American war here, and Vietnam's previous colonialism by the French.The Vietnamese have certainly not had an easy history.

Hanoi is a big bustling city with seemingly zero traffic laws.Old cars, modern buses, and hundreds of motorbikes fill the streets with honking and dust.Red lights do not seem to apply to motorbikes so one must keep one's wits about one when crossing the streets.The sidewalks are packed with vendors selling their wares, women gutting chickens into the streets outside of small butcher shops, and - especially in the evenings - whole families sitting on small stools on the sidewalk, slurping bowls of noodles while chatting loudly to one another.All of these activities fill the air with intense smells - a strange mixture of very good odors and very bad ones.Our hotel was in the Old Quarter of Hanoi, with thin, windy roads that encircle Hoan Kiem Lake, known for the large turtles (and I do mean large - about two-three feet in length) that live in its waters.

One of Todd's highlights was visiting the Catholic cathedral near our hotel (I was not feeling very well and so missed it).He said that the congregation was divided by gender, with the men on one side of the church and the women on the other.When he first arrived, two groups of women were singing the rosary back and forth to one another and he sat for awhile listening.During the mass, the singing/chanting continued, with all the responses by the congregation sung back to the priests.The effect, he told me, was beautiful and he felt the comfort in knowing that despite differences in language and custom, the basic bones of the mass are universal.Throughout our travels, mass has been a powerful example that we belong to a universal community.

While in Hanoi, we visited the prison that held the American POW pilots during the Vietnam War, dubbed by the Americans the "Hanoi Hilton".The visit to the prison was an interesting one.Built originally by the French colonialists to hold "rebel Vietnamese", the current portrayal of the French-colonial-era in the prison is grim and horrifying - complete with an old rusty guillotine and stories of how many Vietnamese were killed on it.By contrast, the portrayal of the American POW's time in the prison resembles fun "sleep-away camp".The walls are covered with pictures of the American POW's playing basketball, decorating Christmas trees and opening care-packages from loved ones in the US.Walking through the prison was surreal and we both came away upset by the white-washed version of the POW's lives.Neither of us questions the fact that the Vietnamese took POW's - it was a war and the American pilots were bombing Hanoi and the surrounding countryside relentlessly.But to then spin the POW's experience seemed to undermine and wash away the hardships that the men endured there and that also did not seem right.The entire visit was a good reminder of how our perceptions of history are often very biased.One of the most striking photos and captions that we saw described the extensive, first-rate medical care that John McCain received at the prison following his plane crash in northern Vietnam.McCain did break his shoulders in the initial plane crash but while in the prison, his shoulders were repeatedly broken by the guards there as a form of interrogative torture.Today, he cannot raise his arms above shoulder height because his shoulder bones and ligaments are all but destroyed.We were not so much angry at the Vietnamese government for their portrayal as disappointed that past horrors can be so sanitized by any government - the US certainly has its share of past events that have been cleaned up in the history books.Part of what moved us so deeply in Cambodia was the fact that their national "horrors" have not been thoroughly sanitized and re-written.We felt that it was good to see such a raw version of historical events because it makes one all the more committed to promoting peace and justice in order to prevent other, future atrocities of a similar nature.Altogether, we had a thought-provoking and striking time in Hanoi.Nonetheless, the pace of the city is a bit unremitting so we were not sad to leave it after a few days and head east towards the coast.