Hanoi - Fine Arts Museum

11/16/03

After lunch we went to the Museum of Fine Arts. Excellent museum, with exhibits from the ancient to contemporary. I took some pictures of the contemporary art; I’d love to see an exhibit of some of these artists at the Seattle Art Museum. The lacquer paintings were unique to my eyes and the depictions of war extremely moving, poignant and sometimes graphically representative.

At our usual 7PM for dinner, we went to Bobby Chinn’s, reputed to be the most famous restaurant in Hanoi. It was very trendy and hip in a subdued way, the food was great – it was the only night we steered away from Vietnamese food. Bobby Chinn’s reminded both of us of Asian fusion restaurants in Seattle with some French influence. We both enjoyed our meals. It was the only time I had chicken and mashed potatoes during the entire 3 week trip. Kathie had smoked duck with green tea and we shared a bottle of French Merlot, which was quite good.

After dinner we walked across the street and joined the carnival atmosphere around the lake. All of the streets were cordoned off for pedestrians only – this is in preparation for the SE Asian Games, which begin on 11/28/03 (which means they’re going on as I write this). Many people were in town already, it felt like Singapore on Christmas Eve. I took some night photos and drew crowds behind me when set up my little Manfrotto tripod on electrical boxes or whatever I could find.

One more full day to go in this crazy, noisy, highly variable city!