The Englishman of Phung Hung Street - Part 1

-

Waking up in Hanoi for the first time can be quite confusing. It is a noisy place and even in the middle of town you hear the call of the rooster at sunrise and trying to out-do the rooster are the government announcements, broadcast from loudspeakers hoisted up on lamp-posts. The messages tell the locals that they must keep the city clean etc though with my limited knowledge of Vietnamese, they sounded intimidating and something I am happy to say we do not have in England.

I’ve lived in many cities around the world, 8 cities, 5 countries and Hanoi is the most foreign, the poorest and dirtiest and one of the most exciting places I’ve had the good fortune to reside in. The combination of noises, smells and sights cannot be replicated.


A cup of hot vietnamese coffee
A typical day involved strong coffee drank on my balcony overlooking the centre of the city, the old quarter, known as Hoan Kiem. My apartment was on the 4th floor of a residential building full of local families.  Vietnamese coffee is strong and is best drank with a pastry and Hanoi has many good pastry shops, based on the French Patisserie (a hangover from French rule).

Sean Usher
October 2012

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

It has been a long long time - Boston and New York 2022

-
Image
I am sitting in a coffee shop in the South End of Boston (Tremont Street), about 2 minutes’ walk from my old apartment on Worcester Square. I lived here for almost 2 years from November 2000 and have some good memories. I have not been back for 16 years.  A lot has changed, a lot has not. The ride to the hotel was much the same although main roads in Boston are almost all underground so you don't see daylight for quite some time and there is nothing fun about sitting in a traffic jam for 30 minutes underground.   I am staying in the Beacon Hill area of the city and it is a cute mix of Victorian era town houses and cobbled streets bookended by the government district and the massive Massachusetts General Hospital. I was supposed to be here with a friend who lives in Quebec but due to him being forgetful etc. he forgot the document he needed to enter the USA so I am now doing this 5 day, 4 night trip on my own, not a total disaster but a very different holiday dynamic.  Last night
Read more

Goodbye Cooperative Bank, it was nice knowing you

-
My bank is in trouble, the great and noble Cooperative Bank has fallen foul of something or someone and turn itself from a mutual into yet another plc, floated on the stock exchange and only 30% controlled by the original owners. A sad day. I've read many stories and many stupid comments but how a US hedge fund managed to be the driving force behind this is beyond me.  A blame game has begun, was it the takeover of the struggling Britannia BS, or the attempts at buying over 600 branches of Lloyds Bank or , as many believe, something more sinister?  We will never know unless there is a major investigation by the financial authorities (which I doubt will happen). As a mutual , Cooperative Bank, had to put customers first, this didn't always work but it certainly won't now. How can company directors at a plc put their shareholders 2nd, or 3rd. This won't work.  What puzzles me more is they believe their own lies.  I received an email (as all customers did) from Euan
Read more

Funerals and birthdays - June 2024

-
Image
I will be glad when June 2024 is over, I am sitting here on June 29th 2024 and I am physically and mentally exhausted from the events of this month.  At the very end of May my Uncle Stan died, he was 83 and prior to his death he was a relatively healthy old man, but a fall and brain bleed and possibly poor care at the Sunderland Royal Hospital led to him fading away pretty quickly, admitted on Friday May 24th and died overnight on May 26th. He was an incredibly kind, funny man and we had a very odd relationship as he would always claim I know everything I know because of him, it was a running joke since my teens and I tried to send him a postcard from wherever I visited in the world as I knew as a former coal miner and shipyard worker, he had never left England and I know he appreciated my postcards.  His funeral was the first I've attended as an adult and it felt odd, being a grown-up can be hard, I comforted my aunt and my mum and had to navigate the usual family politics of a bi
Read more