Phil: Life in Hanoi - Services

Of course there are a variety of things that strike me about living in Hanoi. Here's a couple of them:



This is an example of the way that the power lines look all over the city. It seems like a new line is strung each time a new service is needed. As you can tell, it looks pretty wild. Yesterday we saw a worker putting up a new wire; he was stripping the insulation off with his teeth!

Power is uncertain here. Most days there are no problems. The first weekend I was here, though, the power was out all day, which meant no lights, no AC, no hot water for showers, dishwashing and laundry, and no internet service. Today the power has been going off and on since the middle of the night. We're not sure why this happens. It's just life in Hanoi.

We came back from SaPa last Saturday to find that, while we had power, we had no internet in the hostel. Since it was the weekend, we figured we were out of luck until Monday. So we went to the local internet cafe, with very slow, very old and very dirty computers, just so we could check email and the news of the Western world. Cost: about 20 cents US for the two of us for twenty minutes. But we couldn't skype with family, pay bills nor make blog entries, so it was frustrating waiting. Monday came and still no service. So we trekked to the Geography Dept where we could use wireless twice a day. Tuesday, no service. Wednesday, no service. Finally late Wednesday afternoon service was restored. Gail was told, informally, that the hostel had not paid the bill for internet service so it was cut off! That's life in Hanoi.

In the US people often drink bottled water because it has become fashionable or convenient. But in Vietnam, it is a necessity. The tap water is not safe to drink. Gail has a water cooler in her room supplying us with bottled water to drink and to use when we brush our teeth. It is such a habit to just stick the toothbrush under the tap, one has to really pay attention. Americans enjoy having drinks with ice, but here you have to make sure the ice is made with "pure" water or you don't use ice. But it is not just we Westerners who require bottled water, all the people use it. That's life in Hanoi.