here, there, everywhere

It is so cool to be back in Hanoi again! After two years away, we were both worried we'd been seriously rose-tinting our memories of the city and would be horrified when we came back, but so far it feels very much as it was when we left it, albeit with more cars and higher prices. A lot of our favorite cafes and street food places are still up and running, and we've been able to see a lot of familiar faces, which has been great.


One thing that has changed is definitely my own relationship to this city. I stepped off the plane filled with confidence - I spent a year here, I know how things work! - only to realize that actually, leaving Vietnam for an extended period of time resets your street cred back to zero. I've forgotten my way around, a year in Japan has erased my ability to bargain - not that it was very good to begin with, and, annoyingly, crossing the street is way more scary than it was when I left. Oh, well.


We've been so busy eating street food and drinking cafe sua that I haven't had the chance to take many real photos with my camera; also, I've been too distracted playing with the Hipstamatic app on my birthday present. It's kind of like my Holga, but way cheaper - though I suspect soon the novelty will wear off a bit and I'll want the larger images from my SLR again. Still, it's nice to have something lightweight and - for once - unobtrusive. Though not as unobtrusive as it *could* be - it turns out that, because Iain bought the ipod in Japan where laws preventing sneaky pervy subway photographers are in play, it is impossible to deactivate the noisy shutter sound that clicks every time I take a photo. So, no sneaky pervy shots for me.