The long, long travel day

How long can one person function on little to no sleep? We tested that query during today's very long travel day. It began easily enough, wasting time in our home airport, enjoying a nice meal in our new favorite restaurant, wandering the halls of the empty terminal, this being Christmas Eve, and NO ONE wants to be spending Christmas on plane! We have our choice of places to sit, chairs to lounge in, but the people-watching leaves much to be desired.

Our first flight, to Beijing, is a torturous, 14-hour long haul. Now, Mario will say different - he likes this new 787 we find ourselves in, with its quieter cabin, and he's enjoying the flexibility the aisle seat is giving us, getting up the stretch several times and drinking tea in the galley. I find the time long, especially with the cold I am fighting off. I watch a few movies, and try to sleep some, but with no luck - my neck cramps from too much leaning to one side, the seat too big(or too small?) so the head rest doesn;t sit in the right place...Two hours before we land I am ready to be on the ground. Eventually. we are.

Now, our 8-hour layover in Beijing was once upon a time going to include a rapid tour of the Great Wall, but it apparently has opening hours(!), and we are past them, so we spend our time wander the VERY big international terminal. Having been build for the 2008 Olympics, it is an immense space, with more gates and seating than necessary, so it is easy to find a spot to lie down. Which we do, since there is not much else to do! For such a large terminal, there are few shops, even less due to construction, and not much of anything else to occupy one's time. Walking the oriental garden wastes 5 minutes, searching for a lounge that doesn't over charge takes another 10, and the great search for the free showers, which was ultimately a lost cause, certainly didn't use up more than 20 - which left 6.5 hours. So we slept, sprawled out on rows of chairs, in the darkness and relatively warmth of gate 9.

Another 4-hour flight, during which we DID sleep, and we arrive in Vietnam. Thankfully, our Visas are approved in less than 10 minutes, our back packs are just falling onto the luggage carousel when we arrive, and our hotel pick-up is waiting outside the front with my name on a card - I call that a stress-free arrival. Thank goodness, since it is 5 in the morning, and my brain is turning to mush from lack of sleep.

But the day is only beginning! Remember, it's about 6 in the morning, and though Mario and I have arrived at our hotel, we are far from checking in! In hindsight, booking an extra night, allowing us to check in early, would have a good thing, but we'll just have to remember that for the next trip. For the time being, we freshen up in the lobby washroom, leave our bags in the care of the hotel, and leave to explore Hanoi.

Mario says, after walking the same circuit around the city several times, and visiting much of the "sights" in the area, that he is glad we are not spending a week in Hanoi, as we might run out of things to do - fast. I agree - though there are enough food options to last a lifetime! Our breakfast consists of beef noodle soup - Pho - eaten atop low tables from even lower benches on the sidewalk, which will later disappear, leaving room for a hat shop. We enjoy several strong Vietnamese coffees, trying out different cafe options, from tourist kitsch to business classy. We eat banh mi sandwiches on a street corner, tuck into fried beef noodle balls in front of St. Joseph's Cathedral, and taste doughnuts on our walk down Hang Bong street. Note to self: trust your instinct - don't accept free samples of street doughnuts. They are NOT free. Also, don't let Mario eat free doughnuts, either.

We spend a lot of time people-watching. The park around Hoan Kiem Lake( a sort of central park in Hanoi) in teeming with people in the early morning, taking part in the morning exercise routine. Groups of ladies are dancing up a storm - tango, line dancing, different choreography - while a nearby speaker blares music. Further along, a group smashes away at a badminton bird, and older men stretch and walk and do tai chi their own way. A few joggers make their way through the pack. Later in the day, tourists take their place, posing for pictures in front of the lake and the Buddhist temple on an island, touts offering cyclo rides or tours on buses. The dynamic has totally changed, and our early morning wanderings offered us the chance to seen the two opposites.

The other thing that hits me is the bombardment of stimuli to all of my senses. The noise is obvious, the city filled with more scooters than vehicles, the put-put-put of their engines only being drowned out by the cacophony of honking, a language unto itself! What gets me is the smells as we walk: the smokiness of incense from a temple, or offerings burning in a tin can outside a storefront, the savoriness of garlic and ginger frying in large woks next to food stalls, the sweetness of mango and pineapple from a woman cutting fresh fruit to sell or the fragrance of flowers hanging from a bicycle passing by. We snack most of the day, and my sense of taste bounces between the sweet of the doughnuts, the savory of beef noodles, the salty of fish sauce, the bitter of too-strong coffee. Total bombardment, heightened by fatigue.

Like another Beijing layover, we drag our weary bodies back to the hotel 8 hours later, shower off the grime of 36 hours of travel, and collapse into bed. We rise after dark, the smell of tasty things coming from a wok just below our hotel window. The streets have totally changed again, and we head out into the night for a light dinner, drinks for our trip tomorrow and cash from the ATM. The city has treated us well today, but I think the big cozy bed is still calling my name...