This past week I had the pleasure of traveling outside of Korea, for the first time since being an Alien Resident, to another part of Asia. I traveled 4 hours to the city of Hanoi in Vietnam, spending three days in the bustling city and one additional day visiting the popular World Heritage site, Halong Bay. I was asked by one friend upon coming here, “what is there even to do in Vietnam?” which honestly was a great question since I admit with the end of school last week I did not have the brain power to properly research this trip before coming here. That’s why, I really owe this post to another friend who convinced me that one of the best experiences I would get in Hanoi would be going on a Food Tour. So thank you Ellen, you were right.

Food tours are one of the most popular “tourist” things to do in Hanoi– which as one ofthe notes in the cute little cafe we visited upon our first day there, “The Note,” reminded us of, “You are a tourist, and that is okay.” We decided to do the “Hanoi Street Food Tour” which was $20USD for 7 stops of classic Vietnamese dishes. I knew I was unlikely to remember the name of one let alone all of the dishes we tried, but luckily our tour guide, Emma, predicted this and therefore wrote down a list for us at the end of the tour. Below is the food tour itinerary, along with pictures I managed to snag while I wasn’t devouring the good tastes.

Tastes aside though, I have to get to the heart of this post and that comes from learning about Vietnamese culture on this tour. I’ve always been fascinated with the customs of people around the world and there’s no better way to get knowledge than first hand from someone in that culture. What’s funny is I’m not even sure  how we got to talking about vietnamese weddings, and love, and markets but all this seamlessly came out during the dinner conversation with the group. First off, Vietnamese people have huge weddings. In the States we invite 100, maybe 200 people if we are having a big wedding, and both families celebrate together. In Vietnam, the wife and husband have separate wedding ceremonies, each with their respective families, Emma told us. We asked the question, “so it’s like everyone you know that comes?” to which her response was, “more like everyone you don’t know.” Over 600 people, she said, come to each wedding.

Before they marry, the woman must complete a cooking test to ensure that she will be able to provide for the family. If the woman does not pass this test, then the man’s family will convince him to break up with her. There’s a saying in Vietnam Emma told us, “So tired of rice, desire for noodle.” Simply meaning, a woman must know how to cook well for her man and family.

Similarly (in sort), a man must pass an alcohol test where he must prove his ability to drink great amounts by outdrinking other members of the family. Emma explained that in a lot of households, men still abuse their wives in Vietnam, often when drunk, and that this test is less a test of how much the man can drink but rather a test to see how he behaves when he is drunk so that the woman’s family can ensure that he will treat her well.

All this talk about marriage soon led to the topic of how woman and men even meet in Vietnam since a lot of people still live in rural hills away from the main cities and therefore meeting people can be difficult; the answer: love markets. Emma was surprised we had never heard of a love market before. A love market, is a kind of festival where men and woman come together to meet and get married. She explained that many men and woman come away with boyfriends or girlfriends from this market or even get married following meeting at the market. Some girls even get kidnapped she said casually by men who want to marry them. The woman, after 3 days of staying with the man, can then refuse to marry him and return home. Some woman she even stated fake their own kidnapping if they want to get married to someone. Apparently there is a documentary about Love Markets in Vietnam called “The Love Market” that I now am going to have to watch.

There is a lot of truth behind the statement, “Come for the food, stay for the company” as our 3 hour tour easily turned into close to 4 hours with all the talk at each destination. I even got to try my hand at pulling up a rice pancake from a griddle at one location which I would like to now advertise formally, I did very successfully. I think Emma would agree with me when I say I would most certainly pass that Vietnamese cooking test.