Hanoi

Xin chao! I've arrived in Hanoi a couple of days ago and this city is just crazy... very noisy and busy, but it has its own kind of charme... it has this little lake (Hoan Kiem) in the center of the old quarter which is lovely...
so when I arrived at the hostel, the girls of my room told me to come with them to the snake village... I didn't really know what to expect, so of course I said yes... when we went there, at first we could touch snakes and play with them, and then they offered us to kill them and cut out the heart... well... of course I didn't kill them, but they boys loved it... and then everybody could try some snake (tastes like chicken ....) and get drunk on snakewine (?) ... it was quite a weird experience...
the next day I went walking in the city and visited the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum (where you actually can see embalmed Ho Chi Minh - bizarre) and the Literature Temple. I like Hanoi, it's nice and if there weren't so many motorbikes it would be walkable... but when crossing the street everytime you risk your life... amazing...
then I tried to organize a trip to Halong Bay by myself... I met a danish girl, Rikke who joined me... that was quite an experience... first we took a local bus which took ages there and we were kind of an attraction as the only foreigners...
then Halong City was quite empty (apparently low season, because it's rather cold as well), but then we found someone who offered us a tour, which sounded quite nice in the beginning, a boat for ourselves, we saw caves (beautiful), but then we had two wait 2 hours in the dark to get to our hotel, and the next day we were supposed to do some trekking... well we did but there was a lot of driving involved as well... so it took as ages to get there and to get to hanoi again... very exhausting.... originally, my plan was to get to sapa today, but unfortunately I don't feel so good, so I'm going to stay one night more in Hanoi, and leave for Hue tomorrow...