Foreign tourist.

A tourist was taking shot of Hoan Kiem Lake- and being taken shot vice versa :)

Vietnam is a developing country, the destination for everyone who love to travel and explore the beauty of culture, social life, unique foods and even economy named as "communist". In the last 2010, Vietnam attracted more than 8 million foreign tourists, a number that had great meaning in period the World economy slumped.

I will try to convey the unique culture of Vietnam through photos so you don't misunderstand that Vietnam has the same one as China. We are neighbours, they took our country for more than 1000 years, but they can't change our innermost culture. I am proud to say that.

This picture I took the same time when walking around Hoan Kiem Lake. When I was taking shot of the Lake, I see this woman. Just a smile and I know her image was in my camera :)

Rua Tower ( or Turtle Tower)

Turtle Tower.

Turtle Tower is in the middle of Hoan Kiem Lake, and it's there for over 300 years.

In the 15th century, a King of Le Dynasty built the ground up in the lake and a small house for fishing. Next in the 18th century the relic of fishing house was no more existed. In 1886, a powerful mandarin decided to build this 3 storey-tower as you can see in the picture to make a place for  his father rest in peace forever. However, it's not used in the buried purpose, so the tower eventually became the tourist hotspot.

There are 3 formal Statue of Liberty in the world as I know: in Bedloe of New York, a much smaller replica in Paris, another in Hongkong. But not every one knows that there is another Statue of Liberty in Vietnam, espcially in Turtle Tower. In the time French army colonised Vietnam, they built a little statue on top of Turtle Tower according to the model of Statue of Liberty they gave American. But when Vietnamese took their power back to track, the Statue was demolished.

This picture I got from Vi Wikipedia and the info I filtered from both Vi and En Wikipedia.

Hoan Kiem Lake

View from the lake's bank.

Hoan Kiem Lake is located in the centre of Hanoi- the capital of Vietnam. It's a symbol, both historic and cultural ones. In this lake there is a large turtle, which is said that there are only 4 survive, 3 in Vietnam and 1 in China. They are on the verge of exctintion. 

This picture I took of the First day of Lunar New Year, when rambling around the Lake.

Chung Cake ( Banh Chung )

A cauldron full of cakes

Besides New Year on the First Day of the Year, Vietnamese have a much more important holiday held after New Year Celebration 1 month - Tet Holiday. It's based on the Lunar Year that Tet was born. Tet is time for gathering everyone after one year of hard-working...


In Tet Holiday, Chung cake is of the most-eaten  traditional food. To make a cake needing so many procedures and boiling 12 hours before get a best one. The image showed the period of boiling Chung cakes in my house.What an experience!


Chung cake is often eaten with "gio"- a kind of minced pork that is boil in 3,4 hours.It's wrapped in some layers of unique leaves only have in Vietnam.

Sadly, not so many families make Chung cake nowadays. Instead, they can go to the supermarket and buy some with a reasonable price and no need to burn much time. 

First entry, not yet first blog.

Hi everyone!


This is the many times I try to create a blog, not only using Blogger as here or the 360blog of Yahoo!. But this time is a new experience, a photos blog telling with you- who cares about my litle Hanoi ( although it's the biggest capital on the world, for sure) - and a place I can put all my works ( photos) up there to share lives in Hanoi.


The first entry with a brand-new photo blog and I hope day by day can log into my account and upload new imange, sharing new story or just a thoughts of my 'bout Hanoi.


Please fell free to add me and don't bother to ask whatever info you like. I 'd love to answer all with my best abilities.Thanks!


Nice day everyone :)