Hanoi Rocks

Mike Cho and I arrived in Hanoi in one sleepy piece after walking Seoul for a day.

Seoul was great. There are LOTS of Korean people there and Mike was cracking them up just like he does here (except he was doing it in Korean, which meant that I was only laughing because Mike sounded exactly like Mike, except speaking a different language, which is more funny-weird than funny-ha-ha). In the end we got our fill of kimchee and these spicy dough thingies and deep fried octopus tentacles. We met a dude at some national palace type thing who, after telling us the place was closed, immediately beseeched us to go see some blockbuster korean "Saving Private Ryan" type movie. We told him we were leaving that very day and he said, get a flight tomorrow and go see this movie. Damn! That must be a good movie.

Once I figure out how to transfer pictures to this blog I'll post some pictures of the various cartoon characters that saturate official communication in Seoul. There was little yellow condom man that had something to do with bathrooms, recycling and garbage trucks; there was flying squirell-pig that who was the airport mascot and said simply "we love you"; there was the pig-cop that was actually the police station mascot. Hell yeah!

Its raining in Hanoi today but since the weather is so warm we'll be heading out in speedos and flip-flops in true tourist style. We got a few weird looks at breakfast because Mike's speedo rides a little low, but with all the western television and advertising here I think most Vietnamese know that sometimes, to look cool, you need to be a little uncomfortable.