Hanoi 2

Banh My Nhu Y
French bread, mayonnaise, fried egg, meatloaf type meat, thinly sliced chicken, thinly sliced pork, chili sauce, cucumber strips, carrot and green mango slaw
This was so delicious and only cost 20,000 dong ($0.95)!

Went to the lake to relax and read. Then went to Ngoc Son Temple (which is located in the lake) thinking it was where the water puppet show was. I was wrong hah. But this temple explained the famous tortoise story. According to legend, an emperor was boating on the lake when a Golden Turtle God surfaced and asked for his magic sword. The emperor concluded that the Turtle God had come to reclaim the sword that its master, the Dragon King, had given the Turtle God some time earlier, during his revolt against the Chinese Ming Dynasty. There have been various sightings of a large soft shell turtle in the lake, despite the species being critically endangered. Turtles/tortoises are lucky in Vietnam, along with dragons, phoenix, and unicorns!

I found the Water Puppet Show just across from the temple and was thoroughly entertained by this incredibly creative show! It was different from what I expected and I was very impressed by the show and how seamless the puppets danced in the water.

Ate Pho Ga with the other American for dinner and it was of course different from pho in the States. There were less veggies, which I was a bit disappointed in, but it was delicious nonetheless.

We were wanting something sweet after dinner and went on a quest for bubble tea. Our efforts were realized just north of the lake and we strolled along the active border while enjoying our boba, mine was refreshing lychee :-) We sat for a bit watching salsa dancing. It's so cute seeing Vietnamese people dancing to Latin music! They have the steps down but the rhythm is still a little off ;-) It ended around 10pm so we headed back to the hostel before we got bold enough to join :-P