Upon visiting the hotel’s websites, we were convinced to stop our search for a cheap back packer’s hotel. Indeed, we have found the ideal place to stay in Hanoi Vietnam. The Original Especen Hotel was not only highly recommended by Lonely Planet but was also highly recommended by many travel guides both in print and online.

A single room cost only $17.00 USD while a room for two costs somewhere from $20 to $25.00. The pictures of the rooms in the website were quite impressive considering the price and we decided to contact the hotel. I found out that they answer questions via live chat through yahoo, skype and live messenger so I contacted them via yahoo. The person on the other end was pleasant to converse with, spoke good English and satisfactorily answered all my questions. There was no required down payment for a reservation so we made our booking. Reading online that a lot of tourist got ripped off by taxis in airport, we asked the hotel to arrange for transportation to fetch us at the airport for $15 USD.

Well the day came for our trip to Hanoi, Vietnam and as I mentioned in my post entitled “First impressions of a first timer in Vietnam” we were fetched by the airport by the hotel arranged transportation without a hitch.

We checked in at the counter, and the guy directed us to the other hotel site which was about a minute away. The website mentioned that they have 4 hotels in the area; I initially thought that they were far apart from each other, but they were only each a minute away from each other. The people manning the front desk were accommodating and warm. They can converse in straight English but because of the Vietnamese accent; there are words that you can’t understand. If they see that you seem not to understand, they write the word on paper so that you can really understand what they are trying to say. To some certain extent, I consider their English to be good, save for some few words and the accent of course. That was my first taste of “Vietlish” or Vietnamese English. The website advertised free tea in the lobby, but I haven’t tried that one out. All Especen lobbies have computers with internet connection which you can use for free if you didn’t’ bring any gadget along. They booked us at the double room for $20.00

The hotel room was as what the picture in the website promised. There’s nothing like a nice, clean and cool hotel room to relax in after a long day of travel. As if the air-conditioning is not enough, a fan is provided. But for us the air-conditioning was already sufficient. Water pressure in the toilet was ok. The room has CRT television with cable, a small fridge and internet connection, something we can’t live without. Drinking bottled water and other drinks in the room is not free, but the price is the same as buying it outside. We stayed in the 4th floor. The downside of this was that since there was no elevator, we have to walk all the way up. Good thing we are backpackers and don’t carry a lot of load. A tip if you are not a light traveler, request for a room on the 1st or 2nd. Floors. We stayed in this room for 2 days because we have to go to Halong Bay for 2 days.

The Original Especen Hotel’s 4 sites is located in small alleys, a minute or two walk from the main streets, which of course is a good thing as there is much less noise inside the rooms. Another good thing about The Original Especen Hotel is that it is located within the tourist area where everything is within a minute or 15 minutes walk maximum. As I mentioned in my post “Shopping in Vietnam and sight seeing,” attractions are within the 10 minute walking radius like the water puppet theatre, Hoan Kiem Lake, St. Joseph’s Cathedral, souvenir shops and art galleries. If you are willing to walk for 20 minutes to half an hour from the hotel more attractions such as museums and temples awaits you. You can all search these out in Google maps or any other online map.

The Original Especen Hotel is also located nearby street food stalls, in fact there’s even one a stone’s throw away, just right across our hotel where we ate Pho almost every morning. I wrote about this in my post entitled “Fooling with Pho.” A plethora of restaurants, coffee shops, book shops and shops selling almost anything also abound nearby. The front desk staff was helpful enough to give us a printed out map of the area and made sure we had a calling card so that we can show it to somebody in case we get lost. They also exchange your U.S dollars which according to their site is higher than the banks. I have not verified this, but I’ll take their word for it and I did most of my money exchanging with them. The front desk staff was also nice enough to give us some tips when going around the city such as paying in local currency instead of U.S dollars. As it was consistently raining, they were also kind enough to let us borrow umbrellas whenever we go out. Just like any other hotel in the area, The Original Especen Hostel also offers tours in coordination with travel agencies. We booked most of our tours from them. If you don’t want to book from them you can book at other Tour booking offices near the area. Perhaps you might be interested in “hotel hopping” to review other hotels or guest houses, no problem as these all abound nearby. But for us, we are very satisfied and pleased with our stay at The Original Especen Hostel.

When we came back from our trip from Halong bay since our original room was not available anymore we transferred to another Original Especen Hotel site which was again just a minute away by foot from where we previously stayed. We booked this room in advance, and it was much bigger and nicer than the previous room and it cost us only $5.00 USD more. This room is located on the second floor and is an upgrades version of our previous room as it has all the amenities but with flat screen T.V, bigger in size including the toilet and much more nicer furnishings.

Oh by the way they call it “The Original Especen Hostel” because according to their website “Beware of FAKE hotel at 13 & 26 Ngo Huyen street.” Apparently there’s another hotel considered a competition of the same name in the area. I’ve seen this other hotel and we past by it every morning. I don’t know much about Vietnamese laws but this seems to be a trademark violation in most countries. The other hotel’s signboard is blue, and their name is just “Especen hotel.” It seems like, according to an online search that “Especen” is a generic term and is short for “Esperanto,”a widely spoken constructed international auxiliary language. Luckily when you type “Especen Hostel” their site shows first in Google.

In most travel sites like Travel advisor, The Original Especen Hostel gets close to perfect ratings, albeit with a few negative comments. But the hotel management seems to be monitoring this and always takes time to respond to any complaint and negative comment. It may not be the cheapest hotel by some standards in the area but in my opinion this hotel is cheap considering the quality of their service and gives you the best value for money when staying in Hanoi, Vietnam. So whenever you are in Hanoi Vietnam, skip the luxury 5 star hotels and get closer to everyday Vietnamese life while staying at a comfortable, nice clean and decent hotel that gives you the best value for your money. By the way, this isn’t a paid review. Click here to visit The Original Especen Hotel.

Our second day in Vietnam was devoted to this particular travel ritual. Fortunately, our hotel is located within the old quarters of Hanoi which is a known tourist’s area and famous for its souvenir shops. A few steps from our hotel and it’s already shopper’s paradise. Our hotel is also strategically located and attractions within the 15 minute radius like the Water Puppet theater, Hoan Kiem Lake, souvenir shops, art galleries are all nearby.The landmark, centuries old St. Joseph’s Cathedral which was built in 1886 and has a neo-Gothic style architecture is also only 2 to 3 minutes walk from our hotel.

In Hanoi it is not uncommon to find streets selling a particular product. The main market where you can get much cheaper souvenir items is only a few blocks away. But as we walked towards that direction, we were distracted by the souvenir shops along the way, so we decided not to go to the main market but instead do our shopping in the streets of Hanoi, besides prices in Vietnam are cheap.

The first items we bought were souvenir items such as key chains, shirts, bags and trinkets among others. Most stores in Vietnam accept local currency, the Vietnamese Dong (VND) and U.S dollar, but it is more advisable to change your money in Dong and I will give you a reason why. A dong is about 20,000+ to a U.S dollar (20,916 as of the time of this writing) so if you buy an item say worth 20,000 Dong, you will then ask how much is the item in U.S dollar to which the vendor will normally reply 1 U.S dollar. Trust me the guy is not trying to rip you off. He is saying this for practical reasons because they don’t have coins to give you change for your 1 U. S dollar. Beside the currency fluctuates every minute, so it’s sort of a margin of safety for them. So if you do the math, when you pay 1 U.S dollar you loose about 900+ Dong. At first it does not mean anything, after all 900 Dong is only about .04 U.S dollars. But keep on doing that and it will become a much more significant amount.

An interesting thing caught my eye in one of the shops we visited and that is small bottles with snakes and scorpions inside. I asked what that concoction is all about. The shop keeper said its snail oil which is said to be general purpose oil for body pain. He said you could even drink it to increase your performance (*wink* I’m sure you know what he meant) Now the shop keeper may not be snake oil salesman but I decided not to buy any of it because I didn’t want to be carrying around any breakables and I was also afraid it won’t go through security check.

Going further we came across a lot of art shops. Somebody told us that art work is a big thing in Vietnam, so we set our minds to buy a painting. The first shop we went into gave us a steep price. I am not an art expert but I’ve bought some paintings in Manila, and I can tell if the price is reasonable or not. The next art shop we visited gave us a somewhat reasonable price. The prices were in fact lower than that in Manila, so we decided to buy two paintings there. The gallery owner gave us her calling card and told us that her artists can duplicate any painting and that she can ship anywhere in the world. I wondered why there were lots of art gallery and other art shops in the area. Later on during our city tour, I learned that Hanoi is a 1,000+ year old city and that the tourist area now is where the artisan shops are located. So since time immemorial, artisans have been practicing their craft for centuries already in that area.

After an exhausting shopping experience, we decided to go to a nearby lake-park in the area called Hoan Kiem Lake. I broached the idea of going around the lake, but my wife refused as she was too tired to walk. So we just took pictures of the area had coffee and went back to the hotel. Ah no more shopping at last.

Ph? which is pronounced as “fo” when you say “foreigner” with a rising intonation in the letter “o,” is a delectable Vietnamese rice noodle soup and served with Vietnamese basil, mint leaves, lime and bean sprouts among others which is added by the person who is eating it. The meat in the soup could either be beef which is called locally as ph? bò or chicken called locally as ph? gà. Touted to be Vietnam’s national dish, according to Wikipedia it is listed at number 28 on the World’s 50 most delicious foods as compiled by CNN Go in 2011.

When you walk the streets of Vietnam, you can find Pho served almost everywhere from street stalls, to five star hotels. This is so because according to a local, the regular Vietnamese diet consisted of eating Pho in the morning and for lunch among others with rice serve only at dinner time. The dish has become such a favorite not only among Vietnamese locals but also among foreigners that some enterprising Vietnamese started to brand this favorite local dish. Following the western “fast food chain-franchising” business model, Pho has now a total of 77 outlets and is now available in Indonesia, Hong Kong, Macau, Cambodia, Singapore, Korea, Australia and even in Manila Philippines (Which they would put up one soon in Cebu) through the company Pho 24 which is owned by Nam An Group, the biggest food and beverage Corporation in Vietnam. Now take that McDonalds!

In the Philippines we have our own answer to McDonalds and that is Jollibee, which of course we are so proud of because it is only in the Philippines where the McDonalds is not the number one fast food franchise chain because it is unseated by the big fat bee. Jolllibee’s dominance over McDonalds is of such interest that it is now a business case study in Harvard business school. Sadly unlike Pho24, the flagship product of Jollibee is not a native Filipino dish but westernized fast food products. Sure, the taste is Filipino and we have a smattering of other Filipino dishes served in Jollibee’s menus, but I would have preferred that the flagship product should have been a Filipino dish.

Anyway, back to Pho. I told my wife if she can replicate Pho, considering that she is such an outstanding cook. She said she can if she had the ingredients. But the ingredients such as the rice noodles, herbs and spices are only available in Vietnam. These local ingredients are what make Pho have its unique taste.

Although at first glance, Pho may seem to have the same flavor considering the similarity in ingredients, the taste of Pho differs depending on the quantity and the type of ingredients that are mixed with it. The personal biases when it comes to taste palette of the person cooking it are also taken into consideration. In Vietnam, I’ve eaten Pho on the street, in restaurants and even in Pho24, and I can tell you each has its own unique flavor. So if you ask me where to eat Pho, well since I prefer experiencing local cuisine first at the grass roots (read street food) which I wrote about in the post “Eating street food in Vietnam” I advice eating Pho at stalls in the streets. But if you just want to be extra cautious you can eat it at Pho24, restaurants or hotels.

A bowl of Pho in the streets cost about 25,000 Dong (Which is about $ 1.25+ or PhP 50.00+) Pho24 sells it at double the price, but what the heck, you get to eat at an air-conditioned restaurant and you might be concerned about eating in the streets so you should consider this option. Besides Pho24 sells other culinary Vietnamese wonders that you might want to try out. The price might be higher in restaurants and posh hotels because of the ambiance (So make sure not to order the ambiance)

Nobody ever goes to Vietnam without eating Pho and nobody can truly say he has gone to Vietnam without eating Pho. The name shouldn’t concern you, as some people may be afraid that they might poo frequently if they eat Pho. (During our city tour in Hanoi when our guide took us to Pho24, a foreigner refused to eat Pho, boy he missed a half of his life !) I assure you Pho is among the best bowl of noodle soups I have ever tasted. Oh by the way, if ever we bump into each other or anywhere else where Pho is available, I’ll be glad to accept your invitation for a bowl of Pho because I’m always happy to fool around with Pho.

Our first taste of Vietnamese street food is what is being touted as the national dish of Vietnam, no other than Pho. This one of a kind Vietnamese concoction has such a unique culinary adventure in it of itself that wrote another post on this entitled “Fooling with Pho“. Pho stalls and stands are in almost every street corner, nook and cranny of Hanoi. This was our first dinner on Vietnamese soil and we were craving for more Vietnamese street food !

Going back to the hotel, we stopped by a nearby alley were locals were sitting on small chairs and feasting on some kind of barbecue. We bought 10 pieces of this great tasting hot and spicy barbecued pork and some smoked dried squid which was wrapped in newspaper. The girl we bought it from had a hard time understanding what we were trying to stay. She has to call somebody who can speak some English in order to take our order.

The next day, our first breakfast was the ever famous Pho again! We can’t seem to get enough of this stuff! We had it almost every morning at a Pho stall right across our hostel. The girl we are buying it from can’t speak English so we resorted to using sign language and do just two thing P & P. (Point and Pay) It seems that we were the only non Vietnamese who were the regular customers for that week and the locals were smiling when we ate regularly with them.

I can understand that some travelers would not dare to eat street food because they are considering health and sanitary reasons. It is true that it is quite hard to get sick when you are so far away from your country and you will have to exercise sound judgment when it comes to this. But what the heck! As Mark Twain once said “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” And I might add to Mr. Twain’s ever famous quote “ . . . make sure to eat street food.” However if it is visibly unsanitary then you shouldn’t eat. One can see that Pho sold in the streets is cooked over a boiling pot. It would seem from the looks of it that no living microorganism would ever survive that process.

Street vendors in traditional Vietnamese hats hawked their goods. I was stopped by one of them and she was selling some kind of fried bread in different shapes. I can relate to this because in the Philippines we have a similar street food which we call as “Shakoy.” Since the street hawker couldn’t speak English I resorted to P & P. It seems that she did not know what I wanted or how much I wanted so she placed 3 pieces first and looked at me. I tried telling her how much it cost but it seem she did not understood me or perhaps she was thinking that I wanted more, so she put in another 3 pieces in the plastic. Then she pointed to my money and tried to take 60,000 dong, to which I protested deeming it to be too much, but she pointed to the items in the plastic. I protested because I didn’t know if what she was asking was worth it. She took 3 pieces back and asked for 30,000 dong to which I gave in. (25,000 Dong is about 1 U.S dollar or P 40 pesos plus) I was not sure if I have bought it at a bargain or not, so I asked our hostel front desk how much it really cost. They said a piece cost about 10,000 Dong so it would seem that I was not being conned. I however learned two things when buying street food, first is research first or ask your hostel how much is the price of a certain street food so that you will have an idea as to how much it really cost and second is to prepare small bills and don’t flash around your money when buying street food.

With all its flavorful street food, the excitement in communicating with street vendors who barely speaks English and eating beside the street as the millions of motorcycles in Hanoi passes you by, nothing beats eating street food in Vietnam and I wouldn’t trade it for eating at some posh hotel!

But despite that I still have this itching feeling to visit the place. So when Tiger Airways announced that they will be having their maiden flight (Which was on sale at about $ 100.00 (U.S) or Php 4200+ all in back and forth per person) from Cebu, Philippines to Singapore, I immediately booked two tickets for me and my wife. I knew Singapore was the hub to other Tiger Airways destinations. We were confused as to whether to go to Ho Chi Minh or Hanoi City, but we decided to go to Hanoi City so that we can visit the UNESCO World Heritage Site, Halong Bay. Ho Chi Minh city will have to wait in another trip, one in which Cambodia will be included since it is only 6 hours away. The back and forth Singapore – Hanoi ticket costs us $ 140+ (U.S) or Php6,100.00)

Our flight from Cebu to Singapore left on September 6, 2011. We stayed in Singapore for a night and then took the Tiger Airways flight to Hanoi the next day. After a 2 hour flight we touched down at Hanoi’s Noi Bai International Airport and then proceeded to immigration. I was surprised that we were not asked to fill out an immigration card. I’ve been to a lot of countries but this is the first country I’ve been where no immigration entry card is required. (Until now I still don’t have a clue as to what the purpose of the immigration card, because for me it’s just a waste of paper, considering that all our data is already in the passport which is encoded in the computer, so it’s a good thing that Vietnam doesn’t require this) Since the Philippines and Vietnam is part of the ASEAN, we entered Vietnam visa free. I noticed that some Caucasians got their visas upon entry.

Immigration was a breeze and since we only carried backpacks, we were one of the first ones to exit the airport. I already arranged somebody from our hotel to pick us up since I’ve read in the internet that there are a lot of first time visitors who were ripped off by some unscrupulous taxi drivers in Vietnam. We will be staying at The Original Especen hotel in the center of the Old Quarter in Hanoi, which is a tourist area. Take note that they call it “The Original” because according to them there is another hotel in the same area with the same name. The 45 minute ride from the airport to the hotel cost us about $15.00 (U.S) or about Php 630.00. I wanted to confirm if we got a good deal for this arranged ride, so later on in the trip I asked another foreigner how much he paid for a taxi from the airport, he said the driver told him $30.00 (U.S) but he insisted on lowering the price, so the driver slashed it to $15.00 which is about the same price we paid, so it seemed ok.

Our Vietnamese driver couldn’t speak much English. For us to identify him, he just held up a signboard with our names on it. He led us to the car, helped us with our bags and drove off. There was some sort of festival going when we arrived so traffic ranged from light to moderate and little bit heavy in the small streets.

As we drove to the hotel, I noticed how progressive Vietnam has become. I’ve read news articles about the economic successes of the country and how it has become one of the fastest growing economies in the region, but now I have seen first hand what this really means. Huge modern buildings can be seen right across Hanoi’s landscape. Billboard ads with neon signs litter the highways. Vietnam’s road network is also quite well developed. The improvements that you can see might not be comparable to that of first world industrialized nations, but give Vietnam another 20 to 30 or so years and I’m sure the country will propel to first world status if they maintain the same rate of growth. If you ask economists, the growth in this century they say is first with BRIC, (Brazil, Russia, India and China) followed by the Next Eleven or N-11 in which Vietnam and the Philippines are included. The BRIC together with N-11 are said to be the countries that has the potential to become the world’s largest economies in the 21st century. In the ASEAN region, the emerging growing economies are called VIP or Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines.

Being part of the so called next emerging markets Vietnam and the Philippines have so much in common in terms of economic growth. Its land area is more less the same, albeit Vietnam is a little bit bigger. Population wise, both countries have about 90 million people and both countries’ history is marked by several decades of foreign colonization. That is why when we drove the streets of Vietnam that night I immediately felt at home. The streets were just like passing by the streets of Metro Manila or Cebu where people were standing by outside, eating street food and just loitering around to pass the time by and the traffic is as crazy as the Philippines ! Small mom and pop stores or what we know in the Philippines as sari2x stores are also found in almost every corner. The Vietnamese are also a warm, friendly, hospitable and smiling people just like Filipinos.

However there’s one thing that separates the streets of Vietnam from that of the Philippines and that is the millions of motorbikes that zooms pasts its streets everyday ! I couldn’t believe the number of motorbikes that I saw. I don’t even see this much motor bikes in the Philippines! They say there are about 50 million motorbikes in the country, that means about half the population has a motorbike. A local later on told us that even some of the rich people prefer to travel on a motorbike not only because it is the “in” thing to do but because of its convenience and practicality.

So that you will get a feel of what I am describing, here is a video we took while we drove through the streets of Hanoi Vietnam. The music you can hear in the background is a Vietnamese folk song which is being played using native Vietnamese musical instruments.

After going through the big hi-ways and passing by the crazy streets of Hanoi, we finally arrive at our destination, The Original Especen hotel. You can read about my review of this hotel in the post entitled “Hotel Review: The Original Especen Hotel Hanoi Vietnam” . After checking in, we dropped off our bags and went for sumptuous street food dinner which I will also write about more in another post. Our exciting journey in Vietnam has just begun and we needed rest for that and as the Vietnamese say, Xin chao, see you on the next post and stay tuned for more of our adventures in Vietnam.