A short tour of the neighbourhood

We are not living in the centre of Hanoi, but rather in a area a little north of the Old Quarter called Tay Ho or Westlake. As the name suggests it is the area that surrounds a rather large lake called Tay Ho or West lake. Unlike the centre of town, which is extremely busy with traffic and people, Tay Ho can feel quite sleepy in parts and has a lot more greenery than I had really associated with Hanoi. While this is less exciting than the Old Quarter, it also makes it a lot more friendly for the kids.

Lily's school is also in Tay Ho, but it's in a particular area of Tay Ho called Ciputra. Ciputra is basically a large gated community for expats. It's clean and tree-lined, but a little lacking in services or character. We toyed with living there so that Lil could walk to school and to the houses of her school friends, but just couldn't bring ourselves to do it in the end. It just felt too weird - like we were avoiding living in Vietnam or something, which wasn't what we wanted. Lily isn't very impressed with our decision...

Here are some photos of our neighbourhood (and a couple of Lil's school from Saturday soccer).

View of the lake from a nearby lane way.

Lily playing soccer at school. (You can see Ciputra in the background)

More soccer. She wasn't so keen on the running part...

Tay Ho flower market.

Kinderpark. Small person heaven. Parental hell.

Fine, I did smile once.

Our local park - a very unusual expanse of grass.

An entrance to the maze of alleyways that lead to our house.

Unusually for Hanoi there is almost no traffic in our area, except twice a month when everyone visits the pagoda.

Our neighbours are currently hosting a funeral party. Apparently it will go for several days.
The music is very loud and Charlie is fascinated by it.