8th June - Hanoi

A pretty uneventful day. We've seen pretty much everything that there is to see in Hanoi. Despite being crazily busy, there isn't that much to do other than a few museums that we're not really interested in and going to see Ho Chiu Min's body at the Mauseleum - which we're never up in time for.

A good few hours were spent looking for a pair of shorts for me. New clothes are always a bit of a trial because Asian women are so tiny and I am not. I tried to look at some things on a stall in the huge indoor market but got my hand slapped away by the woman, who gestured that I was too fat for them.

I found a pair in a shop that had been recommended as selling 'big' sizes by Tuey. Matt helped me pick up everything that was in the largest size and I took them to the changing room, stepped over the woman working there who was asleep in the middle of floor and proceeded to try and squeeze my chunky, sweaty limbs into them. Nothing was very suitable and I soon went off the idea because of the heat and the unlikeliness of finding anything.

After we'd been shepherded down a particular set of stairs and out of the door, Matt spotted a more suitable pair of shorts in the bargain bin and so I made my way back to the sticky-hot changing room. This time, the woman inhabiting it was awake and playing with her phone, though she was still prostrate on the floor. The shorts fit and so I happily made my way downstairs to pay, only to remember that we hadn't been to the ATM and so we had no money.

All that sorted, we pretty much spent the rest of the day mooching around before deciding to go and see how much beer hoi you had to drink to get a hangover. At Beer Hoi 45, we met Harry and Sabi - an Australian guy and French girl. They were really nice and we made our way through many beers, talking about Harry's career as a chef and Sabi's experiences as a language assistant in Birmingham.

On our first visit to Beer Hoi 45, the guy there had shown us a picture of a hugely fat English guy and told us that he had drunk 17 beers. We worked out that those 17 beers had still worked out cheaper than one pint of lager in the UK and much cheaper than in Paris and Australia!

On our way for some food at the end of the evening, Harry's arm was clipped by a bike. He was fine but the bike went down and skidded down the road a bit. The driver was uncharacteristically apologetic but as there was no real damage done, we all went on our way. Given the sheer volume of bikes and people, I'm amazed it wasn't much worse but thankfully it was a quiet time in the street and so no-one else was hurt.