we're either brilliant or really stupid

Clubbing on a Tuesday night?
Why not?

After our weekend escapades, Yushen mentioned that he wanted to go out again this week before we left for our tour of the Central Region and that sounded like a fine plan to me. The thing about Hanoi though is that you never really can make definite plans for a certain day or night because circumstances arise that are just beyond your control. I feel like my motto in Vietnam has pretty much become, "Just go with it." That or, "It could be worse."

I mean, being flexible builds character, right?

So our plan for last night was to meet at 7 pm to get dinner at Ngon (the Vietnamese word for "delicious") and then find a bar or club to go to from there.

Well, turns out, the DukeEngage group had already eaten at Ngon twice before (Dave had suggested it and I just hadn't recognize the name when he said it, though I had actually really liked the place when I went before and, you know, didn't have an order miscommunication), and the guys (yes, I was the only girl of all 6 of us DukeEngage girls that went) didn't want to eat there again, so we headed off in the direction of a dirty kitchen joint, only to find it closed. Next stop? Doner kebob (please note, "Doner" not "Donner"), literally a guy with a cart in an alleyway who carves off meat roasting on a spit and puts it in a baguette for you with sauce, chili, onions, and lettuce for only 15,000 dong (which is a little less than $1).

Before we could make our way over to the lake, though, it started to rain. And rain. And rain. And rain. A Vietnamese guy came over selling rain ponchos (talk about targeting your audience, but we didn't get any), and then it rained some more. By the time we got in a cab, several streets were flooded and we had gotten substantially wet.

So we went to the Dragon Fly bar.

Unfortunately for the bar owner and us, the roof had collapsed, causing the hookah room upstairs to be closed that night. But no matter, drinks were going 25,000 dong each (less than $2), and there was a pool table and a foozeball table, where Johnny, Phil, and I dominated for two games, and then got our asses kicked by one of the bartenders who knows too much foozeball strategy for his own good.

The rain finally had slowed down to a light drizzle by around 10 pm, so we walked back to the guesthouse. By that time, only four of us were still down for going out, so Dave and I rode his bike (with rain ponchos on!), while Yushen and Eliza took a cab.

We were almost at Solace when Dave and I realized that his back tire had gone flat. Luckily for us, motorbike culture in Hanoi is huge and there are motorbike taxis on every street corner with drivers who carry around bags of tools to fix motorbikes, pump tires, etc. We got help from a shirtless motorbike taxi man who had been huddled around a fire (which, in retrospect, makes no sense because 1) it's raining and 2) it's still really hot outside even at night). I'm still adjusting to how cheap labor is around here.

When we got to Solace, we found that, apart from some security guys playing pool and two Americans who insisted on showing Eliza and me pictures of them skateboarding, we were the only ones there.

And sadly the DJ was nowhere to be found about 98% of the night. A few Vietnamese trickled in -- including a group of men who were definitely high on something other than life -- along with a handful of foreigners, but we didn't recognize any more than probably 6 of the songs played and the rest were all generic hip hop/R&B songs that had been altered and messed with.

My night was made, though, by a little Vietnamese man who was an extremely exuberant dancer and who had a penchant for getting low.

That, and Eliza's "skeet skeet skeet" dance move.