Last night we took a cyclo tour of the old quarter and ended at the water puppet show. Each street in the old quarter is dedicated to one product. So there's the mattress street, silver street, sporting goods street, etc. Pretty handy for bargaining!
Water puppets are a traditional Vietnamese art form invented by the farmers to entertain the town during the annual floods. The puppeteers stand behind a screen and move the puppets with a wooden rod that's underneath the puppets. So, the puppets look like they're dancing on water. Traditionally, the craft was only known by one man in the village and he would pass on the knowledge to one of his sons. This is still done in the villages, though in the city there are both male and female puppeteers. The puppeteers often acquired some nasty water-borne diseases, but now wear waist-high rubber pants that protect them.
During the show, they re-enacted the legend of the lake. The emperor was having difficulty defeating the Chinese. As he was boating on the lake in Hanoi a turtle emerged with a special sword. The emperor wa able to defeat the Chinese with the sword. After, he returned to the lake and have the sword back to the turtle.
The story also represents the attitude of the Vietnamese, that after war, you should throw away your weapons and move on. Which makes a lot of sense considering the country has been at war for the last 2000 years. In fact, this has been the longest peacetime that Vietnam has experienced in it's history.
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