Hanoi

The site has been settled since before recorded history, but the city dates itself to 1010, when Lý Thái Tổ moved his capital from Hoa Lư to a bend in the Red River and named it Thăng Long, the ascending dragon. For most of the next eight centuries it was the royal city of Vietnam: the Lý, Trần and Lê dynasties built their citadel here, Confucian scholars sat examinations at the Temple of Literature, and the craft guilds that supplied the court settled street by street in what became the Old Quarter. Mongol armies sacked the city three times in the 13th century, and Ming occupation followed in the 15th.

In 1802 the Nguyễn dynasty moved the court to Huế, and the demoted city was renamed Hà Nội, the city inside the river bend, in 1831. French forces took it in the 1880s, and from 1902 it served as the capital of French Indochina. Much of the old citadel was demolished, boulevards, villas, an opera house and the Long Biên Bridge went up, and the city became a centre of colonial administration and of the nationalist movement that opposed it.

On 2 September 1945 Hồ Chí Minh declared independence on Ba Đình Square. After the French defeat in 1954 Hanoi became the capital of North Vietnam, and from 1965 it was bombed repeatedly, most heavily in December 1972. It became the capital of the reunified country in 1976. Since the Đổi Mới reforms of 1986 it has grown enormously, absorbing the neighbouring province of Hà Tây in 2008 and spreading west across former paddy fields.

Hanoi thinks of itself as the keeper of Vietnamese tradition, and defends the distinction with some pride against the commercial energy of the south. Speech is more formal, manners more reserved, and the Confucian respect for learning is visible: families still bring students to burn incense at the Temple of Literature before examinations, and the city's universities and academies carry unusual weight.

Its classical arts belong to the delta. Water puppetry, in which lacquered figures are worked by hidden puppeteers standing waist-deep behind a screen, moved from village ponds to permanent theatres here. Ca trù, the sung poetry of old Hanoi performed by a singer with clappers, a lute and a praise drum, is recognised by UNESCO as intangible heritage in need of safeguarding. Lacquer and silk painting developed at the colonial fine arts college in the 1930s and remain the signature media of Vietnamese art.

Daily custom is orderly and family-centred. Ancestors are honoured on an altar in almost every home, death anniversaries matter more than birthdays, and the lunar calendar governs the year. Older residents exercise around the lakes at first light; evenings belong to bia hơi corners, tea stalls on the pavement and pavement cafés. Hanoians are direct about money and slow to warm, and newcomers often find the city closed at first and generous once known.

About 8.8 million people live within Hanoi's administrative boundary, which reaches far into rice-growing countryside; the continuously built-up city is smaller. It is the seat of government, and ministries, the party apparatus, embassies, hospitals and universities employ a large share of residents. Around the edges, industrial parks assemble electronics and other goods for export, drawing workers from the delta villages.

Housing ranges from the narrow tube houses of the old streets, three or four storeys on a plot only a few metres wide, through Soviet-era collective blocks now heavily patched and extended, to the apartment towers and gated developments spreading west and north. Many families still live above a shop or workshop, and the ground floor is used for parking motorbikes.

The day begins early. Exercise groups and badminton fill the lakesides before six, breakfast is eaten out at a noodle stall, and children are delivered to school by motorbike in the crush that follows. Offices break for a long lunch and a nap; late afternoon brings a second rush, and the evening belongs to beer corners, tea stalls and the lake. Congestion, winter smog, flooding after heavy rain and the cost of housing are the constant complaints, along with the disappearance of old villas and paddy fields to new building.

Hanoi's cooking is restrained: less sugar and fewer herbs than the south, clear broths, and a heavy reliance on fish sauce, vinegar and fresh raw vegetables. The city claims phở as its own and serves it with little more than spring onion, the beef version simmered from bones and charred ginger. Bún chả — grilled pork patties and belly served in a bowl of sweet-sour broth with cold rice noodles and herbs — is the classic lunch, and chả cá, turmeric-marinated fish fried at the table with dill, has a street named after it.

Breakfast and snack dishes are just as fixed. Bánh cuốn are paper-thin steamed rice rolls filled with minced pork and wood-ear mushroom; bún thang is a delicate chicken, egg and pork noodle soup made from leftovers of the new year feast; bún đậu mắm tôm pairs fried tofu and noodles with fermented shrimp paste. In autumn the city eats cốm, young green rice pounded flat and wrapped in lotus leaves.

Drinking is its own ritual. Bia hơi, a light draught beer delivered fresh each day, is poured on pavement corners for a few thousand đồng a glass. Coffee is strong and filtered, often with condensed milk, and Hanoi invented cà phê trứng, topped with whipped egg yolk. Green tea, lotus tea and rice spirit complete the repertoire.