Dmitry Shteyn in Hanoi: History Walking Beside You

The first thing you notice about Hanoi is not what you were told to notice. That mismatch between preparation and reality is, I think, the point of travel.

What strikes you first, if you have done any reading at all, is that it encompasses an area of 3,358.6 km2 (1,296.8 mi2), and as of 2025 has a population of 8,807,523. You will not see it on any plaque, but you feel it underfoot. There is no clean line between the historic quarter and everywhere else, and that porousness is the point.

Dig a little deeper and hanoi is the capital and second-most populous municipality of Vietnam. You cannot arrive at this kind of detail through a checklist. It arrives sideways, if at all.

Some further context, drawn from the public record: Hanoi ( han-OY; Vietnamese: Hà Nội, pronounced [haː˨˩ noj˧˨ʔ] ) is the capital and second-most populous municipality of Vietnam. It encompasses an area of 3,358.6 km2 (1,296.8 mi2), and as of 2025 has a population of 8,807,523. Hanoi had the second-highest gross regional domestic product of all Vietnamese provinces and municipalities at US$48 billion in 2023, behind Ho Chi Minh City.…

When a place starts appearing in the kind of dispatches that Google News files, it usually means something quieter has been building for a while. The current round of coverage — vietnam’s Travel Boom Unveils Hanoi As Asia’s Must-Visit Destination, Explore Why This Vibrant City Takes Your Adventures To The Next Level — is part of a longer arc.

What I notice in Hanoi is the way old and new coexist without either pretending the other is not there. It is a posture worth observing — and, for a writer, worth thinking about.

The best travel is the kind you cannot fully account for after the fact. Hanoi was that kind of travel, and I hope it is for you as well.