Hanoi has an amazing range of hotels, from five-stars like the Sofitel and the Hilton to cheap mini-hotels and backpacker places. There is another kind of hotel - a guesthouse really - that is also very popular. Known as
Nha Nghi in Vietnamese, different people come to these guesthouses for different purposes, many of them for their secret happy moments!
These places are common all over the city and the people who work there don't need many qualifications. The most important things they need is to be clever, fast in dealing, understanding and ignoring. You also have to know how to warn clients when the police show up and hide any documents or booking information.
Nowadays, there are many young teenage couples who, instead of being at school, play truant and go to hotels to 'study' being adults :). The number of older people who have secret second lovers also choose these places for their own privacy. The guesthouse staff don't care who they are, how old they are or what time they arrive. They give the room and collect the money, mostly by the hour! Such an easy job.
On the down side, some of these guesthouse rooms for drug use, prostitution and gambling. Many people have been caught by police, publicly embarrassed in magazines and the hotel staff also get in big trouble because this is illegal. It is clear that these guesthouses are providing for a demand but the meaning of the word guesthouse has a different meaning in Vietnam!
6 comments:
i remember these in japan, though i never entered one. we westerners just use our homes, and at the time, i was not free to be free (i was staying with someone back in the states and so was "taken"_
i don't think they are illegal in japan, and i don't recall their japanese name.
i remember someone translating it as "hotel for a specific purpose," though we all knew what he meant.
one i passed all the time was called butterfly house (in japanese, but really was a pun of somekind, though it was spelled in romanji (english text) to be "cool." the love hotel must be an asian phenomenon, or is it in other countries, too?
don't get me wrong, i have had to rent a room (once) in order to be with someone, and it was only because he was young and lived with conservative relatives, and i was not being honest about my other relationship.
LOL! I love your wording - 'secret happy moment'. This is the kind of stuff I like to read. Cultural differences. 1)How much does a place like that charges per hour? 2)Are many Vietnamese people having pre-marital sex?
Here in the US, it is very common for couples to have pre-marital sex, mainly because we do not live at home with our parents.
This kind of hotels has been existing in Taiwan for ages, for the same purpose. I'm surprised to find out it does exist in VN too.
Like Thuy said, maybe because in Asian countries, adult children usually live with parents until they get married.
Hey isn t this called
"nha tro", too?
fitzecarraldo, yes, you are right.
Thanks all for your comments.
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