Hanoi has an elegance, a grace, unlike any other city in Asia . It is a stately capital, an old grande dame whose worn beauty hints at untold stories - a secret past. It is a city that invites nostalgia, just as it invites questions: Who else has stopped beneath this spreading banyan tree? Who once lived in that proud colonial villa? Who lives there now? In the wide, tree-lined boulevards of the French Quarter, the past is palpable. History clings to the sun-drenched walls like moss.