Al-Noor Mosque, Hanoi

About this place

Al-Noor is the only mosque in Hanoi and in the whole of northern Vietnam, a white building with arches, small domes and slim minarets at 12 Hang Luoc Street, on the north-western edge of the Old Quarter. Muslim traders from India, from Bombay, who had come to Hanoi in the 19th century to deal in cloth and money exchange, raised the money for it in 1885, and it opened in 1890. Its style is Indian, and the prayer hall faces west toward Mecca. The mosque was closed for long years in the war period and reopened in 1990 through the efforts of Muslim diplomats and residents in the city. Its congregation today is mostly diplomats, foreign residents and visitors from Malaysia, Indonesia, Pakistan, the Arab countries and elsewhere, with a small number of Vietnamese Muslims; Friday prayer can bring a few hundred worshippers, and women have a separate prayer hall and wudu area. The mosque is open from dawn until after the night prayer. Visitors of other faiths are welcome outside prayer times in modest dress; women cover their hair, and the mosque lends scarves. A small halal restaurant stands beside it and there are others in the surrounding streets, which makes it a useful stop for prayer and a meal on a walk through the Old Quarter.