Pieces of Viet Nam

[We leave Hoi An this evening for De Nang and our flights back to Saigon, Bangkok, Melbourne and finally Cairns. (Flying on frequent flier miles can lead to some convoluted routing.) When we return to our computers and reliable internet, we will post more blogs on our visits to Ha Noi, Hue and Hoi An, so this is not the last of our Viet Nam posts. I wanted to give you some of our more memorable impressions as we leave this interesting and beautiful country.]

After spending 3 weeks in Viet Nam, we know that we have just scratched the surface of seeing and experiencing this beautiful and interesting country. As we leave, however, a few nuggets rise to the surface as highlights of things we've learned and experienced that will remain with us long after we've moved on to other adventures and other countries.

Rapidly changing countries requires a bit of adroitness. New language, new alphabet, new currency and exchange rates (such as 1 to 1.3, 1 to 30 or 1 to 20,000), and, switching from driving on the right to driving on the left and back to driving on the right. Nothing, however, prepared us for traffic in Vietnam, so here are A Few Traffic Rules:

• Right on Red OK. Left on Red OK. Straight on Red OK, but proceed with caution.

• Going the wrong way is OK as long as you're going along the curbside.

• Sidewalks are for parked motor scooters, people cooking and eating food, card playing and moving motor scooters. Pedestrians may use whatever little space remains.

• Red lights are optional.

• Lanes are optional. Dynamic reversible lanes are even better. (Two lanes going north and two lanes going south can instantly become 3 lanes going north in a manner than can only be described as organic.)

• The horn is the only means of signaling your presence or intentions. Turn indicators are irrelevant.

• No street intersection will ever be clear and safe for crossing. You have to step out into oncoming traffic, move slowly so that the cars and motor bikes have time to decide how they will go around you, and Keep Moving! once you start.
  

Other nuggets include:

• Same Same: the expression that what you're about to purchase is the same as whatever you originally asked for. Or, whatever you're looking at is just like the original that was first there. It's really a versatile expression and any self-respecting Vietnamese merchant or hawker uses it a thousand times a day. We particularly like it when they say, "Same Same, but Different," or, "Same Same, but Better."

• Men play cards, women work: in every town we visited, it was common to see men of any age squatting on the sidewalk around a piece of cardboard playing cards, most likely poker. Beer (bia in Vietnamese) was an essential component, and occasionally money was also openly at stake, though gambling is frowned upon by the Communist government. Meanwhile, the women nearby would be sweeping the street or selling pho (soup), vegetables, shoes or trinkets.

• Soccer 24/7: European Soccer, especially English Premier League, is always available on Vietnamese television. You may not always get a lot of world news, but you never had to wonder about the latest soccer scores....they're also in the daily papers. Soccer was a nice respite (and a piece of home life) after a full day. Jon was able to watch the Asian Cup being held in Doha and was especially thrilled to watch, live, Wayne Rooney's amazing bicycle kick goal for Manchester United against Manchester City.

• Au Dais and Pointed Straw Hats: It's the quintessential image of Viet Nam. The au dai is the traditional Vietnamese outfit for young women; silk pants worn underneath a long, carefully- and tightly-tailored silk tunic with long slits up the sides. No matter how many Vietnamese women today have modern hair cuts and wear western clothing, seeing the young women in their traditional au dais, pointed straw hats and long black hair is breathtaking.

• Face Masks: While not unique to Vietnam, wearing a face mask that wraps around the ears, much like the kind dentists and surgeons wear, is more the norm than not....and perhaps if we'd worn them too, we wouldn't have this little cough. Initially I thought the masks were worn to prevent the spread of respiratory diseases and because of the pollution and smog in the cities. Since we are here during the dry season, I quickly discovered that the masks are also necessary to keep the dust out of your mouth when riding on a motor scooter, the primary means of transportation.

• Ramps: Each storefront/house we saw on each street had one or two ramps leading up the front steps, ramps to drive up the scooters, or, in rare cases, cars, into the first floor "lobby" of houses and storefronts at night. With streets narrow and sidewalks even narrower, nearly everyone stores their transportation in their houses.

• Shrines: They're everywhere -- against houses, inside houses, on tree trunks, on lampposts -- you see small statues, tiny vases, and incenses sticks everywhere there's a shrine, and around Tet, they crop up in more elaborate ways as well to honor ancestors and gods. Not unlike the roadside gatherings of flowers we see on US highways to mark the site of fatal accidents, these ancestor-worship shrines surrounded us as we walked the streets and alleys of Vietnam.

• Cyclos: These pedal-powered, single seat carriages sit on every street corner in Vietnam, beckoning passersby for a "1 hour ride." As walkers, we learned to turn a deaf ear to their constant solicitations. In Hanoi, one evening, we encountered the remarkable and unnerving sight of about 40 of these strung out in a single-file parade through the streets of the Old Quarter, each carrying an elderly Western tourist. Given the number of crossing streets this parade needed to negotiate, it was a wonder it didn't have its own police escort!