We spent yesterday afternoon and today strolling around Hanoi's Old Quarter. This section of Vietnam's capital is full of tourists, clothing shops, souvenir stalls, street food and more scooters than road space.
The traffic here is certainly busier than quiet Hoi An. The scooters keep to a moderate speed, but there is a constant parade of them through the narrow streets. Crossing the road here is an adventure in itself. If you wanted to wait for a gap in traffic, you'd never cross the street. In order to move, you just have to step into the stream and let drivers weave around you as you make it one step at a time to the other side. It's nice that by midday Molly had stopped saying, "We're gonna die" every time we entered the traffic flow. I'd love to video tape us crossing, but I worry the distraction would be terribly bad for so many.
The Old Quarter streets are divided into shopping themes; shoes, electronics, clothes, silk, jewelry, etc. So this morning, thanks to George's growth spurt, we needed to find shoes. It wasn't hard to identify shoe street and he quickly settled on a pair of Nikes for $40. He bought the ones in the top row, 6th form the left.
The traffic here is certainly busier than quiet Hoi An. The scooters keep to a moderate speed, but there is a constant parade of them through the narrow streets. Crossing the road here is an adventure in itself. If you wanted to wait for a gap in traffic, you'd never cross the street. In order to move, you just have to step into the stream and let drivers weave around you as you make it one step at a time to the other side. It's nice that by midday Molly had stopped saying, "We're gonna die" every time we entered the traffic flow. I'd love to video tape us crossing, but I worry the distraction would be terribly bad for so many.
The Old Quarter streets are divided into shopping themes; shoes, electronics, clothes, silk, jewelry, etc. So this morning, thanks to George's growth spurt, we needed to find shoes. It wasn't hard to identify shoe street and he quickly settled on a pair of Nikes for $40. He bought the ones in the top row, 6th form the left.
The city is a photographer's paradise. I keep my phone/camera in my pocket most of the time just so I can look where I'm walking on the broken sidewalks. I know I miss a lot of beautiful and disturbing shots, but at least I have the memories. Here's a little of what we saw.
A flower vendor
The sidewalks are so full of parked scooters that we usually have to walk on the street. There's no traffic in this shot, which is why I could pause for the photo.
This is the decoration street. Lunar New Year in just 4 weeks away.
Property is taxed based on the width of the street/store front. Therefore, most people build very narrow but tall and long buildings. This one would be about 7 feet wide.
How do you think Ontario Hydro and Bell Canada would react to the mess of wires on this pole?
Tonight we caught a cab to what was supposed to be a funky market-style restaurant hangout, but we were disappointed by the lack of people in the area. Choosing not to dine alone, we headed out to the streets from something more interesting. When we passed a Czech restaurant, Barry paused to explain what the food would be like. As they straddled an open sidewalk gutter to chat, I noticed a dead rat mixed with some garbage right below them. I'm so glad I'm getting better at hiding my shock from the kids, and it's impressive to see what the kids now view as normal; 3 weeks ago they would have been appalled by the open gutters and garbage whereas today, they didn't even notice a giant rat in their midst.
So, in case you're wondering, they're learning lots.
So, in case you're wondering, they're learning lots.
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