Riding around in traffic

Some would say that traffic in Hanoi is a nightmare, a sea of motorbikes that appear to operate without any rules.  The reality though, is that mobility is pretty good because of the motorbikes, despite being such a densely populated city.  And there are rules, they just seem to be informal and unwritten.  But everyone seems to know them.

Libby and I went for a long bike ride this afternoon in the traffic.  When we first moved here, we couldn't dream of riding bikes in the middle of traffic because it looked so scary to us, but now we almost look forward to riding on the streets.  I was able to safely take a few videos this afternoon while we were riding to capture some of the mundane everyday life of riding in the traffic.

Here's a video of us riding in street traffic, and at the end a motorbike pulls out right in front of me.  Very common:

This is what happens on a major road with lots of motorbikes and a slow bus -- minor traffic jam ensues, but despite the volume of vehicles, the traffic keeps moving:

Just a typical ride in traffic with Lib:

Here's a common event in Hanoi traffic -- needing to make a U-Turn instead of a left-hand turn.  We also have to go across a few lanes of traffic to make our next turn:

And finally a quick video of us at a red light at a busy intersection with cross-traffic going:

Christmas in Hanoi

Getting into the true Christmas spirit can be a little difficult for Americans in Hanoi.  Sure, there are holiday decorations everywhere, such as the two decorated Christmas trees in our apartment lobby, the "Merry Christmas" words painted on restaurant windows, and the Christmas street in the Old Quarter.  But there is something missing, which I can't quite put my finger on.  Maybe it is the fact that it is a Buddhist country, or that people still work and go to school on Christmas, or the warm weather, that there aren't a lot of Christmas traditions in Vietnam.

Someone described Christmas in Vietnam as like Valentine's Day in the U.S., and that feels about right.  Or as an Australian blogger wrote, "The Vietnamese love Christmas.  I mean, they love Christmas...[but] if you've ever wondered what Christmas looks like when it has been stripped of all tradition, all cultural and religious meaning, and all personal significance, and this is it: Christmas in Vietnam."  Her blog entry is really good and deserves to be read in full:  http://blogs.crikey.com.au/back-in-a-bit/2011/12/22/christmas-without-the-tradition-and-religion-welcome-to-vietnam/

But it was still really nice for all six of us to just take a break, relax, open some presents, and enjoy the Christmas Day.

The kids opening some presents.  Christmas was light on the gifts this year since we're coming back to America in a few days and we only have so much room in our luggage for everything, but we still had fun:

Our Christmas lunch did not have any of our traditional foods for the holidays, but it did include food that we had been saving just for this occasion:

After lunch we decided to sit back and watch a holiday classic:

We also let the kids pick where we would spend part of the day, so the kids opted for Royal City for some bowling and pizza:

Merry Christmas from Hanoi!

Christmas Eve Star Wars

Six out of six of us gave it a thumbs up -- that is pretty difficult for a film to accomplish these days:

Bangkok -- Water taxis, Chinatown, and tuk tuks

Our last day in Bangkok started with more street food from the local market and an exploratory water taxi ride in the rain:

After about half an hour on the water taxi, we got off and discovered......another mall.  This time it was simply called, "The Mall".  It was purely an accident that we got off at that stop, but once again the kids didn't seem to mind.

These are the guys that walk on the boat collecting fares and tying the boat up when it docks. He had an "I Love the USA" bandanna on:

We were committed to get to the top of the temple that denied us yesterday, so we returned during daylight hours and climbed the 350 steps to the summit.  It was worth it:

One of our last stops in Bangkok was Chinatown and Yaowarat Street.  Hanoi does not really have a formal Chinatown -- relations between China and Vietnam have always been a little frosty -- so we wanted to see a large vibrant Chinese community while in Thailand:

These pancakes from a street vendor in Chinatown were some of the best we've ever had:

And no trip to Thailand would be complete without a ride on a tuk tuk:

I guess this is one way to get around copyright infringement:

Some airports feel like they could be anywhere in the world.  Not Thailand!