It's just that crazy here : ) It's like driving amidst a swarm of bees. People weaving in and out of both lanes and driving all over the road. Nobody drives in a straight line. At a stoplight, (especially during rush hour) people cram into every available inch of space in order to make it through the light when it turns green. When we were driving home from parent teacher conferences last night I felt closter phobic in my own car!
It's actually polite to honk here as a courtesy to other drivers on the road - people just DON'T look around them when they drive, even when merging or turning. I rarely pass a motorbike without honking. Somehow I feel that if I honk 2-3 brief times it is more polite. I remember in the States, if someone would honk at me, I'd often get tears in my eyes because it was so offensive to me: "What? Are you saying I've done something wrong???"
These are some funny things I have seen in the past few days. A motorbike loaded up with mannequin parts. Bodices, heads, arms, etc. were strapped all over his bike, but the thing that was hilarious was that he had the long legs sticking out over his handle bars with the hips resting against his own stomach. From a side view it looked like he was driving his scooter with his own legs sticking over the handle bars. I wished I had the camera!
Today I saw the biggest "banana boat" of a scooter in my life. Imagine a skinny scooter with two ladies perched on it with huge three-foot round, four-foot tall baskets loaded FULL of green bananas on each side, and one strapped on the back. This time I did have the camera, but even going 20 mph it is dangerous to attempt to take a photo while driving.
Here are a couple photos from a blog Christian likes called HanoiJake. We love Vietnam.
