Anything goes!

Despite the natural course of adaptation to a country, there are still many things that continue to surprise me.

Street Karaoke

This is one of Asia's favourite entertainment activities (I say "Asia's" because it seems to be a national sport in most of the countries I've visited so far). There are many levels of karaoke, from the little hole in the wall where they have an outdated television and lulling Vietnamese songs, to the classy and luxurious ones like the Jaguarudi next to my house exposing flashy and tacky LED lights scattered all over its 4-storey facade. The young and the wealthy go to this particular spot: young ladies in their vertiginously high heels and shockingly short mini skirts escorted by young men in fancy cars groomed to envy Diesel's latest photoshoot.

View of Lake Truc Bach

But there are some that have brought karaoke to a whole new level: street karaoke. The men (I have yet to see a woman doing this) work either alone on in pairs and are equipped with two to three speakers set on wheels. Tugging along their homemade device with one arm and armed with a microphone in the other, these young men wander around Hanoi's neighbourhoods "offering" sad Vietnamese love songs at an extremely high… volume. This could remain a simply comical occurrence did they not have the tendency to practice this activity at hours which should be devoid of any disturbing noise. Their favourite days to exercise their dissonant falsetto appear to be exactly synchronized with my desire to sleep-in on Saturday and Sunday mornings. In fact, now that the construction next door is seemingly approaching its final touches, I am still awoken at 7am weekends but this time by a wannabe virtuoso singer strolling the neighbourhood seeking fame.

Street anarchy

One might think that after living 8 months in this traffic stricken country, nothing would surprise me anymore. Unfortunately that's not the case. It's funny because to this day, my Vietnamese colleagues and counterparts frequently tell me how "courageous" I am to drive a motorbike.

Forget about rules. Of course they have them, but they are never enforced. Even the policemen that stand on the side of the road (and that only seem to stop women) issue tickets to their victims for the most far-fetched violations. Thankfully they never stop foreigners since policemen's English skills are non-existent and therefore, to avoid losing face, they much rather prefer stopping people who understand the charges, or least act like they do, and pay the price (on the spot, of course).  

There is one rule that I have learned: the law of the biggest. It is extremely important to follow this rule unless you want to risk your life. Pedestrians are the lowest caste in this pyramidal scale, meaning that basically everything roaming the streets and sidewalks (even sidewalks are far from being a safe haven) can be a threat to one's safety. Second to last on the scale are bicycles followed by motorbikes. When it comes to cars, it is not only size that counts, but what type of car you own. A Mercedes is more dangerous than a Toyota and a Bentley more than a Range Rover. You therefore need to know your cars. Now, you might be wondering who the real cowboys are. Well, believe it or not: public buses! The most dangerously life-threatening vehicles let loose and impossible to tame are the red and yellow, toxically asphyxiating city buses. Just this morning I saw a young woman one-third of the way to crossing the street (and mind you, it was green for pedestrians) that suddenly a bus turned right and blasted his deafening honk warning her to get out of his way if she cared for her life. The poor woman, staggered, clumsily bounced back avoiding instant death by miracle.   

The city creeping into the countryside

Another very important rule is: look in all directions before acting, but once you've chosen to act, never hesitate. Ignore anything that might look like a red light, one-way street, sidewalk or a pedestrian. When you're out in the open, you're automatically at risk, no matter what. Forget any common sense or good-street-etiquette rules because you will not survive. First of all, you must always look in all directions when crossing the street or even going through a green light on a motorbike: you never know when a bus might speed through a street signal.  If you've decided to go ahead and defy oncoming traffic on a one-way street (which has seemingly becoming one of my newest nasty habits), just push-on as if you're an indestructible superhuman. Magically, the road ahead of you clears and you feel like Moses parting the waters of the Red Sea.

It will be difficult to go back to Europe and abide by traffic regulations. In the past 8 months I have proven my disregard for authority and rule of law by swiftly embracing anarchic behaviour as my only form of survival. The apogee was reached a couple of months ago when, coming from a friend's dinner party, I volunteered to take my partner and a friend back home. On a motorbike?! Yes, on a motorbike. Helmets off, hop on, here we go! We drew curious looks from all that came across our path: three large Westerners on one puny little motorbike.

But we rushed into the night, not a policeman in sight; hair free-flowing in the wind ready to take flight…