Contender for: The Craziest Place on Earth

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Our arrival into Vietnam is one which I hope no-one I know has to ever repeat. We left our plane after a pretty poor flight, running almost an hour late, no food or entertainment onboard, and stepped out onto the tarmac at Noc Bai Airport.

Our Visa On Arrival meant we should have been met by an official and taken to finish the immigration procedure. We weren't met and after waiting in line for about 15 minutes realised we were in the wrong queue. We finally found the make-shift desk where one "official" was standing playing with his mobile phone. He either didn't, or refused to speak English. He took our passports and visa confirmation letters and disappeared. A few minutes later he returned. By this time there are 20 or so foreigners anxiously waiting for their passports to reappear. We had to fill in another set of forms which required a photo. I had left mine in my checked baggage. This proved to be another problem, and with thoughts of not being able to get through immigration to my bags was a catch 22. After more tense minutes of waiting and no-one explaining, we asked the man who had taken our passports, who simply raised the palm of his hand top us and continued eyeballing his mobile phone. He only later sprang into action after a Dutch family tipped him in order to get the ball rolling.

Finally a woman appeared wielding a handful of passports. I noticed ours and asked her for them with the response 'you pay me now'. Handed over $50 and $2 extra, I am sure for her benefit, for the lack of photo on my form, and finally we could queue for clearing immigration! Lesson learned - get your Visa before you go!

The taxi ride to our hotel was a real eye opener. In just 45mins from the windows of the car, you could begin to understand the pure chaos that is Vietnam. Between 1 and 4 people aged 1-80 riding single mopeds with no crash helmet in sight. These bikes would only sometimes be going with the majority flow of traffic. Cyclo's and other mopeds riding the wrong way down the motorway and cars straddling both lanes to avoided 100's of weaving motorbikes meant for anarchy and naturally an accident where a huge truck had collided with either the central reservation or another truck, bending the cab up 45 degrees,windscreen facing the tarmac. White stripes down the centre of the road only indicate the preferred direction of travel, not necessarily the only or most frequently used one. You can only imagine how difficult it proved to cross the road for us for the first few days!

The Old Quarter of Hanoi is incredibly busy. Lots of shop owners stand outside their residence touting you with 'you buy something?', motorbike riders and cyclo drivers trying to sell you taxi services in English by simple words of 'moto' or 'cyclo' or even by simply pointing at you and then their vacant seat. Everyone in the Old Quarter would have your last penny and ask you for more. Our polite responses turned from 'no thank you' to 'no' to a shake or the head, or risen palm, or even ignoring the hounding altogether.

Unfortunately, mostly all the attractions around Hanoi were closed on the day we wanted to see them. We did however see some beautiful temples and pagodas, as well as photograph the buildings and chaotic city life, which is almost a tourist sight by itself. We ate some good food, some of which local specialties, other food, not so good, we are slowly making progress when it comes to choosing food!

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Photos

Local Crossing
Even the petrified looks from locals reinforce that even simply crossing the road in Hanoi is a death sport

Comments

[rachel]

sounds like morocco
your descriptions of 1-4 people on mopeds with all manner of luggage sounds just like morocco (where the street lights seemed purely decorative as were the roundabouts) sounds like an interesting experience though. can't wait to see you both on your return. xxx all our love, from M as well,