One of the joys of travel, anywhere, is the things you see. The things that are just that little bit out of the ordinary and things that are not things you would normally see at home.
One of the things that see a lot of in Vietnam, is scooters, or as we call them, mopeds. Nothing odd about that you say. But out in Vietnam, and in Hanoi especially, the humble scooter is for a lot of people their ONLY means of transport. So, you do see some incredible and ingenious things being carried on them.
From the lady who simply seems to be carrying the entire contents of her house…
The simple delivery guys…
Scooters with ingenious customised frames for carrying lifes essentials.
The downright dangerous… one child as a passenger is common though, as is whole families of five precariously perched on a scooter.
Another rider carrying the contents of a shop!
The narrow streets of Hanoi don’t allow for regular building supply lorries to get through, so the big lorry dumps stuff in a convenient place, here it’s the central reservation, and then it is shuttled in to the center of the city on a scooter. This guy is carrying around 200kgs of hardcore. Once he had dragged the six bags single-handed on to his scooter he would teeter up the road trying to keep his balance until he had got up speed. All in rush-hour traffic too.
And then there is the incredible inginuity of this guy transporting live fish. The frame held a car battery that powered an air pump that kept the water oxygenated while the fish were enjoying a ride to the next pond no doubt. Genius. Pure genius.
mrandmrsyoung 