The boys will be jealous!

I've ridden many miles around Ho Chi Minh City on the back of Hương's motorbike. Yesterday and today I did the driving!!! 

Some of those rides, and traffic in general, have been chronicled in other posts.

• Oh yes we are walking across that street
• Green means go
• Playing in the street
• etc...

Yesterday we went to Hương's brother's home in Vung Tau. It's a small island and much less traffic than in Ho Chi Minh City. We were offered a motorbike to ride around and take in the sights. 

Hương let me drive without too much hesitation. I've already driven a little, from the parking garage a few hundred meters down the street to the first intersection and from a local market back to the parking garage (maybe 2 km, two right hand turns and no busy intersections).

In Vung Tau I drove us around the whole island. Around a 40 minute drive. Plus about 15 or 20 minutes driving around her brother's neighborhood.

Today I drove in the big show, in Ho Chi Minh City! And for about 10 - 15 km in busy traffic. Not rush hour but actual normal daily traffic. Hương didn't scream once the whole trip and actually said I'm ready for my Vietnamese motorbike license. Oh yeah.

Of course three months learning the ins and outs behind Hương and baby steps driving the bike short distances at quiet times made it all possible. I'd have been road kill if I tried such serious driving much before today.

...and more stuff moves through the streets

Back to the topic of carrying loads around Saigon. This time its carrying big or unwieldy loads on motorbikes and bicycles. When my fiancée visited me in the US over Thanksgiving she gave me the book "Bikes of Burden" packed with photos of overloaded motorbikes. It inspired me to try and get some similar photos and videos for myself. This video is a montage of several overloaded motorbikes and bicycles. Kind of a "flavor" of the typical sights seen while riding around the city.

Many motorbikes at the end of the video are carrying various sorts of plants. Those shots were taken in the days before Tet holiday. It seemed everyone was getting some type of tree, shrub or flower to celebrate Tet. There's also a clip of a family of four on a motorbike. Not a commercial load but still an overloaded bike. And I'm sure there's more motorbikes in the background of the other clips overloaded with people.

Also note the way people dress. Many are fully covered with long sleeves, hoods, gloves and long pants. The daily temperature is about 90°F±! The Vietnamese are protecting themselves from the sun but why they don't get heat stroke in the bargain I can't understand.

Perhaps these clips are not as awe inspiring as the bicycle rider/delivery guy. However this activity goes on morning to night. Like busy ants working tirelessly to support the colony. At some point I might not take notice but for now it continually intrigues me to see all these oversize loads carried on small vehicles crisscrossing the city throughout the day. The motorbikes are typically 105cc I'm told. And of course it's just legs when its a bicycle!

Update: Apparently the typical delivery motorbike is only about 70cc and a decade or two old. The 105cc bikes belong to people better off than the delivery drivers.

Getting stuff from one place to another!

One of the things you'll see in Vietnam is there aren't many large trucks. At least not in the city. So things are transported in small quantities using all manner of vehicle. There's the ubiquitous motorbike that carries everything and is loaded down like the Grinch's sleigh, there's motorized and pedal powered 3 wheeled carts, very small trucks (think smaller than a light duty pickup truck) and bicycles. And the wondrous thing is all this traffic mixes together.

Here's a short example of a guy on a bicycle delivering a load somewhere. Watch it and wonder. And watch for the loaded motorbikes going by too.