Saturday, May 17, 2008

A New Feature...

One of the best things about living abroad is all the different things that you see, hear, taste and even sometimes smell, for better or for worse, that you usually wouldn't experience if you were living at home. Here in Hanoi, one of the major differences from home is the transportation. Mopeds. Everywhere. Thousands of them. Hundreds of thousands of them. Mopeds, or as they are often called here, "Mo-Toe Bi" (say it aloud) are the cities main source of transportation. If you don't have your own, the Xe Om (motorbike taxis) are convienent and cheap, and only slightly dangerous. Motorbikes are used to carry everything from freshly butchered meat, to all five members of a five member family and many things in between.



I'm been riding a little Honda 110 Wave in this traffic for about 2 months now, and everyday I see something else unbelievable on the back of a motorbike. So, I've decided to start a new weekly feature here on HanoiJake. I'm going to try a post a photograph, every week of something unexpected on the back of a motorbike. Now keep in mind, this is no simple task. I usually see these spectaclar feats of motorbikesmanship while I'm actually driving, so I can't always just whip out a camera and start firing away. Lucky for us, I have a phone with a camera in it. (Nokia Plug, send me a better model please, I love Nokia) But, I still can't just bust out the phone and start firing. Although I see locals sending text messages while riding all the time, I'm pretty busy concentrating on the road and the other five thousand motorbikes swerving around me, so the task is still daunting. But, I've managed to get a few good pics so far, so I'll start you off with something pretty tame. And now, without further ado, I bring you..... MotoFoto

2 comments:

mosesm said...

Great, I can't wait to see more photos

puddy said...

i'm sure the pics are cool, but maybe you should keep both hands on the handlebars?