📸 B&W Photo Contest Asia-Pacific Entry #3: CRAZY Hanoi Rush-Hour Traffic 🛵

Hanoi (Vietnam), at rush hour:

If you think you’ve seen crazy traffic, think again.

Well, except perhaps if you live in India.

Trust me: New York traffic feels like a peaceful breeze once you’ve experienced the honking craziness of rush-hour traffic in Vietnam’s capital, Hanoi.

The city center is always buzzing with traffic, but at 5pm you’d probably be better off walking to your destination!

Remember that opening scene of the cult classic ‘Office Space’? Where the old man on the sidewalk moves faster than the cars stuck in a traffic jam? Add a lot of honking, and you’ll get an idea of what Hanoi can be like…

That’s why walking Hanoi's streets in the middle of the night can be a surreal experience. When I visited Hanoi a few years ago, bars had to close at midnight. However, there is always an exception to the rule 😉.

So me and friends found this bar, hidden in an alley, that stayed open until 3 am.

When it closed, I walked back to my hotel. And let me tell you: it was like finding my way through a ghost town. The streets were completely empty! I mean, there was NODOBY outside!

Here are some shots I took:

Crazy huh?

But just when I thought that perhaps the whole rush hour thing had just been a daydream, I’d wake up the next morning to a new city panorama of honking motorbikes…