One thing hard to find in Hanoi old town

Hanoi old town is old. The streets are narrow with the constant roaming of motor cycles and taxis. This does not make it hard to cross the streets of Hanoi, all you need to learn is the art of crossing.

You need to take small steps while looking at on coming traffic. Because most of the vehicles are motor bikes, it is easy for them to manuveur away from you. while it is congested, the traffic is slow. It is quite interesting that drivers in Vietnam do not speed, unlike those in Singapore and Malaysia. Just be consistant with your speed of movement and you will be find.

I have been going around the old town area for 2 days now, plus my last visit, I could probably count a total of 4 days experience in Hanoi. The place is quite polluted, shops are dusty and you can rarely find squeeky clean floors unless you are in a hotels. There are few rubbish bins around and the street sides are covered with rubbish. The cleaners are only scheduled to start cleaning the street late at night. By then you can witness piles and piles of rubbish accumulated at every junction. Rubbish bins used by the cleaners will then be full.

Yet I notice one interesting thing about Hanoi. Even with such unclean environment, one thing is missing, flies. This is true, I visited many food stalls and restaurants, some by myself while some with my colleagues, we could even witness rats residing in a restaurant.

But when it comes to flies, I find it hard to see one. This insect is clearly missing at the restaurants. Even at the street side food outlets serving seafood, flies are missing. You don't see a single fly disturbing the food at all. So it is either the Vietnamese having a way to deter the flies or the food here are so poisonous that it kills off all the flies.

I would have expected that a relatively backward country like vietnam, flies would be a common sight. I have been to many countries with similar statuslike Vietnam, flies were common sight. Thailand, China, India, Indonesia and even a many parts of Malaysia (try small towns such as Yong Peng and Pagoh) are quite infested with flies. They are in such vast numbers that hawkers most of the time give up shooing them away. Vietnam seems to be an exception.

I really looked very hard for 2 days and it is only in the morning on the third day that I finally found one, at a street side hawker selling fresh chicken. There were 3 to 4 chickens carcasses in her basket and there was only a single fly, that lucky bastard.

So are the food here safe for consumption? So far they are safe enough as far as I am concern. I have shell food and French loft from street side hawkers on my last visit. This round, I took Pho from another hawker right across the street from my hotel. I have also taken French loft sandwich from a food stall near by, coffee from an outlet frequented by locals, Pho (again) from another outlet.

Yet I can't guaranttee if all the food are properly prepared. May be I am simply lucky not to have met one stall that cramps my intestines. While flies are not an issue here, there is no guaranttee of the human factor, who knows if the locals would wash their hands after visiting the toilets?