Frogger Blogger

Do you remember the video game Frogger?  It goes back to the golden age of video games.  As you may remember, the object was to direct frogs across a busy highway without getting hit by oncoming cars.  Or as I would say after visiting Ho Chi Minh City (aka HCMC) last weekend, “Welcome to Vietnam”!  Vietnam is a cacophony sounds, an explosion colors, a rainbow of scents and smells, AND SCOOTERS!

I have never seen so many scooters and cycles and they are everywhere doing everything for everyone.  We first noticed scooters everywhere on our drive from the airport of our hotel, the Sonnet Saigon Hotel.  The sky darkened and it looked like rain.  As soon as the first drops fell all of the scooters pulled over and ponchos came out and on.  As the sky opened up, the scooters took off, and the drivers were wearing their ponchos.

Scooters seem to be able to do whatever their owner wants to.  One delivery woman was visiting street food vendors one morning and her scooter was overflowing with plastic cups and plates.  She would stop and plant her feet to steady her load and then somehow reach around and get what her customer wanted without upsetting the load.

If you can't fit everything on your scooter there is always the option of towing a cycle-trailer.

Can't afford a trailer?  Well, if it's a gas bottle you need to move just put it on a handcart and have your friend hold it as you wind through the city.

So with all of those cycles you might think that there would be chaos in the streets--and you'd be right.  Take a look at the video on the left.  This was an intersection right by our hotel.  Drivers mostly respect the lights, but they push it.

You might think you would be safe by just walking down the sidewalk with trees and green space between you and the road.  But you would be wrong.  The cycles take to the sidewalks when traffic gets too bad on the roads.  The bottom line is that you need to keep a watchful eye ahead and behind you.

Parking of all these scooters and cycles is surprisingly organized.  Sometimes businesses will allow cycles to park in front for a small fee.  One location even made sure that you would have a dry seat by putting cardboard over all of the seats to protect them from the inevitable rain that comes in the afternoon. Others string a rope between all of the scooters to, I assume, owners from taking off without paying their total parking charge.

One other thing that I had also seen in Jakarta is the way that Grab rides work.  For those of you that have never heard of Grab it's SE Asia's version of Uber (we have Uber here too).  And here while you can get a car you can also get a Grab Cycle.  You can order them through an app and they show up with a green helmet for you to wear (helmets are mandatory on scooters in Vietnam).  They are easy to spot because the drivers all wear green Grab jackets.  And no we didn't use Grab Cycle.

--Brian