There's too much noise on the streets of Saigon. I'm sure this is a common phrase repeated countlessly by western visitors. Most of this noise, as I think I mentioned before, comes from the traffic; this includes the motorbike engines and honking. Although I don't like the incessant honking, I've encountered it before. In Portugal, the locals honk because they're bored and hey! the car comes with a horn! The Mexican drivers honk because they're angry. The Turkish drivers honk because they don't want to slow down at street crossings (without lights) to look both ways. But those places aren't like here. Here, everyone honks.
There are a million Vietnamese on the road (remember, with motos there really are a million of them on the road), driving in every direction possible on a one way street even if it isn't legal - cars, buses, bicycles, bicycle taxis, all that chaos. And in the midst of the visual chaos is the audio chaos - the mufflers of the motorbikes and the honking. The cars honk. The buses honk. The motos honk. I've tried to figure out what they're honking at (the bus drivers love to honk at traffic which isn't moving even if it isn't possible for it to move). I've tried to figure out who is honking. And I've tried to figure out how, if a thousand motos and vehicles are honking at each other at the same time, the honker believes that the person they're honking at knows they're being honked at.
