Charcoal cooking

The street restaurants around Hanoi usually have charcoal stoves for cooking the food.
The charcoal blocks (or moulded coal dust?) are sold by men or women cycling around town on bikes modified to carry their cargo.
After use, the spent blocks are simply discarded into the road with all the other rubbish...

The Tofu Lady

I sometimes have lunch on the street from the "tofu lady". A common sight around Hanoi. She arrives in the morning carrying everything with her in the two baskets carried on her shoulder. Stove, little plastic stools, plates, chopsticks, napkins, toothpicks...

The tofu and spring rolls are deep-fried and the cut up with scissors, and served with blocks of cold noodles (also chopped up with scissors) and salad herbs, and a bowl of dipping sauce with fresh chilli.
15,000 VND (About 50p)

No right turn

Surely this guy can only get to where he is going by making left-hand turns....?

Band and marching practice

On Monday I was teaching at Blue Dragon, a charity for street children in Vietnam, when I heard drumming coming from a school nearby, so I went to have a look. Some children were playing drums, while others marched in formation carrying bamboo canes. I saw this again in the streets near where I live and wondered if it was something to do with Vietnam's National Day on 2nd September, but my students tell me it's probably just practising for the school's opening ceremony.

Caphe Vietnam

Hanoi has a cafe culture like nowhere else. Almost every other building in Hanoi seems to be a cafe. This is 8:30 in the morning - probably mid-morning coffee break for many people as life starts so early in Hanoi. For me it's a chance for a caffeine kick-start.


Caphe Vietnam (or Caphe sua nong - coffee milk hot) is a small espresso strength brew with a slurry of sweet condensed milk in the bottom. Sounds disgusting I know, but I quite like like now and again...

Emergency delivery

of M&M's...

Get used to it...

This is the sort of thing that would get people fuming back in the UK. Obstructing the pavement and blocking the ATM machine. Here in Hanoi it's so commonplace that after a while you hardly notice. The pavements are blocked so often, you usually spend more time walking in the road with the traffic than on the pavement.


The road where my school is, Le Van Huu, seems to be 'sign street' most of the businesses seems to be making signs of one sort or another. This means that they are out on the pavement welding and cutting, and using all sorts of noxious smelling chemicals. Health and safety would rightly have a fit. A few weeks ago I was walking along Le Van Huu when the blade on an angle-grinder shattered and fragments went whizzing past my head. I could easily have been blinded had it hit me in the eye. I now try to remember to wear glasses or sunglasses all the time...

Public information

Don't look too closely at this. Especially if you've just eaten or have a sensitive disposition...

Outside a hospital near the old quarter in Hanoi is this display cabinet showing rather gory photos. I assume that this is some kind of warning of the dangers posed by the streets of Hanoi rather than some gratuitous voyeurism.

Not really my taste...

... but they came with the apartment. My nice nylon fitted sheet...
...and matching pillowcases...
Lovely!

When it rains in Ha Noi...

...it really can rain.









Wet weather gear.

Lap dog

A typical midget rat-dog...

... presumably too small to waste time cooking. A feisty character, who barked at me like he had a bite.

Pavement barbecue

Cooking the meat for Bun Cha, at one of my favourite street restaurants, on a little pavement barbecue - fan assisted.

Roses for sale...

...by a street side vendor.

A heavy and fragile load

I don't think I'd want to be cycling around with a huge load of crockery. Mostly, such heavy loads are just wheeled round the streets.

Teaching in Ha Noi

Since I'm working as an English teacher in Ha Noi, I thought I should treat you to a picture of one of my junior classes. (7 - 9 year olds)


How girls colour...

...and how boys colour...

Jesus wants me for a sunbeam

St. Joseph's Cathedral in the Old Quarter of Hanoi, not far from Hoan Kiem Lake (Ho Hoan Kiem, or lake of the returned sword) Apparently the French knocked down an important 12th century pagoda to make room for their new church...

On Sundays the service is absolutely packed. The church is full, and extra seating is required outside. Most churches in the west would kill for a congregation like that.

Destined for the pot?

Today, while I was on the back of a xe-om (a motorcycle taxi. Pron. "zay om") I saw two fairly large dogs trussed up in a chicken-wire cage on the back of a motorbike. I couldn't get a good picture as they were too far ahead by the time I got my camera out.

It's quite rare to see any medium or large dogs on the streets of Ha Noi, so I suspect that these might have a bleak [and short] future. It's quite common to see little lap-dogs as pets; skinny little rat-like creatures that are not worth eating...

Street-side barber

Street-side barber. Face masks are in common usage in Hanoi, mostly by women, because of the chronic pollution.

Bicycle flower-seller

Bicycle flower-seller with limpet hat.

Anything on a motorbike (3)

Riding a motorbike, with a pressurised gas cylinder between your legs, whilst texting on your mobile phone, is always a good idea...

Lunch - Vietnamese style

Bun cha (meat patties in a cold stock, with cold noodles and salad herbs) and nem (spring rolls)
About £1.50 - quite pricey for Hanoi - but very nice.
Actually I had a second helping of noodles, so maybe that's why it seemed a bit expensive for a street restaurant.

Anything on a motorbike (2)

Really. Absolutely anything and everything goes by bike. In this case a pig carcase.

Roadside advertising

This is roadside advertising Vietnam style: Get your punctures repaired here...

Anything on a motorbike

A fairly typical load on a motorbike...


And what happens...


...when it all goes horribly wrong...