4 thrilling experiences that Western tourists love in Vietnam
Daily activities of Vietnamese people such as crossing the street, riding a motorbike or eating at a sidewalk restaurant are considered adventurous by Westerners.
Christine Kaaloa is an American backpacker and travel blogger. She left her acting and reality TV producing career in New York to teach English in South Korea. Since then, she has been exploring Asia and Southeast Asia alone for 7 months.
Below are some of Christine’s experiences in Vietnam shared on her blog. To experience the feeling of adventure, Christine believes that people do not need to parachute from planes, eat worms or scream loudly. Sometimes, adventure is just about immersing yourself in the most simple and ordinary things.
Cross the street
This is something that makes many foreign tourists panic when coming to Vietnam. However, Christine gives her fellow travelers some tips through the illustration. Tourists just need to go slowly and carefully, everyone can cross the street with a group of other people before trying it on their own.
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A woman crosses the street with her street vendor. Photo: Grrrl Traveler. |
Motorbike ride around the city or suburbs
For Christine, riding a motorbike is the ultimate cultural immersion for tourists. If you are not a skilled driver, you can feel extremely stressed when traveling on the roads of big cities like Hanoi or Saigon.
This female backpacker suggests that tourists should rent a bicycle to explore small towns and villages as a starting point. She also revealed that tourists will not be able to find the village roads on the map. If they are not confident enough, tourists can absolutely book a motorbike tour to enjoy a sense of adventure.
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Hanoi's Old Quarter through Christine's lens. Photo: Grrrl Traveler. |
Ride a cyclo
Enjoying the pace of life in old Hanoi on a 3-wheeled vehicle is an experience worth trying. Actually, this experience does not have too many risks, except that tourists will have to breathe in quite a bit of dust on the road.
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Female backpacker tries riding a cyclo around town. Photo: Grrrl Traveler. |
Sitting and eating at a roadside restaurant
Westerners are often advised to avoid eating street food, but there are still many backpackers who dare to try and "survive" to tell the story of street food in Vietnam. Street food is a big part of local culture, it is considered fast food for the locals. Dishes are cooked on the roadside, next to where tourists squat on plastic chairs, glancing from hanging boards to handheld menus listing the special dishes of the day.
Christine cannot vouch for the quality of the street food or its hygiene. But she can assure you that you will have a VIP seat with a view of the street.
According to VNE
