Giving Way in Vietnam - a Foreigner's Perspective

Vietnamese people do not have the habit of giving way to pedestrians, we need to respect each other, selfishness will harm ourselves.

I met a foreign visitor with a plaster cast on his arm walking on the sidewalk. After a few polite greetings, John told me that he was a student studying Vietnamese at a university in Hanoi. Since his home was not far from the school, he often walked to school. A few days ago, while crossing the street at an intersection, he was hit by a motorbike, broke his arm, and had to be taken to the hospital for emergency treatment.

Talking about traffic in Vietnam, the American student expressed concern, he said: "I have been in Vietnam for nearly 3 years, but every time I go out on the street is a new experience for me, like participating in an adventure sport, very interesting but also very scary."

Every time I go out in Vietnam with foreigners is a new experience. Illustrative photo

He spoke fluent Vietnamese to recount that fateful afternoon. The pedestrian light was on, John cautiously stepped onto the street, not forgetting to raise his hand to signal for the right of way. Suddenly, from somewhere, a motorbike driven by a young man roared towards him. After a few swerving movements, the motorbike ran the red light and crashed into the foreign student. What is worth mentioning is that after causing the accident, the motorbike sped away, leaving the victim lying in pain with a broken arm.

Despite his broken arm, John said that walking in Hanoi is very interesting, however, on many streets, shops, motorbikes and cars block the sidewalks, pedestrians have no choice but to walk on the road, which is quite dangerous. In addition, many people's traffic awareness is still poor, so it is easy to cause accidents for pedestrians.

John also said that the awareness of many pedestrians is not good, many people still deliberately cross the street when the light is red, cross the street in the wrong place (even though the place where they cross the street is not far from the pedestrian crossing). The above comment is not wrong, surely each of us has encountered difficulties at least once, even "heart-stopping" situations when crossing the street.

Listening to the story of the foreign student and after the real experiences, I suddenly remembered a video that I had just watched a while ago. The video was filmed in Japan, a long line of cars stopped to let some students cross the street, after crossing the street, the students turned around and bowed to thank the drivers.

Video of Japanese students thanking drivers while crossing the street:

.

What a beautiful image, I wish one day I could see those scenes on the familiar streets of Hanoi in particular and Vietnam in general.

You and I, let us join hands to build a civilized lifestyle so that one day soon, traffic will no longer be a nightmare in the eyes of international friends. Hopefully one day soon, the habit of giving way to pedestrians will no longer be a "luxury" for traffic participants in Vietnam!

According to VnE