trcunning:kenyatta:tannerballengee:I found this the other day and thought it was pretty cool, since
trcunning:kenyatta:tannerballengee:I found this the other day and thought it was pretty cool, since I can fully endorse it. Mostly because I spent a month in Vietnam, but also because I wrote the extended version in my memoir:How to cross a street in VietnamWhat was cool about HCMC was that the roads were filled with 90% motorbikes, which made traffic a helluva lot easier to tolerate. Unlike cars, motorbikes can move freely, avoiding pedestrians and other bikes with ease, instead of blocking traffic and causing congestion. One of the things we’d learned while being in Vietnam is that, while it looks dangerous and intimidating to cross a street filled with zooming motorbikes, it’s actually fairly easy. The people on motorbikes are constantly watching out for you, the pedestrian. So when someone crosses the street, they will easily maneuver around you. But the trick is this: NEVER stop in the middle of traffic. The motorbikes are watching and anticipating your moves—they are either plotting to go ahead of you or behind you. If you stop, that fucks them up and you risk being hit. So my advice to crossing the street is this: find a good place to cross, find a decent gap in traffic, then walk, WITHOUT stopping, and WITHOUT looking from side to side, keep your eyes straight and un-deflected, like you’re walking with blinders. While this may seem stupid and suicidal, my reasoning is if you look from side to side and see the motorbikes coming straight for you, you’ll panic and freeze up, thinking that you need to jump out of the way. But NO, they need to avoid you, not you avoid them. The motorists know what they are doing. They’ll go around you. Hell, I’ll bet you could even cross the street with your eyes closed and you’d make it to the other side just fine. (It’s true, I tried it.)Having ridden a moped in traffic and walked across streets in both Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, I can endorse @tannerballengee‘s ruleset.here’s the original video.It’s like reverse Frogger, you’re the obstacle - be as predictable as possible. Whoa -- source link