When traveling to a different country, you can be easy to get a cultural shock, getting a cultural shock as visiting Vietnam in general and Hanoi, in particular, is not an exception. Here, there is something you should know before going to Hanoi in order to get preparation and avoid unexpected problems.
Traffic
Traffic congestion is the most popular problem happened every day in Hanoi even on rainy days. Because the most common mean of transportation in Hanoi is motorbikes, you can see in the rush hours, there will be numerous motorbikes moving slowly on the narrowed streets. Therefore, if you plan to go somewhere in Hanoi, try to avoid the rush hours from 7am to 9am, and from 5 pm to 6 pm. In addition, crossing the road in Hanoi is quite dangerous. If you want to cross a road in Hanoi, learning the way to do it is really necessary.
Dog meat
Traveling to Hanoi, you can be surprised or shocked by the eating behavior of Hanoian. Besides the common meat like beef, pork, chicken, duck, you can see that the people of Hanoi can eat all kinds of meat from animals such as birds, goats and especially dog meat. That is the thing that you should know about this. In your country, dogs can be your friends but in Hanoi and Vietnam in general, they can eat dog meat easily. As a result, when you go with people in Hanoi, they can invite you to eat dog meat, don’t be surprised, you can refuse if you don’t want to eat this.
The attitudes of sellers
In your trips to Hanoi, you can go to visit some famous places such as Hanoi Old Quarter, Temple of Literature. In those places, you can easily see a lot of street vendors who can run to you and insist you buying their products because they think that foreign people are very rich and they can gain a lot of money from you. However, this is just a small part in overall Hanoi because you can meet and see a lot of friendly people as coming here.
Language barrier
Language barrier is always a problem when you go somewhere. In Hanoi, although it is the capital city of the country, the number of people who can speak English are not many. Thus, in case of you can get lost in the streets or some places, learn and prepare some phrases or sentences so that you can able to communicate with the local people.
Going to the market
If you have a plan to go to the market to buy something for yourself or buy some souvenirs for your friends you should know how to bargain in the market because the sellers or vendors often set a higher price for the foreign people than the local people to gain profit. Therefore, ask the price in different places before buying something to save your money is a wise choice.
Trying to get a safe and fun trip is always the best. For this reason, you should know about the above information so that you can get used to with the culture and lifestyle in Hanoi or even if you encounter those problems, it maybe become an unforgettable part of your trips to Hanoi since it is the culture and the way of living of Hanoian.
