I flew out from Hong Kong to Hanoi today, and was greeted at the airport by.... no one! The woman I am staying with told me she would send her driver to pick me up, but as I walked out and scanned for someone with a sign with my name on it and saw nothing. Then I realised my plane was early, and he was probably not here yet. Just as I was completing these thoughts in my hear that a little man shuffled up with LAURA BATTY written on a piece of paper, and he took me to the car and we set off for the city.

I'm staying in a house just outside the city, on the West Lake, with beatiful views especially at sunset! This also means that I have to take a motorbike taxi or xe om into and out of town, which is a lot of fun!

Hanoi is kind of like Paris, except messier and more crowded, and very hectic. The streets are wide, lots of trees and people selling baguettes on street corners! Coming from Thailand where bread is virtually non-existent, this was so exciting!

Pavements in the Old Quarter are used as motobike parkings, so you have to weave in an out trying not to knock them over and start a chain reaction. Also avoid the rubbish, makeshift barbershops and old women sitting on the streets. Lots of nice designy-type shops, selling clothes and souvenirs, and every so often a woman in a conical hat carrying 2 baskets hanging from a stick on her shoulder comes up to offer you lychees or pineapples, and when you decline, she goes "photo?" and puts her hat on your hear and baskets on your shoulder... This happened to me and I stood there like an idiot struggling with the baskets (heavy!) and the hat that was slipping down over my eyes trying to give them back to her..

The most striking thing about Hanoi so far has been the traffic. There are millions of motorbikes in this city, and as someone put it, it seems like they have all just learnt how to drive. It also seems like the cars drivers are planning to learn how to drive next year. In any case, the streets are just flowing endlessly with motorbikes, cars, cyclos, bikes and pedestrians all narrowly avoiding each other.

Like in most Asian cities, a 2-lane road has an invisible middle lane which is open to traffic going in both directions. This is the lane of choice, I think people only revert to their designated side of the road in really extreme conditions, when say, faced by an oncoming 18 wheeler. The rule they seem to follow here is, let them avoid me. When you're on the back of a motorbike that is about to dive straight into a roundabout without looking for who/what is around and with no thought about priority its pretty exciting and scary.

Crossing the street here is also something to be learnt. You have to walk slowly right into the stream of motorbikes and let them swerve around you. Easier said than done... but its a bit of an adrenaline rush, and it gets easier as time goes on. I just look ahead and hope for the best!!