Below are the highlights and some descriptions to give a bit more cultural context: 0:43 - Here is a shaved ice vendor with some jars of candy in the background. Men’s hair styles haven’t changed too much. A customer is wearing a very large wide brimmed hat, which would have been very popular among the ethnically Chinese. A short while later, you see a young man (older brother) wearing a baggy tan suit with a hat similar to Pith Helmets, often worn by expats.
The drinking glasses are handled like the tea cups today in the phở and most other restaurants... they drink from the glass while standing there and then put it back. The vendor gives it to the next customer without washing it.
I like the donkey carts outside Ben Thanh Market. Safer than many taxis today. I wonder if the locals compared the odor of the donkeys to the odor of the French and other foreigners?
Almost all the locals are barefoot. I wonder when shoes became common?
The guy who shorted the rickshaw driver at 8:36 reminds me of the f-ing expats today who bitch about paying 5% more than the locals in the market when the locals obviously need it more than they do. I hope he's rotting in whatever hell there might be.
It's strange to look at these old videos because there are such drastic changes from 1880's to the 1970's, and then the technology regresses a bit. If you have seen any Vietnamese movies from the 1980's, they are mostly in black and white with 1950's lighting.
You start seeing shoes quite often after WWII. There seems to be a transition from rural to urban around that time. If you look at some American films from the 1920's-30's, you may see some rural Americans without shoes too.
As far as the money situation goes, I call this the tourist tax. This minor surcharge is the transfer of wealth between the extreme poor and those better off financially. I suspect that some of the complaining about an expat paying the tourist tax is the feeling of being taken advantage of. I would rather give out money out of my own free will than have someone try to cheat me. I have some stories about this.
The drinking glasses are handled like the tea cups today in the phở and most other restaurants... they drink from the glass while standing there and then put it back. The vendor gives it to the next customer without washing it.
I like the donkey carts outside Ben Thanh Market. Safer than many taxis today. I wonder if the locals compared the odor of the donkeys to the odor of the French and other foreigners?
Almost all the locals are barefoot. I wonder when shoes became common?
The guy who shorted the rickshaw driver at 8:36 reminds me of the f-ing expats today who bitch about paying 5% more than the locals in the market when the locals obviously need it more than they do. I hope he's rotting in whatever hell there might be.
It's strange to look at these old videos because there are such drastic changes from 1880's to the 1970's, and then the technology regresses a bit. If you have seen any Vietnamese movies from the 1980's, they are mostly in black and white with 1950's lighting.
You start seeing shoes quite often after WWII. There seems to be a transition from rural to urban around that time. If you look at some American films from the 1920's-30's, you may see some rural Americans without shoes too.
As far as the money situation goes, I call this the tourist tax. This minor surcharge is the transfer of wealth between the extreme poor and those better off financially. I suspect that some of the complaining about an expat paying the tourist tax is the feeling of being taken advantage of. I would rather give out money out of my own free will than have someone try to cheat me. I have some stories about this.