Why did the foreigner cross the road?

I've been temporarily let out of Germany and I'm in Asia for two weeks on business: One week Ho Chi Min City and one week Shanghai.  I'm considering it a bit of a luxury to only have to deal with a 6 hour time change (rather than the usual 16 hours from North America) and to only have to be in 2 cities in 2 weeks.  My previous work trips have been known to include 4 countries in 9 days.

A collegue gave me a strict set of instructions last year before my first visit: cross at the zebra stripes, walk slowly and at a consistent pace and look straight ahead.  Don't look left or right and whatever you do, don't flinch.  When he gave me those instructions, I laughed.  After all, I grew up in Montreal and consider myself a professional j-walker.  I've been to India 5 times and saw the craziness that is traffic (though you couldn't be a pedestrian in India due to the lack of sidewalks and sharing the space with cows!)  Yeah right I thought.  Surely, it's nothing.  Man, was I wrong.

Of all the crazy things I've done in my life, and there have been a lot, from jumping out of a plane, white water rafting class IV rapids in costa rica, paragliding off a mountain and getting a tatoo in Argentina, none have been as scary as crossing the street in Vietnam. No, really.

I stick to the rule of crossing only at zebra stripes or traffic lights. And even then, it's really, really hard not to flinch.  To have a car or motorcycle barelling ahead of you and to just keep going not knowing how agile they are, well, it's nerve racking.  The motorcyclists are use to this and have it down to an art.  I've had motorcycles come within 2 inches of me, literally!  The most important rule to follow is to walk at a consistent pace.  This way, motorists can gauge your speed and you won't mess up their system.  Flinch, and your toes (or worse) will get hit.

I've scoured youtube for the best example of what it's really like.  Some of the videos that people have posted aren't nearly as bad as what it's REALLY like.  But the video above is a pretty accurate example of what it's really like.  I've never been somewhere where I really had to analyze if I REALLY wanted to cross the street!