Every afternoon on the busy street corners in central Ho Chi Minh City District 1, you find a pair of traffic police. These chaps direct the traffic, as traffic police do. Now the dilemma occurs because there are traffic lights, traffic signals, in operation on these corners working at the sane time. Each pair comes armed with a long baton with a reflector on the end for directing traffic and a whistle, blown loudly, to indicate a change. .One chap has a turn out in the middle of the road doing his bit, and in the case of the chap in this photo working with the traffic lights and the changes. The other chap blends in with the surroundings and obscurely stands on a street corner. After a period of time they swap places and duties. I managed to snap this guy quite close to the local market near my home last night. Coming down the road on his right were huge numbers of cars and buses, not to mention the thousands of motor bikes and cyclists. However he basically retained his position on the road and the turning traffic went around him. Obliviously the police command quite a lot of power, and maybe that’s the reason they do traffic duty. No one cut the corner, or even drove close to him, while I watched. And on a whole the motorcyclists who can be a law unto themselves, were all law abiding citizens.
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