Hanoi’s New Year’s resolutions for 2019 revealed

Hanoi – Speaking exclusively with The Durian in a moment of festive earnestness, the Vietnamese capital city, Hanoi, revealed its New Year’s resolutions for 2019 over a nice jug of bia hoi.

“I know it’s not really a thing that I’ve ever taken too seriously – we’ve got our own New Year’s celebration coming up in just a few weeks, but I felt that now is the time to just give the whole ‘new year, new me’ thing a go,” stated the city of Hanoi as it took a moment to reflect on the comings and goings of its nearly 8 million inhabitants.

“I can’t guarantee I’ll stick to these,” said Hanoi, smashing a wry smile, “but we can see what sticks!”

Explaining that while self-improvement wasn’t just the sole preserve of millennials who could no longer squeeze their gelatinous forms into yoga pants, the Vietnamese capital noted that even a city as old as itself could still find time to change its ways, or maybe some of them.

“I think 2019 could really be the year we all get the hang of those indicator things on our bikes,” it said, “Blinkers, turn signals, whatever you call them – I’ve been meaning to figure out what to do with them for years now, but there just never seems to be time between rush hours to really work on it and I’m still not totally sure I’ve figured out this horn honking business yet.”

Given the enduring nature of this mysterious function that has been bestowed upon all motorcycles across Hanoi, it remains unclear whether the bustling metropolis will ever come to grips with the use of the indicator.

“Maybe, and this is a big one, not just hiring the first English Teacher to rock up to their demo class with a ukulele and TEFL certificate they’ve printed off the internet,” Hanoi stated.

“I deserve so much better than another acoustic version of ‘Somewhere over the Rainbow’ warbled out by some Canadian teenybopper trying to find himself in Southeast Asia and so do the students,” it added.

Hanoi also expressed a desire to snap the texting fingers and thumbs off any English teacher taking to social media to complain about paying 10,000VND more than a local for a 30,000VND bowl of phở, noting “They earn fucking crazy money here, more than they would back home in most cases, so maybe for 2019, you could stop being a whiny fuckwit and just enjoy living in me?”

“It’d be nice if we could all stop burning so much trash too, but it’s gonna be pretty fucking cold for the first few months of 2019 – my nipples could cut glass, or they would if I had nipples, but I obviously don’t – I’m a city.” Hanoi added, before continuing to muse on the mass bonfires of discarded rubbish that blight the city’s face, “All the same, I don’t see many other capital cities burning the shit they don’t need any more on a daily basis, quit making me seem like a dick in 2019? Please?”

“Fuck! I totally forgot, helmets!” cheered the 8 million strong city, “Totally gotta get on this whole helmet bandwagon this year.”

Noting that there were some elements of itself that Hanoi would like to change over the coming year, there were certain things that were off-limits.

“I ain’t doing shit about my diet – if you don’t like Bún chả you can fuck off to Bangkok with your elephant pants and prance around the Khao San road,” the Vietnamese capital chuckled, “and you can prize my bia hoi out of my cold dead hands, don’t even try it punk.”

"Basically, fuck the 'New Year, New Me' wankers, I plan to be the same crazy, beautiful mess I've always been - come at me 2019!" Hanoi exclaimed with vigour.

From The Durian and Hanoi, we hope that 2019 makes up for the skidmark of a year that’s now, thankfully, sliding to an end.

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