Hanoi sharks reportedly migrating south to Saigon’s metro lines

Quận 1, Saigon – Top ranking Vietnamese sources have today confirmed Saigon’s fury with Hanoi authorities for using up all of the good excuses regarding delays to the capital’s metro line. The diplomatic spat erupted earlier this month following reports from Hanoi that sharks had been migrating south with the specific intention of chewing on the metro line currently underway in Saigon.

Officials from HCMC have rebuked this claim, noting that the situation is far more complex than this by adding that the delays were in part due to a change in weather – compounding the issue further, this shift in meteorological patterns had turned the construction site of Saigon’s metro line into a literal breeding ground for sharks.

“Not only are these delays directly related to sharks chewing at the lines and mauling contractors, the atmospheric changes here have tricked the sharks into thinking it’s mating season,” revealed one low-level authoritarian from the HCMC local administration. “We believe the rampant orgies and battles for dominance to secure a mate is adding to the sharks’ appetites, as such the metro line won’t be operational until at least 2021.”

The first two metro lines in Saigon are well into their seventh year of construction in an apparent contest with Hanoi to test the limits of what the Vietnamese public will believe as rumours of corruption, kickbacks and special interests circulate like a warm fart in a cold elevator.

“Corruption? Good God no!” spat one anonymous Saigonese bureaucrat. “It’s the horny sharks from Hanoi that have ruined our glorious public transit system that will, upon completion, hand mastership of the roads and skies once more to their rightful owners – the Vietnamese public and, of course, the Party.”

One Hanoi-based journalist who wished to remain anonymous hinted at the existence of documents somewhere deep in the bowels of the Politburo that insinuate a sly move from Hanoi to dispatch a team of distinctly incompetent contractors to “oversee” construction on the Saigon metro line and to “advise” wherever possible, although this is yet to be confirmed.

With neither of the major Vietnamese cities managing to understand quite what a public transport system ought to look like, The Durian took to the streets to explore the brain of the average Nguyen on the issue of metro lines and pathetic excuses.

“I just think it’s nice that we, as Hanoians, can put to bed the – what you might call, history – of our two great cities to appreciate just how desperately inept our city planners are,” said Nguyen Đi Tù, a local xe ôm driver.

“There is more that unites us than divides us,” he added.

Meanwhile Nguyen Chết Mất, a lifelong Saigon resident and recent graduate in the performing arts explained the existing tensions from his own dramatic perspective.

“Do I feel a brotherly bond with the northern taxpayers who are funding this nightmarish large-scale Lego disaster-piece? Yes, but I’d really appreciate it if they could at least leave our administration some better excuses – it’s getting embarrassing having to listen to officials talking about migratory shark orgies when clearly, more obvious factors are at work.”

At press time officials from both the north and south had entered a game of brinkmanship, each  repeatedly delaying their respective metros one year longer than the other, pushing the expected operational schedules back to 3028.