In Vietnam, many haunted by street vendors’ sales speakers

Street cries once found their way into poetry.

They were intimate, familiar sounds of everyday life, especially in towns and cities.

Those cries belonged to vendors who toiled from dawn to dusk, their voices rich with feeling and unmistakably individual.

However, that was the past.

Today, the sales pitch is no longer human-made, but pre-recorded messages blare endlessly from morning to night.

At one stall, a woman’s loudspeaker lists every kind of vegetable without missing a single item.

Next to her, a man advertises gourds and melons, using a pre-recorded speaker.

Fish sellers, shrimp vendors, and fruit merchants hold a handheld speaker, each blasting at will.

Selling requires calling out, vendors said.

Yet if shoppers find the jumble of sounds unbearable, imagine those who live nearby.

Automated, pre-recorded cries have become a daily obsession, a form of auditory torture.

Buyers and sellers must endure it, while passers-by and residents are haunted.

These handheld speakers echo from rural markets to city streets, from narrow alleys to main roads, from large markets to makeshift ones, from intersections to the gates of schools and hospitals.

They sound from early morning until late at night.

Worse still are the large loudspeakers – deafening, jarring, sleep-stealing machines that leave people jumpy and irritable.

Such terrible noise is generated by fashion shops, watch and eyewear stores, and beer halls, especially during the year-end period.

Sales loudspeakers have now permeated nearly every place at every hour.

At intersections, vendors add speakers to sell glue traps, kickstand shoes, fruit and more.

Under blazing sun and choking traffic fumes, commuters become the victims of sonic assault every time the lights turn red.

Modern life already overwhelms people with sound.

Incessant honking, especially by those who use horns indiscriminately, and the thunderous speakers of shops have long plagued pedestrians and nearby residents.

Yet the problem is spreading as unregulated noise multiplies, with each person turning up their own device.

At makeshift markets and sidewalk stalls, speakers appear every few meters.

There are, however, exceptions.

Some vendors use speakers considerately.

A man selling ice cream on weekend afternoons turns off his speaker as soon as children gather.

Also, others keep the volume low, just enough to be heard without disturbing residents.

A few even lower the sound at traffic lights to avoid bothering people beside them.

However, such awareness is rare compared with the many who play their speakers loudly, whether out of indifference or intent.

What has long proved difficult must now be enforced.

With the government’s Decree 282, which came into force on December 15, it is time to clamp down on noise caused by loudspeakers.

Everyone has the right to seek a quiet living space.

Under Decree 282, which replaced Decree 144/2021, the long-standing regulation that prohibited noise only after 10:00 pm has been abolished.

Instead of regulating noise by time frame, the new decree focuses on the actual level of noise generated, regardless of whether it occurs during the day or at night.

The change is widely seen as a turning point in addressing chronic noise pollution.