In downtown, they try to attract customers (hotels, restaurants, bars), especially foreign ones but there are few travelers in this wet and coldish season.
but, why so many people are without shoes??
Many people keep wearing summer clothes since it's okay when it's +22, not that cold (although I chose jeans and sneakers). Another reason: it's rainy almost daily, several times a day, and unpredictably, downpours and puddles are common, some people don't want to have wet shoes on their feet. Moreover, all Vietnamese (in Central and Southern Vietnam at least) wear no shoes/slippers in houses, only barefoot, so they are used to keeping feet cold (no surprise, there is a cough epidemic here again).
Wearing trousers and slippers in the street is quite Vietnamese style in general.
Wow world is so different! Here not even in summer with 35 degrees people go around with slippers, everyone shoes, slippers only at home and in the beach... When it's rainy a lot people use boots
As for small everyday details, it's very different. Bigger social things are almost the same.
Wearing slippers at home looks like a crime somewhere in between murder and theft for a Thai person (almost). 😄
Central and Northern Vietnam are damp and chill in winter so the attitude slowly changes with every 100 km north.
They can't help you if you drive a motorbike through puddles and downpours. Very few people have cars in Vietnam, an absolute motorbike nation. And almost no passers-by here - everyone is on a motorbike. People who work outdoors (cleaners, vendors) often wear garden rubber boots in Hue City. Motorbike drivers, if it's raining, are covered with plastic raincoats with feet uncovered, wet, in slippers, 95% or more. In cold winter Hanoi, I am sure there are more guys wearing good leather boots or garden rubber boots.