Ooh no. It may be cheaper but false economy I reckon - the food there is really mediocre, greasy shite if you ask me...
Green Papaya is great though, as long as you don't order a curious tofu and prawn dish which when a little bit pissed as I was last time I went there made me feel very queasy indeed.
There's a great little cheapy thai a few doors down from there too but I can't remember the name of it.
I boycott the Hai Ha and advise others to as well - some very dodgy vicious gang-related activity. My wife and I were eating in there two years ago, she was 9 months pregnant, the circle of Vietnamese geezers on the back table, about eight in total, suddenly turned the table over, started smashing plates in each other's faces, pouring boiling water over each other, and throwing furniture at point blank range. This mass gang fight went on for three or four very long minutes, whilst everyone else in the restaurant - it was packed - watched, wondering how safe it was to make for the door, as the fighting lads were moving back and forth. This was literally terrifying. Don't think pissed Brit pub brawl, think hard skinny fuckers with their shirts off, pouring with blood, literally trying to kill each other and not caring who got in the way. I got hit in the face by a flying plate, my wife got some of the shrapnel after it broke. Finally after everyone piled outside, the fight did too, last I saw one of the owners/servers was hitting one of the mob over the head with a fire extinguisher.
Plod was called. Arrived a good ten mins later, and idly wondered why none was left, and couldn't be bothered heading off in the direction they assailants disappeared in. Didn't take witness statements off any of the diners.
I called Hackney Gazette next day. They never followed it up.
That, plus the broad-daylight stabbing together of a Vietnamese guy on Mare Street last year on a mid-week afternoon, in front of dozens of witnesses, after which he was never even identified and none of the Vietnamese businesses on mare Street wanted to talk to the Gazette, plus the repeated burning downs of the former Viet Thai restaurnat on the corner with Westgate Street, left me with a rather jaundiced view of the Vietnamese community, I'm afraid.
(ETA - the Vietnamese shops on Mare Street, that is - not Vietnaeme people in general!)
That said.... don't let me derail thread! Pembury, lido, Anatolia, yes. Avoid the Cat & Wanker like the plague. Check out the art galleries in Enterprise House, in Wates Road and Vyner Street and in the block off broadway market. Hackney is fab, and I really miss it.
