Formerly known as Saigon (I still prefer this name, conjures images of old school glamour for me) the southern capital of Vietnam was our first stop after a relatively eventless border crossing from Kratie. The bus stopped just after the checkpoint for us to have our first taste of Vietnamese food which was included in the ticket. We were very impressed with they standard at this random roadside pit stop and got pretty excited about the improvement from the sometimes overly sweet Cambodian food.
I’d met a Vietnamese guy on the bus who’d been chatting to me and offered us a lift to the centre of town, as he’d already booked a taxi. When you hear the word free in Asia you automatically assume there are strings attached and put up your defenses but it turned out that he genuinely just wanted to welcome us as guests to his city, which was awesome, especially as we didn’t yet have any Vietnamese dong! Such a ridiculous currency by the way, you’re literally carrying around millions. A bit of wandering down vibrant alleyways full of hotels and restaurants finally led us to our place, luang vu, which was highly rated online and did not disappoint for a few nights of more luxurious living. We were meeting Jess’s sister Rebecca here so that she could join us on our 3 or so week tour of ‘Nam which would make a welcome addition to the group, evening out the numbers again.
Once she’d arrived we could get our tourist on and start exploring the city, as all we’d managed to do the afternoon we arrived was get some dinner (admittedly an amazing and cheap claypot yum yum) and find the local Topshop! Our main plans for the city were to do a day trip down the Mekong delta as there was a fair bit of southern Vietnam that we didn’t have time to see, and also to do the usual city stuff. First was the war remnants museum, which much like he killing fields in Cambodia, wasn’t exactly a “fun” excursion but again it blew me away how little I knew about the history of this part of the world. I didn’t know about agent orange, I didn’t know that the war was really between southern and northern Vietnam, and I didn’t know that America still haven’t done anything about making amends. Admittedly it was very skewed and propaganda ish representation, but some of the photos and the number of disabled people begging on the streets couldn’t be ignored.
Aside from that serious part of the tourist route we also visited some more neutral parts of the crazy buzzing city. When we weren’t crossing roads and trying not to get killed by whizzing mopeds we just hopped in the city’s very cheap taxis from one place to the next. We saw a Chinese jade pagoda which also housed thousands of good luck turtles (swimming in a very small pond), the old colonial post office, still functioning with its beautiful architecture, and the Notre Dame cathedral. We also popped into the expansive Thai Binh market which was very nice but was mostly just to browse and hide from the brief torrential rainpour, and also the hidden Mariamman Hindu temple, which had the most amazing tiled walls and floors. Really beautiful. There were a couple of cool shops we found nearby as well that made local crafts and sold replicas of the old propaganda posters from the war which we all bought a few of.
We stayed in the city a day longer than expected so were able to fit in a trip to the Saigon Botanical gardens/Zoo. Rebecca is really into her monkeys, having done her masters on primate conservation and we were worried about the conditions that some of the enclosures might be in. We were pleasantly surprised and found the zoo to be quite a good one, with lots to see. The only animals that didn’t seem too happy were the white tiger who was pacing and literally looked suicidal, if an animal can, and the hippo which had a tiny pond to swim in for such a massive creature – not to mention the idiots throwing stuff at it to make it move. Still probably worth seeing for the tiger cubs, monkeys and the pretty botanical grounds.
That evening we bought tickets to go to the opera house and see a show, similar to the circus we saw in Battambang, with young people doing acrobatics and dancing. The setting was lovely and the traditional music really added to the scene. W couldn’t take pictures but that meant we could sit back and enjoy the show all the more. It wasn’t as vibrant as the circus in Cambodia but there were so,e really great bits, and some really funny ones. They had lots of props, big bamboo sticks and baskets to roll around and climb on and off. One piece made fun of the hectic life in Vietnam, alluding to the crazy driving, the disorganized queuing and the constant noise. We followed the show with a fancy dinner and then went up to the 54th floor of the … Building to have a drink and take in the view over the mad city. Ruth expensive but worth it for the height although Jess hated it and though she was going to die! Most of our other night time activities involved grabbing a cheap beer (25p!) and joining the hordes of locals and tourists who sat around on mats and seats on the streets of district 1 to chat.
Finally our day trip out of the city to Monkey island came around. To be honest this was pretty average in the end so I wouldn’t recommend it for the price and I won’t write much more then a skeleton of events for it. We got a ferry over the Mekong and drove another hour to the monkey forest which we expected to have monkeys roaming around freely, and it did for some part, but also had monkeys in cages, on chains and one was even riding a bike blindfolded and doing handstands. Not ideal for the conservationist in Rebecca. There was a really cool jet boat ride through the mangroves to an old war guerrilla base which was the highlight, but they then made us watch a boring and very old propaganda video which brought it down a bit despite the interesting subject matter, too slanted a viewpoint. Feeding crocodiles was next which we just watched as the employees were poking them quite hard with sticks and finally a an average lunch and walk of a very bland beach. Not really worth staying the extra day for but tours are often mis sold in Asia so nothing we can do about that really.
Next up was an overnight bus for Jon and I to Dalat. Jess and Rebecca were flying so we would meet them there. Up into the mountains for cooler climes and to meet “The family”..!
Bitten by the Travel Bug 