Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam – Day 11 (Feb-9)

(2 hour flight from Singapore to Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam)

Good morning Vietnam! We arrive smoothly to the Siagon Comfort Hotel ($33 with breakfast, overpriced; but has a phone, and includes free internet) located in the backpacker district. From the tour book, we expected a mob scene at the airport (like our trip to Kunming, China in 2003) but everything was smooth. Ho Chi Minh reminds me of Hsinchu city in Tiawan (Vana: reminds me of China), everything is a buzz with traffic. For dinner we head straight for the Pho. Kevin thinks it is similar to Pho in California, Vana thinks Pho in Goleta taste much better.

We walk to the central night market, which seemed small for a large Asian city. We pass groups of teenage couples, and their customized cartoon color motor bikes. Everything moves to the buzz of traffic. We wait for a critical mass of pedestrians because crossing the street. In Vietnam (as in most of Asia), might makes right. Busses and trucks always have the right of way, and pedestrians are nothing (Vana: the trick is you have to act like you know what you are doing. No running or acting nervous). Vana buys a durian fruit (also known as stinky fruit) and we try a rice desert from a street cart.

(Durian)

People on the street rattle off Vietnamese to Vana at supersonic speeds. Vana ignores them which further intensifies the “dialog”. I kindly inform them in English that Vana does not speak Vietnamese, which brings a puzzled conclusion to the conversation.

Vana: Okay, it gets tired after a while. If locals didn’t talk to me in Vietnamese a mile a minute, then they always ask “are you Vietnamese?” “you look like Vietnamese, where are you from?” (I get these questions about three times day). If I shop in a store, the foreigners will come up to me for help, I shake my head and says “Sorry, I don’t work here”. So I dress more like a foreigner and always bring the camera as a tourist sign.

The thing that bothers me is that almost every male foreigner (single) walking on the street has a young Vietnamese girl next to him. They are known as their escort. I don’t want to be assumed one. Later on this trip, we heard a story where a Canadian Thai woman was traveling with her Caucasian husband (she speaks a little Vietnamese as well). Locals will come up to her and ask ‘so how much did he pay you?” and “hey, ask your husband to buy more”. They got local price for everything, but that’s the price she paid. Stories like this make me sad every time.

CLICK HERE to see more pictures from this day.

Ho Chi Minh City, train to Nha Trang, Vietnam – Day 12 (Feb-10)

We spend the morning buying a train ticket. There is a 5-star private train we wanted to try, but the schedule and cost doesn’t make any sense. Also they don’t answer their phone, and their office is moved. We buy an overnight soft sleeper on the National train for tonight.

We head to the War Remnants museum, which is well presented; history of Vietnam independence from the French and Americans, scenes of the war, and victims of the war. Besides tanks, artillery, and aircraft parked on the grounds, the pictures really make the exhibit. The photographs are taken by 134 photographers who died in Vietnam and Indochina. Like a visit to Holocaust museums, you always remember the feeling of seeing the pictures.

(result of ‘burn all, destroy all and kill all’ policy. even woman and children are targets)

(Spreading chemicals in the forest, which made people sick)

(Chemicals made pregnant women sick, these are the pictures of their children)

(this is a famous photo)

(a mother with her four children crossing the river trying to get away from the war in South Vietnam)

What can I say? War is bad, people die, and chemicals make people sick. Besides the famous pictures we’ve all seen (like burned children running and screaming), there was one that caught my eye; showing an air view of miles of carpet bombed rice fields. Politics aside, that is some expensive rice!

The overnight sleeper is clean and comfortable. We have a young local women and younger brother in our car. Every cabin in the train is a buzz with TV, loud conversation, and cell phones. I wake up and find our cabin mates asleep with the TV on, and cell phone playing music simultaneously. They are easily powered off.

CLICK HERE to see more museum pictures.