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Lost in Saigon

Ho Chi Minh City Travel Blog › entry 24 of 77 › view all entries

My Backpacking Journey through Southeast Asia at the end of 2006 and into 2007. The ups and downs of my trip and the many beautiful places I visited. Trully an Experience of a lifetime!

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Lost in Saigon

November 17, 2006

Uncle Ho

After touring the Mekhong Delta, the Cuchi tunnels and Cao Dai Holy See temple, Bohng Phatry and I decided it was only right to spend some time visiting the main sites of Saigon, rather than making our way out on another day tour outside the city.

We paid a visit to the;
- Fine Arts Museum (had some spectacular art work)
- local street markets (nothing special)
- Popped into a few modern malls, Saigon Central... JUST for the aircon ahhaha
- Took a few snap happy shots of the Theatre and the People's committee building, Hotel de Ville.
- History museum, very good layout, and contained many items of Vietnam History. It also contained some very exquisite examples of Khmer statues, that were most likely obtained during the 1979 liberation of the Khmer people from the Khmer Rouge
- Last stop was at the Jade Pagoda, which wasn't all that appealing as suggested in the Lonely Planet guide.

Me in front of the Theatre

After a long day of walking, we headed back to the Go Go Go Bar and played a few games of pool with some Irish fela's.

The following day we did another tour, around district 5 (Cholon, Chinatown).
There wasn't anything different about Chinatown from the rest of Ho Chi Minh City. We had breakfast at a Yum Cha joint, which took a while to find LOL. The whole breakfast for 2 only cost us 50,000 Dong each!!! BARGAIN!

After breakfast we came across an excellent example of a Chinese Pagoda. I say this because, both Phatry and I had no real interest in small Chinese styled pagodas, and we only paid a visit as it wouldn't of been right to now visit at least one while we were here hehehe.

We walked around Chinatown for a few hours, and dropped by Cho An Dong (An Dong Market), and did some souvenier shopping!!!! Just like at Cho Ben Thanh in District 1, the shop keepers were fairly rude, and pesistent.

Swirly Incense at a Vietnamese Temple

Continually grabbing you when you are about to walk away, yes literally grab you by the arm and won't let you leave until you have purchased something or escape their demons grasp. Otherwise if they don't grab you most will probably shout out some illicit Viet at you as you walk off.

This kind of treatment and agressive is not too appealing to tourists, and gives a bad impression on the Vietnamese people. Don't get me wrong there are many friendly Vietnamese on the streets who are always eagered to lend a helping hand when you pull out a map and ask for directions. They all come scurrying around you even when you already have someone else showing you, they will all gather around and try to direct you in Vietnamese, as the majority and I mean the large majority don't speak any English :) Cheers street folks!