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Published: August 11th 2006
By Nathan Hey everyone .... finally arrived in Vietnam ... after 20 hours of being on a plane, it's finally good to be here. The flight was long, but luckily I was on one of those planes that had personal TV screens with on-demand video/audio/and games. It made the flight slightly more enjoyable. The weather here is not as bad as I thought it would be ... it has been in the low 30's most of the time and a lot less humid than Ontario was for the past week or two. Anyway, I'll pass the keyboard over to annie so she can type how the first few days are going. She's much more of the linguist and you'll all enjoy reading her version more than you would my math-minded english 😉
By Anne-Marie I met Nathan at the airport on Monday evening. After a bit of a mishap with his backpack, which decided to stay in Hong Kong for a few extra hours, we were off to explore Saigon!
Saigon is technically the name for District 1 (there are several districts in the city) and Ho Chi Minh City is the official name of the city. However,
we have yet to hear anyone use the latter. Saigon appears to be the default term. I'm a bit surprised at how non-touristy Saigon is. I expected it to be a watered-down version of Bangkok but it really is quite awesome. It's refreshing to be in a huge Asian city without being bombarded by 7-Elevens and Burger Kings. That's not to say that Saigon doesn't offer its western comforts, it just seems that it hasn't been completely overtaken by the tourism industry.
We spent our first day in Saigon walking around the city which was exhausting! You have never seen traffic like this in your life. Motobikes (sometimes with up to 5 people on a bike, including babies), bicycles, cars, pedestrians all crammed into the roads with seemingly no rhyme or reason. It truly is a sight to behold; even more astonishing is that we have seen no accidents (although plenty of close calls). Nathan got some great video footage of the traffic which we'll have to upload somewhere.
I woke up feeling really sick. I had a runny nose, felt nauseated and overall feverish so it was a bit of a struggle to get going. We started
the day with massages at the Vietnamese Institute for the Blind; yep, blind masseurs who provided the best beatdown I have ever had. For $3, we had one-hour massages that really helped my feverish body recover.
We walked through town over to the War Remnants Museum which I was completely unprepared for. The museum focusses on the civilian casualties and after-effects of the American war rather than on the war itself. Among the many photos are pictures of horrific war crimes and the disfigured victims of Agent Orange, the defoliant used by the American military during the war. There are also "tiger cages" where dissidents were caged and tortured. It's impossible for me to even begin to fully describe what we saw yesterday. I wish I could put it into words but the horror is just too great. Nathan took some video footage of the museum but I didn't take any pictures. It didn't seem right.
Nearly getting caught in the rain, we made it back to the hotel before going to visit Bing. Bing is the eldest sister of my sister-in-law Muoi. She lives with her family in Cholon (District 5), also known as Chinatown. We took
a taxi to their home which is the original home that Muoi and her brothers and sister grew up in. It took a bit of navigating to find the home as it was hidden down an alleyway behind the main street. What a gorgeous home! It's five floors and has been fully renovated by Bing's husband. She invited us to stay for dinner with her two daughters, Boi and Dinh (19 and 16), who were very sweet. Their English was great and we were able to communicate with them just fine. They certainly enjoyed making fun of Nathan's inability to use chopsticks! Overall, it was the perfect first day in Saigon.
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Its great to see Nathan made it in ok and that you have a partner for travel (poor guy, will probably end up carrying 4 tonnes of footware after one of your sprees.....but then this is asia, and they make tiny shoes...heehee) Anne it was very nice for you to visit Muoi's family like that...it made her week. also glad you are discivering the good and bad, its important in understanding cultures to know everything and ballance it. Stay safe Pupetta!