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Published: February 23rd 2012
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$2 lunch at "The Lunch Lady" Day 1: Atlanta
Due to our city's lack of decent public transportation, the first leg of our trip to Vietnam started with a 1am train from the station near our house to the airport (there is no transport between 1:30-5am, and our flight was at 6am). We pulled an all-nighter at the airport, afraid that we would fall asleep and miss our flight. There were an incredible number of homeless people passed out in the waiting area, many of whom seemed quite experienced in airport squatting - - they were practically on 1st name basis with the police officers who came around 4am to kick them out. I had no idea the busiest airport in the world had such a nightlife :-).
Highlights in between Atlanta and Ho Chi Minh:
1. Chicago airport bathrooms - - fancy toilets, and automatic mirrors that are billboards until you walk up, then they switch into mirrors - - never seen that before!
2. Japan Airlines - - great service, clean, polite, abundant food, comfortable seats, even better than Lufthansa which was previously our favorite. The airplane was huge and half empty, and
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Diego relaxing on our hostel's balcony when we finally arrived in Ho Chi Minh city after what seemed like an eternity of flights and layovers. was complete with a help-yourself snack bar, which was an adventure in itself as all the labels were in Japanese. The 1st thing we tried (well, Diego tried - - after one whiff I decided to pass) was something that looked and felt like a gummy bear, but according to Diego tasted like seaweed). The 2nd thing Diego pulled out of the basket was actually pretty good - - puffed vegetable fries of some sort (in response to my question of what they were, Diego replied, "I don't know, I don't speak Japanese"). Lastly, I picked something that actually had a small English label under the Japanese one, thinking that it would be pretty hard to go wrong with "Japanese Rice Crackers". Wrong. That was quite possibly the worst thing I have ever tasted. The supposedly safe "rice crackers" tasted like week-old rotten fish, no exaggerating.
After what seemed like ages of airports, airplanes, and sleepless nights, we finally made it to Ho Chi Minh city. I don't think I ever want to see another airplane again in my life. With only 2 hours of sleep in the past 48 hours, we were dreading having to deal
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The local market with the Ho Chi Minh airport. We had heard lots of nightmare stories, but to their credit it was not bad at all. We made it through the visa office (we had arranged the visa and filled out all the paperwork beforehand, so we just had to "pay money" in the words of the officer behind the desk) and customs in 15 minutes. There were some English guys ahead of us who were not so lucky though. Their private tour operator had told them that they did not need visas, so they went ahead and booked the flight, only to be told it was either "pay lots more money" or be deported. When we left, the visa officer had just told them that they had to wait for a travel agent to show up to get their visa for them. At 11pm, they were all closed. Those poor guys were probably waiting there until the agencies opened in the morning. Knowing that we would be exhausted, we had arranged for our hostel to pick us up at the airport, and we were relieved to see that they actually showed up and were there waiting when we walked outside. After a
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Street vendor coconut milk cold shower we felt much better and had the energy to go have a few beers on the balcony before we passed out in our room.
This morning we were up at 7am for our hostel's breakfast of eggs, french bread, coffee, and juice. The hostels here are MUCH better than the ones in Turkey and Bulgaria that we experienced last year - - they are actually quite nice, very clean, and comfortable. Our room is spotless and has a private bathroom, TV, AC, and even a mini-fridge (not to mention little things like towels and sheets, which were not always provided in the eastern European hostels unless you paid an extra fee), all for $20/night! After breakfast we walked. And walked. And walked. And almost got run over by about 100 different scooters. And walked some more. All the walking paid off though. We started out with the local market, where they sell pretty much everything, from fish to tofu to veggies to what looked like live eel. After the local market, we hit the more touristic Ben Thang Market, which was enormous and had an even wider variety of merchandise to choose from, including lots
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Cool stairs at the Independence Palace of knock-off clothing, shoes, etc. Diego was drooling over some of the sunglasses, watches, and bags, but thankfully I was there to talk some sense into him before he loaded up with stuff on the 1st day.
From there we made our way to the Independence Palace, which has been left just the way it was when it fell to North Vietnamese troops in 1975. Built in the 1960's, the building is very "mid-century" style and has very cool floor to ceiling windows that open completely on all sides of the building to allow the breeze to flow through. The basement was practically a bunker with thick concrete walls, offices, control rooms, and telephone/radio rooms.
For lunch, we decided to attempt to find "The Lunch Lady", the street food place featured on Anthony Bourdain's show (as well as many other culinary travel sites). Diego had been looking forward to this ever since we decided to go to Vietnam, so we braved the mid-day sun and started walking again. By this time it was HOT. Very hot. And we kept getting stuck on the sides of the streets with no shade (crossing streets here is
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Floor to ceiling windows that open to allow much-needed breeze throughout the building somewhat of an adventure). Thanks to Diego's rusty but not forgotten Colombian street skills we managed not to get plastered to the asphalt and eventually arrived half-baked at the famous lunch lady's corner. I, of course, made the mistake of eating one of the red pepper slices provided as a condiment on the table and could barely taste the rest of my meal, but at least I had a seat in the shade - - Diego's chair appeared to be the only seat on the whole corner where the sun somehow managed to get through a little hole in the tree branches and continue to torture Diego throughout lunch. I'll take the spicy pepper over the mid-day Vietnamese sun any day! To make matters worse, on top of the sun and the spicy peppers, the lunch of the day was hot noodle soup. Needless to say, we were sweating like pigs by the end of it. I don't know how all the Vietnamese people do it - - even the ones dressed in office clothes don't seem to sweat at all, and we were bright red and drenched in sweat in tank top/t-shirt and shorts. Anyway, we had a delicious
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I want these windows! lunch that cost about $2 per person.
The sun was still brutal, so we decided to have a coffee and wait it out in a coffee shop. We were so fed up with the heat and sun that we went against everyone’s warnings about ice (due to the possibility of getting sick from the water) and had blended ice coffees, which were wonderful. I just hope we don’t wake up throwing up tonight. We are not sick yet, so I am keeping my fingers crossed. The cold drinks were pretty stupid of us but very refreshing nonetheless.
After recovering sufficiently to face the traffic once more, we walked several more blocks to the War Remnants Museum. This museum was very informative but very depressing. It is amazing how cruel people can be to each other.
When we finally made it back to our hostel at the end of the day, Diego was devastated when he couldn’t get facebook to work. Every other website loaded just fine, except for facebook. Turns out, after asking Uncle Google, that facebook is actually banned in parts of Vietnam and China. Poor Diego. He is
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The palace is decorated with the same furniture and decor it had in 1975 having withdrawals now.
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DANIEL
non-member comment
///WOW
QUE RICO DIEGO, LAS FOTOS ESTAN INCREIBLES!!!