Backtracking.. Ho Chi Min city (Saigon)

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Ok, if I can remember Ho Chi Min at all..

The girls, Kieran and I made it a habit to get expensive dinners, because Ho Chi Min is the food capital of Vietnam. We enjoyed taking the girls out for their first ever japanese meal - sushi, shashimi, sake.. the works. It was good fun.

Kieran and I got up at the crack of noon and searched long and hard for a restaurant that didn't exist. After that we visited the "re-unification palace", formerly the headquaters of the Southern Vietnamese goverment. It now served the same purpose for the government of the north. The tanks were left on the lawn where they'd burst through the gates in 197(9?). This wasn't the highlight of vietnam, although we did get entry and a guided tour for one dollar. I suppose the building was an interesting contrast to our houses of parliament, where you are unlikely to find secret staircases descending into bomb shelters ten meters below the ground, movie theaters, or casinoes on the roof.

We set off for the war remnants museum. Like Tuol Sleng, this had me in tears. It was so well put together, with absolutely amazing and tragic photography, particularly showing the after effects of agent orange. Also memorable were a few shots of American soldiers proudly brandishing heads of young Vietnamese men. Really, really devastating.

This had us in a bit of a glum mood, til' dinner came around. We went to this fantastic vegetarian place. It was quite popular among the locals, there were no other tourists to be found here - this place was more of a plastic yard chair set up than what we had gotten used to. The food wasn't very well presented either, but once that stuff hit your mouth, hoo boy! It was amazing! Fried Cauliflower in this amazing spicy sauce, thick vegetable curry, ooh, yummy.

The next day, we went to the Cu Chi tunnels. Halfway between Ho Chi Min City and the Cambodian Border, the tunnels were used by the Viet Cong to outwit the Americans. It seems like something out of fiction, but these people dug tunnels as much as ten meters down that went as far as the Cambodian border. Americans would chase the VC into the forests, only to find that charlie had vanished, and they couldn't find a reason.

We came around to the first hole. Well, really we just stood around what looked like an ordinary section of jungle, and our guide told us about the tunnels for a while. then he started thumping around with a log, until finally he found a different tone. he pulled back the leaves and showed a grate, no bigger than a cinderblock. He pulled it off, and sure enough, there was a tunnel, out of nowhere. He asked if anyone wanted to go in. One overly enthusiastic 40-some Aussie cried "Grease me up!" and hopped in.. or sort of lowered himself into the crack. He came out a few seconds later, as he could see nothing.

Our guide asked if anyone else wanted to go. Silence. I volunteered. It was a tight squeeze in there, and once you were inside, you couldn't see a thing. I had brought my camera in with me however, and repeatedly took shots, and was able to find my way based on the image on my LCD.

Kieran climbed in after me. We crawled through the tunnel a ways, using the camera some of the time and just feeling it out with our hands the others.

When I went right up to a crevace in the wall, and shone the red-eye light of my camera, I almost always found a collection of two or three bats. Unaccustomed to our presence, I was able to get right up close to them and snap a shot before the flash scared them away. they would often fly right into my face.

The guide had been shouting for some time, and was threatening to shut us in the tunnel ( the guy was a real prick). We'd been promised more chances to explore the tunnels later, so we climbed out. The rest of the tour was fairly sickening. It was basically the guide glamourizing all the aspects of the war - explaining to us how the VietCong had manufactured weapons, designed sickening booby traps, etc, so that was disappointing. But the worst of it came when the tour was led to the firing range, where we were all give then opportunity to fire AK 47's at the price of 1.50 USD a bullet. I guess most of the people on our tour hadn't been to the war remnants museum yet, because I was sickened by this. After seeing how much destruction and unhappiness these guns had brought, to then turn around and capitalize on them for American tourists!

Later that day, we decided to go for a massage. I'd already been worked over by an ex-con, so I figured I should go to the seeing hands massage parlor, to receive treatment from a blind masseuse. I realize now that the main reason that this is not very popular in other places in the world is that it is brutally painful.

My girl specialized on the kidneys. She delivered repeated chops to this area till I thought I'd been winded. There's no tissue to massage there - only vital organs. When she wasn't smacking my kidneys, she was driving her elbow into my spine, slapping my forehead, chopping tender areas around the knees, and giving my buttocks undeserved amounts of attention.

All the while, in the stall next to me, Kieran was getting worked over properly. The entire hour of his massage, I heard nothing but the sound of open hands slapping Kieran all over his back. The only thing that kept me from bursting into hysterics was the immense pain that I was in. The only break kieran got was when his masseuse stepped out of the room (for over ten minutes!) to find his radio. Kieran later said that the attack may have been racially motivated, as the man obviously felt a deep hatred upon seeing him.. oh wait.

Anyway, Kieran got mad at me every time I patted his back for the next few days.

Before leaving Ho Chi Min, we decided to get a taste of Gourmet Vietnamese food. Most of our meals up till this point had been international, to please the tastes of our less than adventurous companions. So we went to the snazziest place in town, the temple club. We dropped a pretty penny, but it was worth it - an absolutely delicious meal. Four varieties of spring rolls, each quite unique (two were wrapped in herbs, one in pastry and one in rice paper), orange peking duck (kieran says it's the first time he's enjoyed duck), and a hot pot of caramel pork, which was still boiling for several minutes after it arrived at our table. A rich slice of Saigon cheese cake capped the meal off, and we made our way home slowly, bellies heavy, pockets light.

And that's Saigon. I've been so many places since there, but I'm too tired to write about it now. I'll catch up with Dalat, Nha Trang, and Hoi An (where I am now) tommorow.

Night!

Thomas

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