Thanks for the blog baton Fran – Rich here again. After Nha Trang, our travels took us further South toward the Mekong Delta and Ho Chi Minh City. Formerly known as Saigon until ‘liberated’ by the North Vietnamese army in 1975 and renamed after their leader, Ho Chi Minh City is Viet Nam’s biggest, brashest and most vibrant city. After Hanoi’s mostly low-rise, pretty colonial buildings and tree-lined boulevards, HCMC’s skyscrapers and slightly dodgy-looking alleyways were an interesting contrast. After the less than optimal bus journey that Fran described in the last post, our 8 hour train journey was relative bliss. Our cabin mates were from Exeter which meant recalling lots of our student hangouts with them – happy days! We opted for a bed even though it wasn’t an overnighter so we had a bit more room, plus the windows were clean enough to get some good photies! The train was late arriving and even later getting to HCMC but we didn’t mind as it wasn’t a bus!!!
Hugging the coast then…
…through the hills towards HCMC
Arriving in HCMC we grabbed a taxi with our cabinmates and were dropped off on Pham Ngu Lau in the backpacker district. Our hotel was on the ominous-sounding Alley 219 – after some initial trepidation we disappeared down the dark alley; thankfully we stumbled across our hotel after only a few wrong turns! A good night’s sleep was in order, however one of the English guys in the room next door ensured this wasn’t the case when returning at 4am with a lady friend and playing ‘mood music’ at full volume accompanied by some sort of repetitive furniture moving – not sure what that could have been…!
The following morning we fuelled up on super-strong Vietnamese coffee to combat the shoddy night’s sleep and hit the city. The weather is pretty changeable in Viet Nam at this time of year so we had to dive for cover from sudden downpours a few times – it was still pretty boiling at 35+ degrees even after the rain though! The city is definitely as vibrant and go-getting as the guidebooks describe – I spotted one pretty retro computer shop in Hanoi but a whole district of them in Ho Chi Minh City! Just about managed to resist buying any gadgets…!
Pretty crazy phone wiring!
Hosing it down in a park
We headed in the afternoon to the Reunification Palace in the centre of the city. This grand building was erected in the 60’s and the architecture oozes 60’s chic! The building was erected on the site of the old Norodom Palace built by the French, commandeered by South Viet Nam’s President Diem after the French left, and demolished by Diem after an assassination attempt there to make way for the new structure. The North Vietnamese Army ‘liberated’ the Palace in 1975, an event which signalled victory for the North; the tanks used to storm the palace are proudly on display in the palace grounds. The new custodians of the palace renamed it the ‘Reunification Palace’ and preserved much of the palace in its’ original state to show the excesses of the capitalist South, complete with some awesome 60’s and 70’s kitsch furniture! Particularly intriguing were the underground war rooms featuring some huge strategic war maps and a rabbit warren of claustrophobic grey tunnels going down level upon level under the palace – the ‘No Entry’ signs on some of them just making me want to have a closer look (as usual)! The displays on the history of the American War were laden with rhetoric and understandably focussed little on the South Vietnamese who weren’t so keen on Communism – it was all fascinating though!
Reunification Palace – looks a bit like something out of Thunderbirds or an early Bond film!
One of the liberating tanks
Excellent 60’s architecture…
…and some even better interior design inside!
Some of the war maps
Underground tunnels seemingly leading to nowhere
After the palace we wandered back through the Northern half of the city centre, past the grand old post office (seizing the opportunity to post some postcards!) and a number of churches – a sizeable proportion of the Saigon population is Catholic; a legacy from the French occupation.
Saigon Cathedral
La Poste
Before we departed for Cambodia, we also checked out the War Remnants Museum, though we weren’t brave enough to go inside to look at the deformed foetuses preserved in formaldehyde, illustrating the birth defects caused by the millions of litres of napalm and agent orange dropped by the Americans over Viet Nam during the war. It’s amazing considering the history of Viet Nam that the people are all so friendly and content – a real credit to their resilient character. One final trek also took us out to one of HCMC’s ornate Buddhist pagodas. Tucked away in a backstreet, the temple was pretty non-descript from the outside but once you entered you were wowed with ornate carving and gold-plating everywhere, though it was pretty dark. There were plenty of photo opportunities but as people were worshipping we thought it best to just quietly observe and light some incense for the chap from Nha Trang.
‘Get to the chopper…’ – Arnold Schwarzenegger from the film Predator
The Mekong in Saigon
One or two mopeds…
We thoroughly enjoyed our time in Ho Chi Minh City and Viet Nam in general – we’ll be sad to leave but it’s been amazing and we look forward to returning at some point in the future! Next stop Cambodia, via the Mekong Delta by boat – should be awesome!!!
P.S. Just so this post isn’t too morbid, I thought the following photo of an ice cream shop would lighten the mood…
0 comments:
Post a Comment