Ho Chi Minh City

Ho Chi Minh City, formerly Saigon, is the most populated city in Vietnam with just over seven million inhabitants. It's very, very busy. There are so many sidestreets and alleys that it's easy to lose time just wandering about the place, which is what we've spent a fair bit of time doing. It's not the most beautiful city we've been too but it has loads of character. The streets (and alleys) are always alive. Haphazard wiring, neon lights and lots and lots of motorbikes and scooters are everywhere you go - traffic is beyond crazy, to the point where scooters take over the pavement even (check the video below!). The beer is insanely cheap (18p a glass), and the people are friendly. It's a great city.

Lunchtime!

Other than wandering the streets our time has been spent largely doing thigns related to the Vietnamese War. On our first day we headed to the Reunification Palace, the second we checked out the War Remnants Museum, and the third we headed to the Cu Chi Tunnels. Each of these provided a fairly biased account of the war, but were all pretty interesting.


The Renuinification Palace was the base of the war for South Vietnam, and the site where the war ended when a tank crashed through its' gates in april 1975 (the same month the Khmer Rouge took control of Cambodia). We had a walk around, watched a propagandist video and then headed home - it was interesting, but probably the least interesting of the three.

The War Remnants Museum was really well done - outside it had loads of replicas of tanks, helicopters, planes and all other sorts of vehicles from the war. Inside were three floors of displays and information about the war, most of the displays were photo displays but they were really good. There were also some weapon displays and such. We weren't expecting it to be as bad as the S21 and Killing Fields in Cambodia but it was quite a bit more horrific. Lots of really graphic photos. There was an exhibition about Agent Orange - a chemical that was used to strip the foliage in the jungle to stop the Vietnamese hiding there - that was really sad to see the families that are still suffering today and will be for future generations as people are born with horrific birth defects and disabilities. Again we didn't take too many photos of this but if you want an idea, put Agent Orange into google and have a look at the images that come up. There was another section on the war atrocities commited by the Americans during the war - again very sad.

The third day at the Cu Chi tunnel was a little bit more lighthearted and quite good fun. We drove about an hour and a half out of HCMC and arrived at Cu Chi. The tunnels are an extensive network of tunnels apparently stretching out over 200km where Viet Cong guerillas hid, fought and lived during parts of the war. We were told that the tunnels contained living quarters, communications and ammo bases and even schools and hostpitals. There were also loads of traps around the areas and apparently the Americans couldn't really get near the Viet Cong. We had a little tour of the area and were shown some of the traps and hatches that soldiers hid in before being shown into the tunnels. We passed through a section that was 40m long (and had been made taller and wider for westerners) and it was really hard work, we all came out sweating and out of breath. There was also a shooting range where you could fire any of the weapons used in the war. I didn't have a go since it seemed to cost quite a lot for something that would be over so quickly. The reason I mention it is because there was a similar thing that could be done in Phnom Penh near the Killing Fields. We'd heard that you could blow up a cow with a rocket launcher for $350. We found out you can shoot a rocket launcher for $350 but dismissed the cow part as something of an urban legend. Anyway, last night we met someone who did shoot the rocket launcher, and he told us that actually the cow part is true (though it costs an extra $100), he watched a video of a guy he met doing it. Even shooting the thing seems crazy to me, that's over two weeks budget out here, and as for the cow thing that just seems twisted to me. Only in Asia....

Our guide

On our last day (today) we hopped on a local bus to the other side of town to check out some Pagodas in Chinatown. The architecture was really interesting and they were pretty cool inside but nothing particularly mindblowing. Alot of the stuff we had done in Ho Chi Minh was concentrated in one area so it was nice to get out and have a bit of an explore.

Tomorrow morning we hop on a bus over to Mui Ne, which will be one of the last beaches on our travels (devastating). After that we travel up the cost stopping at Nha Trang, Hoi An, Hue and Hanoi. Hopefully the rest of Vietnam will be as much fun as it is here!

Here is a great tune by Oceansize. I think it was on an Orange advert quite a few years ago. Not a massive fan of most of their stuff but this tune is a beauty!