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Saigon, Cu Chi Tunnels and Mekong Delta
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We arrived in Ho Chi Minh City (also known as Saigon) after a somewhat eventful bus journey where we ended up going into the back of a rather large lorry. Not entirely sure how the bus driver failed to notice it but no one was hurt and the bus cant have been that badly damaged as we stopped for no longer than a minute to check it out. Anyway we arrived in Saigon and for once the bus dropped us right in the centre of the city exactly in the backpacker area known as Pham Ngu Lao. We almost immediately found where we stayed for the rest of our time in Saigon which was in a couple's house who rented out a couple of rooms to make a little bit of extra money. We later found out that they were both English teachers and classes were held every evening downstairs which was really nice to walk in to. The couple 'Mr. n Mrs. Long' were really lovely and even prepared us fruit one afternoon when we came back from a day out sightseeing, which really showed us the friendliness the Vietnamese are renowned for. The room was also really nice, the cleanest place we have stayed in by far and somewhat homely.
The first night we were there we popped out to see what was what and soon bumped into Eric and Mel who we had met previously in Halong Bay. They were also with a guy called Michael who was lovely and we all decided on a night out to celebrate finding each other and finding beer at 4000 dong a litre (13p!!!). Anyway without going into too much detail we consumed a few litres of beer and went to a few other establishments before heading to a club which is supposed to be THE place to go, 'Apocalypse Now'. Unfortunately we arrived too late and it wasn't allowing anyone else in so we returned to some other bars to continue our night until deciding we really should go to bed.
The following day after a rather late start, was dedicated to sightseeing around Saigon. We walked down to the Dong Khai area which is the backbone of Saigon and rather French, where a lot of the expensive hotels and restaurants are as well as the riverside. We followed a planned walk around the area which allowed us to see many of the city's museums and colonial remnants including the late nineteenth century Notre Dame Cathedral, the Reunification Palace and the former Hotel de Ville which now houses the 'People's Committee'. The following day we were up early to head out of central Saigon to the Cu Chi Tunnels. For those of you who know anything about the Vietnamese war against the U.S, the famous tunnels where the Viet Cong lived and fought from are something pretty spectacular. Here we saw some of the tunnels that were actually used during the war and although they have been widened to allow us fat western tourists to go down and see what they were like, they were very small all the same. It was a very dark, sweaty, claustrophobic experience and something which left us wondering how these people had lived down in the tunnels for a period of up to 10 yrs. We also saw many of the traps which they used during the fighting and the artillery which they had used and then had a chance to fire some of these ourselves. Both of us fired a pistol at the shooting range and Henry had a go on the AK47. Although we were tempted to go for something bigger, the cost put us off pretty quickly.
The following day we got up again pretty early and took a trip to the Mekong Delta. After a couple of hours on the bus, we jumped on a tourist boat and made our way across the Mekong, passing huge barges carrying sand and fishing villages made up of floating shacks along the way. On the far side, we disembarked onto several smaller boats and began to wind our way through the palm lined channels of the delta, until we came to our first proper stop of the day, a honey farm. Here we were told a bit about how they make their honey (not rocket science, bees + flowers = honey!), and also shown how they make coconut candy (grind then squash coconuts, mix with sugar, cook, cool - job done). We also tried some of the honey mixed with tea (ok) and rice wine (no amount of honey can make this taste good), and got to mess around with a huge snake.
After this it was back on the boats to our lunch stop, then into smaller rowing boats to negotiate the narrower channels to the fishing village. Here we had some free fruit, and were forced to sit through what felt like an eternity of traditional folk songs. These were awful, a clear demonstration that tacking on the phrase "hand-made" or "traditional" does not mean these things are better! This was the last stop on the Mekong tour, and it was back across the river to the bus then home. One bit of drama - when we got back to the bus two fellow travelers found that their bags had been gone through, nothing was taken but it was a sobering thought that you can never be too careful.
Our last day in Saigon was dedicated again to sightseeing around the centre of the city. We took a public bus over to an area called Cholon which is basically a dense cluster of streets and is the Chinese ghetto of the city. The short bus ride was again eventful with some crazy woman who kept changing seats to get closer to us and who kept pointing at the two of us and up in the air and then touching her forehead whilst muttering something we made absolutely no sense of. The word 'OK' was used at least 3 times in any sentence she used and the rest of it was in Vietnamese. After trying to grab our hands and generally being very odd she got up grabbed Henry and kissed him on the cheek before exploding into giggles and getting off the bus. Very strange!
Cholon really was something else, from the vast array of Pagodas we saw to the large markets which sold just about everything you didn't need and nothing we did need. We wondered around the area for a good few hours and took refuge for a quick drink and toilet stop in KFC which just about kept us going. The pagodas were the main reason for heading to Cholon and really were quite special (see photos). We ended the day by having dinner back in Pam Ngu Lao at a cheap no frills eatery which was half inside and half on the street. It was here we tried the first really strange thing to eat on our travels.... a ducks embryo! (unfortunately we only had Henrys phone with us that evening so the pictures are on there but we will try to upload them if we find the right cable in Bangkok). To sum the experience up a ducks embryo it tastes a bit like egg, a little fishy, there were feathers and the head was visible, there were a lot of veins and something which looked very much like a placenta.... We ate the lot. As I'm sure you can imagine we felt a little ill after, not because it tasted bad but it was the thought of what we had eaten. We went to bed that night hoping we wouldn't be ill the following day as we had booked our bus to Cambodia.
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