Ho Chi Minh City

Trip Start Sep 05, 2008
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Trip End Ongoing


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Monday, November 10, 2008

Not a massive day, today. Ourselves and the Oz-mericans went for a combined shopping / sight-seeing walking tour around the city. I had read up on where the decent shops are on the net, as our guidebook is slightly out of date and we're getting a little tired of arriving outside a hotel or guesthouse that sounds great only to find it's closed down / been demolished / become a brothel.

The fact that I was responsible for the research on the shopping front left me wide open for abuse, and this was piled on when I led us, a bunch of backpackers, past Louis Vuitton, Mont Blanc and the largest Gucci shop I've ever seen (including New York). I wasn't in the market for a Louis Vuitton rucksack, I just read that the street was a good place to head.

Vietnamese food is good, cheap, generally safe (ie no gutrot) and easy to find Ho Chi Minh, the man himself
Ho Chi Minh, the man himself
 . So it was a crying shame when it started to absolutely pour it down that the only shop in close range was KF Bloody C. Rancid. But we capitulated and ate the greasy offerings.

We saw parts of HCMC that I'm sure we wouldn't have seen otherwise, and it was a good laugh, and a relaxing day. A beer here, an ale there throughout helped it go a little smoother. Ended up buying a really good, but obviously fake, North Face rucksack to contain the various bits and pieces that we've bought on our travels and were too stingy to post home (Air Mail costs a fortune for a several kg package, and Surface Mail takes about 6 months). It cost 16,000 Dong (about £6). I also bought two ace/mint pairs of shorts that cost the same amount. The label says Abercrombie and Fitch; but looking at them, they can't be fakes. And when you see fakes, it's the same fakes and they're everywhere; these aren't. They're made in Vietnam. Maybe someone nicks them from the factory.
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