Saigon

Ok, before we get in to talking about Saigon, a few lines should be written about our bus ride from Nha Trang. The bus itself was similar to our previous night bus, but about 20 years older. That's 20 more years of people sleeping in those same seats, if you know what I mean. In addition to the smell and worn away cushions, it turns out they assign some of the seats on the bus. The problem is, there's no way of knowing which ones they are. We grab a couple of decent seats in the back, and just as we start to relax, a family comes on and we are in their seats. Ok, we'll move, whatever, all the seats are the same anyway, right? WRONG! Mattie gets put in a seat that only a midget could love, and Julian's seat was just about perfect - for someone Mattie's size! So, we had the option of Mattie being comfortable and Julian being absolutely miserable or both of us suffering together... Well, we're married now so if one of us is going to suffer, both of us are. She took one for the team. Anyhow, the night was pretty miserable, but we made it to Saigon eventually.

We got off the bus and wandered around checking out a few of the hotel options, but the prices seemed a bit high so we continued to look. Finally, a woman came running down the street after us(not at all uncommon) telling us to check out her place for a good price, and she was right. The only catch was that it was above her store, a suit making shop. So, although our "lobby" was filled with silks and shoppers, the room was nice enough and we took it.

The first sight-seeing place we went to visit in the city was the War Remnants Museum. I would hardly call it a museum and more a propaganda warehouse, but it did contain some mint-condition American vehicles from the war.
CH-47:


M-41:


175mm:


UH-1H:


F-5A:


Don't know what this one is:


Back to the comment about the museum. We expected a pro-NVA, anti-American slant going in, that's only natural. But, in a museum, I also expect that stated facts be accurate, or at least accurate enough such that a person born after the war(such as myself) can't walk around pointing out about a dozen blatantly obvious lies. One room contained the following statement, "the guillotine was used by the Americans in the war in 1960," complete with a life-sized model. This is one example of many false facts we saw. Statements like this ruin the credibility of the entire exhibit and serve only to take away from the true realities that the people suffered through, as if that weren't enough. I am sure that some of what the museum says is accurate, but there is so much b.s. in there it's impossible to distinguish between fact and fiction. I was sorry that we paid 30000 Dong to see that garbage.

Moving on... We continued our sight-seeing over to the former presidential palace where NVA tanks broke through the gates in 1975, a moment that has come to define, depending on where you're from, either the Fall or the Liberation of Saigon. It had a beautifully manicured lawn, but the building had been turned into a museum, and we had had enough of those for the day.

Almost directly across the street from the palace is a large catholic church, the first we have seen in Asia. It was really surprising to see right in the heart of old Saigon.


From the church, we made our way down to the Saigon River and made a loop around the city back to our hotel. If we thought the motorbikes in other cities were crazy, we hadn't seen anything yet. At every stoplight, they're lined up like race cars, hundreds deep, engines being revved up waiting for the light to change. The crosswalks only give about two seconds of warning between green and red, so if it changes when you're in the middle, you better start running! It happened to us, but we were lucky enough to make it back to the hotel.

On to dinner... Julian has been eating lots of pizza on this trip but has largely been dis-satisfied by the quality. So, you can imagine his excitement when he saw that our hotel was next door to his favorite pizza place, Pizza Hut! Mattie, who is much more willing to experiment with the local fare, caved and let him drag her in. We went in and ordered a large, pan, meat-lovers pizza. It didn't disappoint:





Afterwards, we went back to our hotel in anticipation of the food coma which was sure to come. The next morning, we had an 8 o'clock bus to catch to Cambodia!

-Mattie and Julian

Location:Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam