Saigon part 1

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My first impression of the Saigon, otherwise known as Ho Chi Minh City, was chaotic, busy, and not particularly pretty. We were in District 10, which was a bit away from the city center and not visited by many tourists. After walking around a bit, I did come to enjoy the fast paced atmosphere and felt like we saw a more authentic part of the city. Most of the tourist stay in District 1, which is more modern, where most of the foreign embassies are, and of course, where all the restaurants and bars are.

Traffic was absolutely horrific; worse than anywhere I've seen in my life. There were of course a lot of cars, but the ratio of motorcycles to cars was said to be 50 to 1. Bikers weave in and out of traffic with horns beeping all the time, as disasters are narrowly averted. There are no traffic lights or stop signs, even at very busy 4-way intersections, but they seem to have a system that everybody understands. It looks like a bizarre type of choreography. Basically, you proceed through the intersection after barely slowing down, and just sort of weave around the other cars and bikes doing the same thing.

While there is a sidewalk, you can't walk on it because the motorbikes are parked there, as well as food stands with table and chairs. People just walk in street and hope traffic swerves around them. If you do find space on the side walk, it's short lived; you find yourself going up and down the curb, which is high and slanted. It looks like pure suicide to try to cross the road but apparently it's possible as we saw people doing it. You step off the curb, and just walk straight into oncoming traffic, keeping your eyes on each driver to be sure they are prepared to weave around you. It's tricky once you get to the middle of the road, because now you have to watch both lanes. Drivers regularly swerve into not only the next lane, but opposing traffic as well. Nothing to it, once you see how it's done. You do have a will and travel insurance right?

After we dropped our bags off, we walked to a grocery store, about 15 minutes away. It was a hair-raising adventure. Google took us down very small back alleys that seems far too narrow for cars, and yet there they were. You also saw motorcycles going in either direction that were so close they almost rubbed the sides of the walls or bumped into one another. Right in the middle of the of this were Caron and I. We wanted to look for someplace to eat along the way but quickly realize that wasn't going to happen. The only places we saw were food carts with a table or two in front. The problem was, the tables looked like kiddie tables for pre school. If I were able to sit on one, it would never hold me and I would never get back up. We continued on to the market and hoped for more tourist-friendly restaurant, or at least one with adult sized chairs.

The supermarket in and of itself was quite the adventure, it was basically combat shopping. There were so many people, it was difficult to walk through the aisles, let alone push a cart. We were the only western girls in this very large Walmart like store. People actually stopped, stared then smiled. They seemed quite curious as to what we could possibly be doing there, but were quite friendly. Many of the children ventured a hello and grinned from ear to ear when we replied. It was quite an unusual experience but it made me sad to know that is not the reception people who don't look like us normally get when visiting my country.

Next to the grocery store we were able to find a restaurant that had almost normal size furniture. None of the staff spoke English but the menu had pictures. We thought we conveyed no chili's / not spicy, but apparently not; the soup was hotter than anything I'd ever eaten. Caron laughed and said it's probably only a one on the chili scale. No secret I'm a wimp lol. We have been warned not to drink the water in Vietnam because the pipes were susceptible to leaks, which let bacteria it. I chose a milky tea which I was a little bit unsure about. After the first taste of soup, I didn't care what was in the tea as long as it included milk. The soup was actually quite good; it had noodles, beef, apparently kimchi and mushrooms, (both of which I carefully picked out), hot dogs and a little piece of corn on the cob. We decided we had had enough adventure for the day and took Uber home instead of walking back. On a happy note the grocery store had Mountain Dew, something I rarely see in my travels.

We walked to the Ben Thahn Street Food Market in District 1 and could definitely see a difference the closer we got to the tourist area. We ran into more and more westerners, and started seeing a few signs in English, which was oddly comforting. Much to our delight, we saw more and more actual sit down restaurants, with adult size chairs and tables. The food market was much smaller than we anticipated, but as promised, was filled with stalls offering mostly Vietnamese street food, but also food from many other countries. I finally found my favorite Vietnamese dish, bún chả. It's a simple dish of grilled pork and white rice noodles with lettuce, carrots, and bean sprouts. I was surprised it took so long to find it, so far all the restaurants we'd eaten in have served a version of ramen noodles. The seating was basically long community tables and you never know who you'll be sitting next to. We met a young Scottish woman, traveling on her own for 6 months around Southeast Asia. She was one of many, many young people we would meet along the way. Asia seems to be the destination of choice. Some are digital nomads; people who have figured out a way to make a living location independent as they say, basically working from anywhere. Others work part of the year and save money, then quit and go traveling. They head home when they're broke, only to repeat the cycle all over. I know some would say they are irresponsible, but I think it's amazing. They're young and learning so much about the word around them. They are taking time to live life before settling down with a career and family. I think it makes them very well rounded.

The walk there was extremely sticky, not because of the heat as much as the very high humidity. It should have only taken 40 minutes, but seemed much longer, mainly due the the difficulty of no sidewalks and having to cross roads. It didn't help that Caron slipped on one of the sloping curbs and rolled into traffic. She was saved because she had the good fortune to fall just behind a parked car, otherwise, she'd have been a goner for sure. Sadly for me, she wouldn't walk anywhere after that. Normally, I walk everywhere I go, regularly logging in 15,000 steps or more. I love traveling with Mic because he also enjoys walking. If I'm honest, I can't say I didn't enjoy the cool comfort of hopping in the back seat of an air conditioned Uber and letting someone else worry about traffic and directions.

After we had rested a bit we headed to the War Remnants Museum. This is related to not only the Vietnam War, but also the first Indochina War involving the French colonists. It was pretty interesting and as an added bonus, air conditioned. It was mostly photographs accompanied by the typical history leading up to each of the conflicts. It was very interesting to see the Vietnam War from their perspective and of course there was quite a bit of propaganda. But then, don't our museums do the same thing? There was a section dedicated to war photographers which showed some really gritty pictures. Many I had seen before, as Time Magazine covers, such as the child running naked after a napalm attack.

After wandering around the museum for a while, it was time to head home. We were drenched in sweat and were looking forward to a nice shower, followed by a nap. As we walked along, we could see many of the Vietnamese were napping as well. It seems shopkeepers and street food vendors would just lay down right where they were and sleep. That often meant the sidewalk. We saw people laying on their parked scooters, sound asleep. We saw one man asleep on the stoop of his shop. I'm not sure why he didn't topple over as he was not leaning against anything. The cutest were four girls dozing in their shop. Three of the girls were sitting on the floor leaning against the counter. There was another girl behind the counter, with her head resting on it. It was such an adorable photograph that both Caron and I stopped. It seemed to be the norm as we had seen many people sleeping on the job. This is my kind of country if they are that dedicated to an afternoon siesta.