Phase one: South Vietnam: Ho Chi Minh City
August 26, 2008
Just came back from a 9 day backpacking trip to Vietnam with mom, had the best time since Bali, almost didn’t want to come back. Here’s bits and pieces of the story.. hope I do the trip justice :p
16 Aug- 18 Aug
Day 1: Ahhhh yesss, the Americans were here.
Arrived at HCMC, had a culture shock when crossing roads (wrong side of the road- depends on individual perspective of course), the road traffic conditions, the sights, the smells. Ask anyone that have been there and they’ll tell you, Vietnamese people love their horns. Beep beep! Honk! Teet! Poooonnnnnn!!! Very common and frequent.
Me: How far is the train station from here?
Cab driver: 5 km
Me: How far is the hotel from here
Cab driver: Very faarrrr… Thatee mini (30 minutes)
Me: Ok, so can we stop by the train station first?
Cab driver: You pay me extra?
Me: How much extra?
Cab driver: 3 dolla extra (on top of the 12 dollars already agreed upon)
Me: Ok (thinking of not wanting to make an extra $12 journey back later)
Lesson #1 (learnt very quickly): 5km and thirty minutes are really the same distance. It DOES take 30 minutes to cover 5 km seriously. So yeah, although cab driver gave me the impression that the train station was very near the airport and the hotel was thatee mini away… I should’ve just gone to the hotel and figure out the train tix later.
Day 2: I come to Ho Chi Minh City, Munam munam..
-the Mekong river
Hahahahahah.. on one of our “breaks” my tour guide turned singer wannabe serenaded us with a song that he wrote on his own.. And made the stricken crowd chime along with him at the ends, piping “munam munam” hahahahahah have no idea what it meant.
So.. Mekong Delta.. I know it sounds harsh, but really, Mekong Delta trip is good for the totally ignorant about Asia, but not the best for Asians. The ‘local’ fruit tasting is the same as in Malaysia.. the river is really what Klang river looked like when I was growing up, and the candy making is.. normal (Especially if you spent a good 5.5 years in Parit Raja where kilang (factory) of keropok meant little ladies doing it manually)
One thing though, the last small boat ride was a peaceful one, really was relaxing one for me.
Spent the evening shopping at Benh Thanh market- mostly
ridiculously overpriced things so if you don’t enjoy bargaining, just go to the shops outside the market area where things start at a more reasonable price and are generally cheaper than the market.
ridiculously overpriced things so if you don’t enjoy bargaining, just go to the shops outside the market area where things start at a more reasonable price and are generally cheaper than the market.
Day 3: Where the American enemy killed innocent peasants, pregnant women and something something children
-the real size of the Cu-chi tunnel, it was too muddy to try out (hahaha yeah right i had a feeling my girly attributes would’ve gotten stuck if I did) hahahahah
…And If you had any sense of humour you would be laughing at
the terrible script of the videos they showed in the Cu chi tunnels. Really. I don’t mean to belittle the suffering of those who went through the war, but seriously, the overdramatising of history is ridiculously funny, especially when they conveniently forget their own atrocious acts during the war.
the terrible script of the videos they showed in the Cu chi tunnels. Really. I don’t mean to belittle the suffering of those who went through the war, but seriously, the overdramatising of history is ridiculously funny, especially when they conveniently forget their own atrocious acts during the war.
- that’s how tiny it was (remember that as it is this is enlarged for tall people like mom to barely be able to squat in).. it got smaller as we went further in, apparently it gets smaller to a point where you have to belly crawl your way through (something we didn’t bother to of course) hahahah
The Cu chi tunnels were an amazing invention though, had to give that to the Cu Chi gls (guerrilla, but widely mispronounced by tour guides as… gls) Went into one (which apparently was already made bigger for us tourists) and got horrifyingly a little claustrophobic (pic above hahaha), REALLY hot and generally had a good heart/ thigh/ back pumping exercise :) Can only
imagine how it was for them back then, being pregnant/ dying/ injured and having to be in those tunnels.
imagine how it was for them back then, being pregnant/ dying/ injured and having to be in those tunnels.
I would tell you more history about the Cu Chi tunnels, but I
don’t believe everything tour guides have to say, especially after a friend overheard Malaysian tour guides telling tourists (while pointing to Maxis tower in KL) that Ananda Krishnan owns that, and also owns Air Asia.. That’s why all Air Asia flights begin with the letters AK.. Hahahahaha serious idiocacy. Soooo… google Cu chi up or wiki it up y’all.
don’t believe everything tour guides have to say, especially after a friend overheard Malaysian tour guides telling tourists (while pointing to Maxis tower in KL) that Ananda Krishnan owns that, and also owns Air Asia.. That’s why all Air Asia flights begin with the letters AK.. Hahahahaha serious idiocacy. Soooo… google Cu chi up or wiki it up y’all.
Later in the afternoon, we went to the War Remnant Museum, where more education was gleaned from the numerous pictures and stories they had. What got me really sad is imagining my children someday visiting Iraq and reading about the same themed posters that questioned why the people in that generation did not do more to put a stop to the war. Why, still, after the lessons of Vietnam, is the world (and by world I mean you-know-who) repeating it again in Iraq? Also learnt about Agent Orange, and it’s devastating effects on its victims. One can only hope that the war in Iraq does not end in those disturbing circumstances.
-a depiction of a prisoner held during war. Very disturbing. The whole museum was disturbing. As the war in Iraq is (I hereby make a political statement that I want the Democrats to win!)
7pm- took a 16 hour train to Hue (to be continued in Phase 2). More pics may be uploaded if I don’t lose em to the Trojan spyware invading all computers I have.
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