We have arrived!

Wow!

We arrived and had our first taste of Vietnamese traffic, doesn't seem to be any rules except "just go". Once we had arrived at the guest house we all had itchy feet and wanted to get exploring.

Ms Tu (the guest house owner) had her son walk us to a local "pub". The walk was absolutely amazing, each street has its own personality. There are buildings on top of buildings and plants everywhere. People seem to chill out and socialise in the street. So much to look at!

 

Once we had arrived at our "pub" Ms Tu's son left us and we were on our own. We all started off with Tiger beer, which was served warm. The solution to this is to put a MASSIVE ice block in our glass. Beer and ice, yum! Next it was time to order food. No one in the pub spoke English and the menu was in Vietnamese so after about 5 minutes of staring at something we didn't understand, we decided it would be best to point to a picture and order that. Duncan and Donovan's crispy prawns arrived and looked delicious. My soup arrived and .... blaaaaa! The soup pretty much consisted of raw egg white and coriander. I was almost sick on the table but managed to eat a bit of it by drinking beer immediately after each mouthful. A couple more beers later and we managed to navigate our way through the windy roads and find home. All in all, an awesome first night. People are exceptionally friendly.

 

Friday

 

We woke up and wanted to explore more, so off we walked to the Saigon zoo. It was about a 15 minute walk and we had our first lesson in crossing a Vietnamese road. This is pretty daunting at first as there are just so many people on scooters driving without order. Eventually we realised you just put your foot onto the street and walk. People will drive around you.

The zoo was magnificent. There were so many animals and such a beautiful botanic gardens next to it. We happily wandered around for the day and had lunch in a little restaurant over looking the giraffes. Inside the restaurant there was a group of men playing drinking games (about three of them were policemen in full uniform) and having a festive time. Again, I was amazed at how friendly everyone was. After lunch we went to the history museum which was pretty interesting, we got to see a mummified Vietnamese woman. Before we went home we stopped at a little watering hole on the side of the river and watch boats come by. No one spoke English there either and I had to show them my book of translations to find out where the loo was. Lame, I know :) Feeling more comfortable here as the hours go on. For dinner we went back to the same pub as before, but this time I went prepared and had written down key food translations. I still have no idea what I ate, but everything tastes fantastic!

We walked home just in time, as we stepped inside there was a torrential down pour followed by an amazing electrical storm.

 

I find people here will go out of their way to help you, even if they don't understand you. A lot of people walk past us, smile and give us the peace sign. Its awesome.

 

Saturday

 

We took a taxi into town today to see the centre of the city. Its like stepping into a different city! As we arrived there was store after store, Jimmy Choo, Armani, Gucci, Versace, about 15 top stores in a row. Very different to the less touristy place we have been staying. I think we possibly saw more Europeans than locals. There are big, beautiful parks everywhere, shops, 5 star hotels. About a five minute walk from the expensive shops was Benh Tan market, one of the bigger markets of the city. Here you can buy just about anything you could think of for next to nothing, including knock-offs of the designer stuff we had just seen. Walked around for hours exploring the streets. Almost everyone here could speak basic English, and I think for the first time all 3 of us knew what we were eating. We had a drink on top of the Caravelle hotel which has a panoramic view of the city. Exquisite!

We then walked to the war history museum which was interesting but a bit disturbing.

 

I will hopefully be able to post pics soon, words cannot describe the beauty here. Having an absolutely amazing time with Duncan :)