What did I do in Saigon?
After having to find a hotel at around 4am in the morning, we didn't too anything too strenuous in Saigon. The most activity we did was playing pool, which after a while, especially having not done too much exercise in a while, can really do you back in. Dave and I found this pool hall, which was full of locals who worked and played against customers for money. I beat probably the best guy in the place, but then lost 3-1 to Rosie who was a demon on the table, and 100,000 dong along with it, but only because she decided during the game that we were playing 'Vietnamese' rules.
We did manage to visit the War Remnants Museum, which gave an excellent depiction of the War and its impact on the soldiers, including American soldiers, civilians and the landscape.
In the evening, we hopped from bar to bar - first up was the rooftop bar at Caravelle Hotel, then Go2 bar on Backpackers' Alley, Q Bar and finally the nasty Apocalypse Now, which was full of 'working' girls.
Rather than go to Phu Quoc Islands, we headed for a couple of days into the Mekong Delta as the weather was fairly thundery. The two days were excellent. Chilled out rides on longboats, hectic ferry crossings, watched a performance from local musicians, and lots of floating markets, some of which were a bit lame. We spent the night in Cau Tao, which is the largest town in the Delta region. We decided to jump on the back of a motorbike and find a pool place. We were taken quite far from our hotel, but the place was great. After some pool, we chilled in a coffee shop which had back-to-back episodes of the original Tom and Jerry cartoons - I think we were watching for at least an hour. We then had a local dinner - hotpot out on the plastic stools on the pavement.
We returned to Saigon and met Seb, Sally and Jay, who I hadn't realised earlier but was on the same boat in Halong Bay. It ended up being a very late one in Alley Boo. We also saw an amusing, but quite sad, little kid who dancing like he's Usher in front of tourists for money, while his mum just sits there hoping he brings in plenty of cash. The video is on the blog too and worth checking out.
My final day in Saigon and Vietnam was spent at the Cu Chi tunnels, a network of tunnels the Viet Cong built to defend themselves from the air raids during the War. We saw the booby traps the Viet Cong used - quite amazing, but very sick and deadly. I went into a couple of sections of the tunnels, whose entrance was only 30x40cm. It was very narrow and claustrophobic, and was on all fours for a lot of the time, but it was very cool. We finished off shooting AK47s and the M60 machine gun - amazing, but very loud - wartime must have been hellish with so many going off at the same time.
Appropriately, I ended my visit to Vietnam with a kebab and some pool before heading to the airport amid crazy drivers in treachorous weather conditions.
I have mixed feeling about Vietnam. Most people are out to rip tourists off, it's difficult to find a place where you don't get hassled constantly by street hawkers, the roads are heaving with motorbikes, and worst of all, there are hookers everywhere. Yet, it had a very vibrant feel about it and was seemingly very capitalist. The scenery, particularly in the north, was stunning. I suspect the torrential rain we got for the past week or so didn't help, but I'm sure I will return, if only to visit Phu Quoc islands and Dalat.
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