Highway
1 - Saigon and the Mekong Delta
 Riding
on the bus down Highway 1, we were still hours outside of Ho Chi
Minh City, yet already in the throes of the commercial giant formerly
known as, and still popularly called Saigon. Along the
endless row of pollution-choked local business, Vietnamese men sipped coffee
from street-facing plastic cafe chairs, and massive churches testified to
southern Vietnam's substantial Christian population. The highway became
congested with buses and cargo trucks, while at the edges of the road, high
school girls in Vietnamese 'ao dai' silk trousers and tunics rode bicycles
home. We finally reached the city center as darkness fell and millions of
lights lit up the glitzy hotels and towering office blocks. The Saigon River
reflected neon reds and blues from giant billboards, and the streets became
aglow in headlights from the millions of motorbikes that filled the city.
Thanks
to these hordes of scooters, walking across the road in Saigon takes a
lot of nerve and practice. Mostly, we preferred to take cyclos,
bicycles with passenger carriages on the front, from where we could leisurely
take in the city scenes. Amidst contrasting buildings like the French
colonial Notre Dame Cathedral and the gleaming Diamond Plaza shopping
mall, there were also many tree-lined avenues and landscaped parks full
of children playing badminton and teenage couples cuddling on benches.
At Ben Thanh Market, we squeezed through the narrow aisles
of shopping stalls, and honed our bargaining skills to buy cheap sunglasses.
Despite all this excitement, we couldn't ignore the deformed and limbless
people begging on the street; reminders of Vietnam's difficult past. To
learn more about their plight, we visited the War Remnant's Museum
- a horrifying but educational look into the horrors of warfare - and
took a half day tour out to the Cu Chi Tunnels, where
villagers dug themselves into 250 kilometres of tunnels to escape American
bombing.
Spending
the last few nights with our traveling buddies before we went our separate
ways, we had two totally different options for hanging out. In the Pham
Ngu Lao tourist area, there were dozens of bars and international cafes
to choose from, then just a few blocks down, we were the only tourists
in sight, trying local food from the street kitchens and drinking 'bia
hoi', or draught beer. Both were fun, but we loved staying in the latter
neighbourhood; soaking up local life in the alley by Miss Loi
Guesthouse, and being cooked for and treated like family at Hotel
Madam Cuc 127.
While
Saigon is a good place in Vietnam to learn some history, visiting the
Mekong Delta - to quote the Rough Guide to Vietnam -
is like stepping 'into the pages of a geography textbook'. On a two-day
private trip through Buffalo Tours, we got to explore
the incredibly fertile waterways, towns and islands that make up the delta.
Most of the time, we were on the water, boating through
a floating market, past stilted shack neighbourhoods, and along narrow
farm-lined canals, docking now and then at various villages and
factories. We got to watch everything under the sun being produced
or hand-made, from rice paper, noodles and caramel candies to floor tiles,
bricks and clay pots. Walking along An Binh Island, papaya, dragon fruit,
longan, jackfruit, pomelo and bananas grew in orchards and wildly all
around us. Rice husks were piled up high to use as fire fuel for cooking
and firing pottery. Hyacinth bushes ringed the island to prevent erosion
and to attract fish. We dined on all this fresh fish, rice and exotic
fruit and were given generous amounts of rice wine liquor shots to wash
it down. We spent the night at an island homestay with
a gentle 76 year-old man named Ba Linh, his wife, three children and two
grandchildren. Ba Linh's son-in-law cooked us a beautiful dinner, and
though the locals sleep on hard wooden beds, we were given comfortable
canvas cots for the night. Through the homestay program, Ba Linh had already
met people from all over the world, yet was still eager to talk with us
and learn all about each other's cultures, so our guide worked hard to
translate everything back and forth.
It's
this hospitality, openness and outgoing nature that the southern Vietnamese
are known for, and which made our trip that much more memorable. But don't
take our word for it, go and meet the Vietnamese yourself, and while you're
there, give yourself time to explore this beautiful and fascinating country.
Traveler
Tips:
**Open Tour Bus Tickets allow you to pay one low price for a one-way bus
ticket across Vietnam, stopping at the major tourist destination cities.
The ticket includes your choice of 3 to 8 destinations from south to north
or vice versa, and the travel dates for each segment can be decided as
you go along. The buses are pretty comfortable, air-conditioned, and usually
pick you up from your hotel.
** U.S. Dollars
can be used for many purchases/costs, but Vietnamese Dong is preferred,
easier to use, and it often works out slightly cheaper than using dollars.
**Always get
on and off a motorbike on the left-hand side. Muffler burns on the right
calf muscle are a common injury, but can be easily avoided this way.
Recommended
Reading:
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