Trip Report: Day 1 Saigon
Pre-flight
It wasn't the best of start for the trip.
It was raining very heavily in the morning and Kok Wai aka LG called me at 5.30 am to bring an extra lock for him. I was supposed to hitch a ride on his dad's car since my house was on the way.
However things didn't look good when he called me again at 6.10 am asking me to help him find out whether the airport has AXS machine. He was still at an ATM near his house settling his bills. Oh gawd; we had to check in by 6.40am!!
What the fuck he was thinking was beyond me. Couldn't he settle this kind of stuff the night before? I was still able to settle my packing and other stuffs despite helping out at run 2 in the 2 days before the trip. Naturally I can't help but feel pissed.
In the end, I got my father to send me to the airport because I didn't want to be late. I would rather go without him then to miss my holiday.
Airport
We weren't late in the end because of the inefficiency of the ground staffs. However we were still the last to check in. I told myself to put the incident behind me first because I don't want to spoil the holidays. Meanwhile the ground staff wasn't in her best mood too; LG got scolded by her for not producing his Malaysian passport.
After clearing the immigration it really felt like the Amazing Race when we had to RUN to our gate. We were among the last to board the plane but I still felt quite great that we were finally on my way to our first stop: Saigon.
Saigon
The flight was surprisingly short; total flight time was probably 1h50m. The customs official who checked our passports left a deep impression on us; his stares were scary and the face was always stern. Maybe that was his way of saying "Welcome to Vietnam".
We were the last from our flight to get out of the airport because Ho Teck and LG both complained of stomachaches. Then we tried to get a cab to our guesthouse.
10 usd was the best price that we could get down to. On the hindsight we could have walked off and negotiate with another cab driver. Well there was always a small price to pay for being a noob. 6 usd is a more reasonable price for the short 30min ride into the city.
Vietnam's traffic was legendary. This was my 2nd time in Vietnam but the number of motorcycles still amazed me. First-timers like HT and LG were probably even more surprised than I was.
Guesthouse
We stayed at Luan Vu Guesthouse which was located at an alley off Bui Vien St in the backpackers' area in Saigon. There were many travel agencies, restaurants and bars in the area catering to the foreign tourists visiting Saigon.
Our room was located on the 5th level of the building. Bad news for us because there was no lift. We had to lug our 10+ kg backpacks all the way up the stairs.
The room was clean and bright; we had cable on TV and the toilet even had a bathtub. The view wasn't too fantastic though because I could look down into a living room of a house in the next block. I wouldn't complain though because we were paying only 21 usd per night per room for all that plus free internet and breakfast in the morning.
Lunch
We rested in the room and discussed about our plans for the day. LG complained about his stomach problem and took some medicine. For lunch we decided to check out one of the Vietnamese restaurants that we had read about in the guidebook: Quan An Ngon.
After checking with the receptionist on the direction, we proceeded to walk there from our hotel. It was a hot and sweaty 30 minute walk but the lunch did not disappoint us. The food was cheap and delicious; most dishes cost below 2 sgd. We promised ourselves that we would be back again before we left Saigon.
Sightseeing
Quan An Ngon was diagonally across from the Reunification Palace but it wasn't open when we finished our lunch. Our map showed us that Notre Dame Cathedral was nearby and we walked there to take some photos. It turned out that the nice building beside the Cathedral was the Post Office and we went in to take a look as well.
We realized that we couldn't survive in Vietnam on USDs only so we set out to find moneychangers. We finally found one in the Parkson Departmental Store and became instant millionaires as our 100 usd became 1.6 million dongs.
Reunification Palace was opened to tourists by then and it used to be the Presidential Palace of Republic of Vietnam aka South Vietnam. The fountain was impressive and we looked at many of the rooms as well as underground bunkers inside the palace. There were also the derelicts of the tanks which crashed through the palace gates on 3oth April 1975 which was the day when Saigon fall to the North Vietnam.
LG was dying by then and he took a cab back to the guesthouse by himself. HT and I walked to the War Remnants Museum from Reunification Palace. There were quite a few exhibits in the museum and I would say that some of them were really eye-opening.
The one that stood out to me was the re-creation of the prison in Con Dao Island. The prison was for political prisoners of the South Vietnam government and the exhibits tried to describe the methods that were being used to torture the prisoners. The word inhumane would be an understatement; evil could probably be more appropriate. The amount of pain that one human being could inflict on another is just really beyond me.
Dinner
HT and I went to check out some of the possible tours and signed up for the Mekong Delta 1 day tour the following day. On the recommendation of the guesthouse owner we went to eat at Dzoan (?), a restaurant ran by supposedly the best cook in Vietnam. The food was not bad I guess but we had an overdose of glass noodles.
After dinner we did some grocery shopping at a supermarket before retiring back to the guesthouse. It had been a long day and I was glad to wash up and hit the bed.
It wasn't the best of start for the trip.
It was raining very heavily in the morning and Kok Wai aka LG called me at 5.30 am to bring an extra lock for him. I was supposed to hitch a ride on his dad's car since my house was on the way.
However things didn't look good when he called me again at 6.10 am asking me to help him find out whether the airport has AXS machine. He was still at an ATM near his house settling his bills. Oh gawd; we had to check in by 6.40am!!
What the fuck he was thinking was beyond me. Couldn't he settle this kind of stuff the night before? I was still able to settle my packing and other stuffs despite helping out at run 2 in the 2 days before the trip. Naturally I can't help but feel pissed.
In the end, I got my father to send me to the airport because I didn't want to be late. I would rather go without him then to miss my holiday.
Airport
We weren't late in the end because of the inefficiency of the ground staffs. However we were still the last to check in. I told myself to put the incident behind me first because I don't want to spoil the holidays. Meanwhile the ground staff wasn't in her best mood too; LG got scolded by her for not producing his Malaysian passport.
After clearing the immigration it really felt like the Amazing Race when we had to RUN to our gate. We were among the last to board the plane but I still felt quite great that we were finally on my way to our first stop: Saigon.
Saigon
The flight was surprisingly short; total flight time was probably 1h50m. The customs official who checked our passports left a deep impression on us; his stares were scary and the face was always stern. Maybe that was his way of saying "Welcome to Vietnam".
We were the last from our flight to get out of the airport because Ho Teck and LG both complained of stomachaches. Then we tried to get a cab to our guesthouse.
10 usd was the best price that we could get down to. On the hindsight we could have walked off and negotiate with another cab driver. Well there was always a small price to pay for being a noob. 6 usd is a more reasonable price for the short 30min ride into the city.
Vietnam's traffic was legendary. This was my 2nd time in Vietnam but the number of motorcycles still amazed me. First-timers like HT and LG were probably even more surprised than I was.
Guesthouse
We stayed at Luan Vu Guesthouse which was located at an alley off Bui Vien St in the backpackers' area in Saigon. There were many travel agencies, restaurants and bars in the area catering to the foreign tourists visiting Saigon.
Our room was located on the 5th level of the building. Bad news for us because there was no lift. We had to lug our 10+ kg backpacks all the way up the stairs.
The room was clean and bright; we had cable on TV and the toilet even had a bathtub. The view wasn't too fantastic though because I could look down into a living room of a house in the next block. I wouldn't complain though because we were paying only 21 usd per night per room for all that plus free internet and breakfast in the morning.
Lunch
We rested in the room and discussed about our plans for the day. LG complained about his stomach problem and took some medicine. For lunch we decided to check out one of the Vietnamese restaurants that we had read about in the guidebook: Quan An Ngon.
After checking with the receptionist on the direction, we proceeded to walk there from our hotel. It was a hot and sweaty 30 minute walk but the lunch did not disappoint us. The food was cheap and delicious; most dishes cost below 2 sgd. We promised ourselves that we would be back again before we left Saigon.
Sightseeing
Quan An Ngon was diagonally across from the Reunification Palace but it wasn't open when we finished our lunch. Our map showed us that Notre Dame Cathedral was nearby and we walked there to take some photos. It turned out that the nice building beside the Cathedral was the Post Office and we went in to take a look as well.
We realized that we couldn't survive in Vietnam on USDs only so we set out to find moneychangers. We finally found one in the Parkson Departmental Store and became instant millionaires as our 100 usd became 1.6 million dongs.
Reunification Palace was opened to tourists by then and it used to be the Presidential Palace of Republic of Vietnam aka South Vietnam. The fountain was impressive and we looked at many of the rooms as well as underground bunkers inside the palace. There were also the derelicts of the tanks which crashed through the palace gates on 3oth April 1975 which was the day when Saigon fall to the North Vietnam.
LG was dying by then and he took a cab back to the guesthouse by himself. HT and I walked to the War Remnants Museum from Reunification Palace. There were quite a few exhibits in the museum and I would say that some of them were really eye-opening.
The one that stood out to me was the re-creation of the prison in Con Dao Island. The prison was for political prisoners of the South Vietnam government and the exhibits tried to describe the methods that were being used to torture the prisoners. The word inhumane would be an understatement; evil could probably be more appropriate. The amount of pain that one human being could inflict on another is just really beyond me.
Dinner
HT and I went to check out some of the possible tours and signed up for the Mekong Delta 1 day tour the following day. On the recommendation of the guesthouse owner we went to eat at Dzoan (?), a restaurant ran by supposedly the best cook in Vietnam. The food was not bad I guess but we had an overdose of glass noodles.
After dinner we did some grocery shopping at a supermarket before retiring back to the guesthouse. It had been a long day and I was glad to wash up and hit the bed.
posted by shyh jie at 10:50 PM
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