day 3: saigon city

today is our last day in saigon. our remaining time here will be spent going around the city and replacing the damaged bags anni bought at a shop near ben than market. but first, here is our itinerary:

- early morning breakfast at the hotel (same food again - baguette with either scrambled eggs or jam, coffee or tea, and juice)

- go around pham ngu lao (we were in need of a little more cash for a last minute shopping) and buy the wetshop pants i wanted since day 1

- see notre dame, the post office, a couple of pagodas at cho lon, museum of atrocities, and water puppet show

- check-out at noon, eat a late lunch, go around ben tahn again and then go back to hotel to finish packing :)


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it's already july 7 and it is only now that i am writing about our last day in saigon.

notre dame cathedral, saigon

we were able to do a lot of the things listed in our itinerary except for the pagodas. on our last day in saigon, it was raining really hard in the afternoon. luckily, we were able to visit notre dame cathedral in the morning and the post office, too. the cathedral was really beautiful. i would have wanted to take photos of its inside but there was a sign at the screen separating the church lobby from the pews saying: this is a place of worship not for tour. i felt guilty and never took a shot inside the church. although it was beautiful, i would never trade it for the more beautiful churches we have here in the philippines (one church comes to mind - the guadalupe viejo church at guadalupe). the next stop was the post office where there's this beautiful ceiling architecture and artistry. one can't miss uncle ho's (is it okay to call him uncle ho? people there call him thus) large portrait in the center wall. we also liked the telephone booths - made me think of the telephone booths in the UK. :)

inside the post office

what surprised us the most are the number of couples having their wedding pictorials in the area! one even had a change of costume because when we left the post office, the girl we saw was still posing at the front of the church in her white dress! :) in our less than an hour stay at the area, we saw at least four couples having their wedding photos taken. i wonder if they ever really get married inside the church or is it just for posterity? hmmm...

motorcycle traffic

trusting our tourist map, we set out to go to the war museum, also called the museum of atrocities. it was about a fifteen minute walk which took a lot longer because we just had to stop around almost every corner for anni to have her motorcycle shots. of course, we did have a little trouble crossing the street too, especially those where there were no pedestrian lanes. while in the taxi on our way to notre dame, anni commented that it might be scary to drive in saigon where motorcycles are the kings of the road. now, she said, she doesn't believe that if you can drive in manila you can drive anywhere. now, it's when you can drive in saigon that you can drive anywhere. as i am loyal to my country (LOL), i still believe the first. there's more character in the philippine street where jeepneys, private cars, cars of the politicians, tricycles, motorcycles, even pedicabs at times, and calesas fight for the right to their own space in the street! :) anyway, back to the story.

when anni had her fill of taking photos of the motorcycle scene, we walked along the park near the independence museum (which we weren't able to see) and had to stop again to have our photos taken with the poster of ho chi minh. we made another stop on our way to the war museum when we saw an inviting yogurt place. of course, after tasting their yogurt, we all agreed that the yogurt place at our subdivision is better than what we've tasted. i wonder if it is just because we have a different type of tasting food? good thing though was that the smallest yogurt was cheap - only about 35,000 dong (at this time, i only had a couple of dong left, just enough for entrance fees, food, taxi and terminal fee). from there, the museum was only five minutes away.

L: poster of ho chi minh at a park near the independence museum. sorry, i don't know what is says. R: in honor of the current copa mundial, a shampoo advertisement featuring portugal's ronaldo. as a basketball nation, we don't see this in our country, only posters of local celebrities endorsing the same product.

 

the entrance to the museum was about 15,000 dong and upon entering the building, what one will see are the different kinds of aircrafts used in the war. there was a chopper, a tora-tora and something that looked like an F-16. inside the museum, there were a lot of pictures depicting the pain and suffering the vietnamese suffered in the hands of the americans during the 20-year vietnam war. looking at those pictures, reading the story of the children murdered by an american soldier who later became a US senator, brought tears to my eyes and made me want to just sit there until my companions had their fill of the pictures. i couldn't even look at the pictures of the victims of the agent orange. it was so sad! after a while, we decided to go to the upper levels. looking at the museum guide, i wanted to look at the photos taken by (foreign) correspondents during the war. they were fascinating. most depict vietnam in chaos, vietnamese - both the farmers and the soldiers, the lean american soldiers, and a couple pictures of then and now vietnam. i wonder what the americans (and french) would have said when they come and visit the place? my sister one female caucasian wipe her tears while looking at the pictures. granted, one could say that this is just a one-sided view, the vietnamese side. still, there was so much suffering here. if there was something that made my heart heavy during my stay in saigon, it would be this. it is such a sad feeling to know that people a couple of years ago experienced this, and also knowing that for just a little bit, my own country was part of this as we were (and still are!) friendly with the american government. i also feel blessed though that i never had to experience such bad things. no wonder they call it the museum of atrocities. i never got to see the children's art at the other room but my sister said that they were all children's painting of hope. i'm glad that hope is never lost for all of us. i was also glad that the 12nn bell rang and we were asked to leave the place.

a picture displayed in the museum: a common vietnamese pleading not to be taken for questioning

our next stop was back to the hotel to check-out but after that, we were away to ben than and the rain had started pouring down. we got lost going to the water puppet show and got there early. we were able to get seats near the front on the last show at 5pm but as it was an hour or two away, we had time to waste. luckily there was this japanese art exhibit where we were able to while away the time looking at japanese contemporary art and movies.

japanese art by daimonji, 2002. an open air bath with a wide window.

the water puppet show was okay. not too exciting for me though because i didn't really appreciate the big puppets moving around the water because the water masked most of the movements, and there were a lot of splashing that i didn't understand what was happening anymore. add to it was that all the show were in vietnamese. i'm impressed with the voices of the puppets, though, and the music because all were done live by people seated at the wings of the stage. i do not recommend this much but if one wants to see a part of vietnam culture, then one should watch this, even just once.

water puppet show theater 

dinner was at the wrap and roll restaurant. a friend suggested we dine here to really eat the real spring roll vietnam is famous for. here, one can "design" their own fresh spring roll but since we don't know how to do it, we ordered something else and just watched the other diners do the "your-own-roll" thing. most of the spring roll was served with vermicelli. know what that is? that is the sticky sotanghon! LOL. one thing i learned that day. anyway, the food wasn't great (again, this is most probably because i grew up knowing a taste different from this!) but i particularly liked the vermicelli dipped in peanut sauce and the fried spring roll. oh, i remember now why i didn't like the fresh one. it was because they added some strong tasting leaf that for me, didn't really go well with the other veggies inside it, plus the wrap was tough - not the ones like in the fresh lumpia we have here, where it is soft and chewy. we were not impressed too because it was too pricy! unlike the restaurants we went to at pham ngu lao, the servings were big, tastier and they were cheaper by 100,000 dong! oh well. at least we experienced the "traditional" vietnamese food and have formed our own opinion of it, instead of basing it from other people's experiences.

fresh prawn spring roll

after dinner, we went back to the hotel to pick up our stuff and head straight to the airport. but before that, and i must say that we are totally grateful to mr. chan for allowing us this, we had to take a shower at the hotel's visitor bath/toilet since we got wet from the rain. once we were ready, again thanks to mr. chan, he carried most of our stuff and got a taxi for us. as an advertisement, if you are going to saigon and are on a budget, look up bich duyen hotel. the place is clean, the manager is very helpful, and it is near a lot of other eating/shopping places and sights.

at the airport, carrying just enough money to last us until we arrive in manila, we found out that there was no terminal fee at the airport! we were wrongly informed by someone who just recently came back from saigon! now, we were holding this much money and we decided to have our money changed directly to peso once we arrived in manila. unfortunately, and this is another lesson learned the hard way, the money exchange located at naia 3 do not, i repeat, do not change dong currency. so we are now left with dong bills for our bill collection! *sigh*

all in all though, this was a great travel with my sister and friend. i hope we can do this again soon! :)