My beginning of the end...

By the time we left Cambodia I was ready. We had heard so many great things about Vietnam I was anxious to get there. Although it was a little bittersweet because Vietnam feels like the end of our trip, I was mostly excited. We got our visas for Vietnam while we were still in Cambodia. Basically, you pay a travel agent $60 to take your passport and get the visa for you, then you pick it up the next day. Very easy!

We rode the bus, stopped at the Cambodia border to get stamped out. A few feet later at the Vietnam border we waited in a mosh pit of people for our names to be called. Once called, you walk through a mini airport security type thing, scan your bag and then you're in Vietnam. 

Conor and I are traveling from southern to northern Vietnam. Our first stop was Saigon (aka Ho Chi Minh City). The names are interchangeable. I'm going to stick with Saigon because it's faster to type. 

When we first got into Saigon is started pouring rain. Vietnam is beginning their rainy season now. It's not too bad, it rains really hard for an hour and then it stops. The rain was letting up when we got dropped off in Pham Ngu Lao, the popular backpacker section. We walked down an alley and got approached by a guy in front of his hotel. He showed us a room- great, clean, air conditioner, $16- sold. Our hotel turned out to be awesome. The staff was so nice, the guy gave us a detailed map with places to go in town. They even gave us orange soda.  Thanh Thuong hotel, I love you. 

Conor and I walked around for the rest of the afternoon/evening. We saw markets, the Opera house, went to a fancy happy hour. After a while we went back towards our street for dinner. We decided to eat at this tiny "restaurant" on the street. It was a small cart where you order by quantity because they only serve one thing. We had 2 Pho dishes (the popular noodle soup served everywhere in Vietnam). It was delicious. I knew I loved this soup before I came here, but I am trying to make it a point to eat it at least once a day. Our dinners of 2 soups, water and a beer cost 70,000 dong, about 3 dollars. 

The common and cheapest way to hang out at night is to sit in plastic chairs set up outside convenience stores. The whole street is lined with red and blue chairs just on the sidewalk. You can drink cocktails for a dollar, beers for 50 cents and everyone just hangs out together. It's awesome. Every once in a while a police truck drives by and the people panic and make everyone stand and move back. There is a faint painted line on the sidewalk the stores aren't supposed to cross. It's hilarious because the second the police is down the road everything continues as normal and the chairs are reset back on the street. 

The two touristy things we did here were the War Museum and a tour of the Mekong Delta. I'll start with the museum. I'd like to think that I'm semi knowledgable about the Vietnam War and I get it, America messed that one up. But once inside the museum, I felt like a bad person. Conor and I decided that if anyone asked, we were Canadian. This museum was very much one sided and totally bashed on America. There were a lot of depressing photographs and facts. It wasn't the most fun activity to do. Our Mekong Delta tour was also disappointing. We drove 3 hours away to a "floating market", which was basically empty. A woman huffed and puffed as she towed us down the river for a bit on a small boat. Everything was rushed, we couldn't enjoy it. I was glad we did these things, but not my favorite day trips so far. 

Conor ended up getting a slight infection in his food after scratching a mosquito bite too much, so we took it easy for a few days. We walked around mostly in our neighborhood, hung out, read and watched some TV. However this didn't stop us from visiting a food stand we saw on Anthony Bourdain's show.

 The Lunch Lady is a foot cart a cab ride away from where we were staying. She makes one dish a day, all fresh ingredients from the market she visits in the morning. The day we went she was serving pho, I was in heaven. It was the best soup I've ever had and I wish we could've eaten there everyday. 

Saigon was awesome, amazing and currently one of my favorite cities. There's something about it here I just love. Maybe it's the crazy traffic, or the awesome food. The people here are kind and friendly. It's a place you could just walk around for hours in. We went to some fancy happy hours and drank cheap on the streets. I am truly going to miss it here, but I know I'll be back again some day.