'Shooting in Saigon'

19th Nov

After an early breakfast and quick goodbye, i head off to the central market on a moto: sitting on the back of a speeding bike in mad traffic with both packs on?! anyways, i get there pretty much safe though my stomach didnt feel too great...predicting a very long journey indeed:s

'Escaping from the choking pollution of the roads filled with motos, one can find the heart and soul of Saigon in the alleyways, the blood vessels of this bustling city which offers so much intriguing history, people and life on a plate'

By getting the 10 dollar a/c bus, you have the luxury of not having to deal with immigration and customs at the border. You simply hand your passport (which i did anxiously) to the guy on the bus, and he gets your cambodian exit stamp whilst you wait on the bus and takes your filled in immigration form to the desk to get an entry stamp. All i have to do is get off the bus at cambodian side, walk with my luggage the few hundred yards to immigration, where they scan your luggage and stuff, and you get back on the same bus afterwards. Simple.

It is however an energy sapping 4hrs to the border when your ill, and having forgotten yesterday's malaria pill, im having to take 2 today which is not helping with things. On the way and especially near the border crossing, i saw Asia truly in action. I witnessed people carrying seemingly their life possessions stacked meters into the air on a cart with 'mini'-sized wheels. And after probably pulling it for a day already to get here, they got a long way to go still. At the Moc Bai border, there were incredible minibuses with just as many people and items on the roof (baking hot day) as there were squashed inside. that's a tough 6 hrs and they have no aircon or leg room...in my bus alone, the emergency exit was blocked by large tapped up boxes carrying aircon units and about 8 sacks of 20kg rice! Overland borders are legendary here.

Once across, its only another 3 hour trip to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), passing some serene mekong delta paddy fields witnessing my first conical hats which signal my arrival in Vietnam. Arriving in backpacker central: Pham Ngu Lao street, im too knackered to argue with touts and let this friendly old cyclo driver, Dong, take me down some random street alleyway for what he insists is a 'cheap room for you, 5 dollar'. It certainly was 5 dollars though also on the 4th floor in a guesthouse w/o a lift. Quite a hike with my bags though i take the double fan room w/ bathroom when i see it. If you're interested, the place is called 'NGA guesthouse room for rent'!! add: 219/24 Pham Ngu Lao, HCMC. Guesthouses in Saigon are all next to each other competing and typically thin multistorey buildings, there is a lot of choice in a small space.

After paying for some lunch with US, went to bed and woke up around 5pm, still with no Vietnamese currency, so head for an ATM, which are easily more available than in Cambodia. I take out, for the first time ever,the full maximum possible: 2million dong (actually around 70 quid)which came outin 40 crisp 50000d denominations. (Made me think back to rumours that you have to bring a wheelbarrow's worth of notes to buy a loaf of bread)

As my time is short as i got stuck in Cambodia, i book myself onto a Half day tour to the Cu Chi tunnels and plan to do most of the cities sights in the afternoon; Bad timing, as although i also have Monday here, all museums and public sights close on only that day of the week!!grrr. Bump into the friendly Dong again and discussed what i wanted to do 2moro when he offers to take me on a cyclo tour of Saigon when i get back from Cu Chi. Sorted.

20th Nov

After an alright sleep, im sent into a panic thinking im gonna be late for the 8am departure of my tour, and when i get to the office, it turns out im 20 minutes early and the clock in my room was wrong; i dont have a watch (no intention of getting one either) :) In true fashion, the bus leaves 30 minutes late anyway as two 'Amairekins get on the wrong bus, though we have an incredibly funny tour guide who is well enthusiastic even though its prob his hundredth tour. this week. A pleasant chatty Norwegian lady sits next to me on the bus and i hear how she quit her job ages ago to go travelling. respect; i must have met half a dozen people already who've done the same thing. They are in control of their lives and much happier for it.

Finally get my first Vietnam history lesson, providing a good platform to visit the Cu Chi tunnels, used by the Viet Cong (Guerilla forces operating in South Vietnam) as a means of spying on the South for the Communist north. Arriving in replanted jungle, as the americans decimated the forests here with tons upon tons of napalm and B52 bombs, the site is imaginatively designed for tourists with many props, old destroyed tanks still there, chance to 'walk' thru the caves. In pitch black (bring a torch.), you're actually waddling forward as the caves are only about a meter in height and diameter. not for claustophobes. They were designed this small, so that only the slender Vietnamese could use them :). The secret entrances measuring 27cm by 57cm!! were just big enough for me and the guide, but some of the other visitors were plain embarassed at their futile attempts to get in. Fortunately for them, the government widened later sections for tourists. This incredible network stretches kms to the Cambodian border and on 3 different levels - the deepest being 11m underground.

Other attractions included a shooting range where one can chose from pistols, rifles, big machine guns and other semi-automatic weapons. The distant sound of gunfire echoes through the Jungle adds to an already eerie Jungle atmosphere for unsuspecting tourists. For 180000d (10 bullets; 7 quid), i chose the rifle and without earmuffs, my ears rang for an hour after firing at some targets. Quite a recoil as the soldier had to hold my shoulder to stop me being knocked back! Can't imagine being hit by these 20 cm long bullets. Ouch!

Get back and see Dong, whose actually been waiting for my return, and he introduces me to some lovely Pho (Vietnamese beef noodle soup) eating from this alleyway street vendor... sitting on little plastic chairs reaching barely 15cm off the ground, all the locals stare as squatting doesnt come naturally to me! One thing that has struck me about the Vietnamese is how sociable they are with each other. During the cyclo city tour that followed, hardly anyone is inside, sitting on tables out on the pavements chatting, eating or playing cards, footy and even badminton. Even washing up takes place in the street. There are frequent power cuts in Saigon so i guess theyjust dont wanna be caught inside when it happens.

The whirlwind tour ofthe town's sights included the Reunification palace, which was the south Vietnamese president's palace before Ho Chi Minh's, the brains and balls behind reunifying the country split by the Geneva convention,tanks rolled in and claimed it. A highly emotive War Remnants museum displayed vivid photos of amongst other things the suffering caused by Napalm and Agent Orange bombs on the Vietnamese populations (particularly shocking was a jar on display containing this disfigured unborn child preserved in Formalin) and also the mutilation caused by American Soldiers who would drag the captured to death behind their tanks. To be fair, there were also pictures of what the Viet Cong did to captured Americans, which were equally shocking. There was also a decent collection of US Army artillery and vehicles such as the B220 helicopter with its side-mounted machine gun used to gun down fleeing locals. just like out of Apocolypse Now! Though the museum had its heart in the right place, there wasnt enough text for history virgins like me, and i left only with more horrible war images without knowing from which battles they came.

Next stop was a pagoda i didnt want to go to, but as my cyclo driver was getting tired, i let him off and pottered around for a bit though id seen hundreds like this before...Dusk already, i arrived at my final destination in darkness: Notre Dame cathedral and the landmark of French occupation with the first Vietnamese cathedral modelled on Paris. Tons of people outside for some reason; the driver tries to explain why: but keeps referring to crying and pointing at a statue?! was there a miracle going on in the church, was there a crying statue? I didnt stick around to find out, as it appeared that it was almost bed time for the old guy, so i agreed to go back paying him a generous sum for his dedicated service.

21st Nov

Decided that there just wasnt time for the Mekong Delta, as there's no point in doing a day trip when you really need at least 2-3 days to get a fair impression. Maybe next time. Thus, slept in and secured a soft Berth sleeper on an overnight train to Nha Trang for tonight (11pm), but when i come back to collect the ticket, they told me that that train was fully booked, and that they only had the 6pm one, which still arrives at the beach town around 6am, though leaving 5 hrs earlier...No choice, cant go another day behind.

Hire a 'xe om' (moto driver) to take me to the Giac Lam pagoda (the one i wanted to go to), which was pretty and at the peak, i got some sweeping views of the bustling metropolis consisting of densely packed pastel coloured buildings stretching miles into the distance in every direction one cared to look. The sino-temple next door contained monks who seemed to float through the place humming as i checked out the neat mahogany finish, which gave the place the look of an old chinatown restaurant.  Get back to hotel and have lunch before sitting out front of the hotel like the residents did to write some postcards.  Locals then came round to try and converse with me in English and Japanese which was fun and in their kindness, one of them bought me some sweetcorn when a cart passed by! How nice and i felt very welcome to the alley.

Traffic is just as mad here as Phnom Penh and ive learnt to place confidence, however naively, on any driver i hail, that ill get to my destination in one piece. They arent big on helmets here. 10m people, 15m motorbikes...somehow it works. Its a funny site when a roundabout becomes fully jammed with motorcyclists each blocking each other and not budging. Looks like a mosh pit, but with every one on bikes choking on the fumes...most women wear funny balaclavas. To their credit, the Vietnamese display some acrobatic ingenuity when it comes to transporting goods and engines. Ive seen some incredible contraptions which can only be described as Engines with wheels. The best though had to be a lady on a motorbike pushing her husbands cyclo along with her outstretched leg, while he struggles to steer the contraption packed to the rafters with fire wood!! Other gems include motodrivers balancing with one handcomputers, TVs, a kitchen sink and even a refrigeratorbehind them and driving with the other hand.

After a dodgy dinner, i get to the station early. With the amount of pollution ive inhaled during the past 3 days, i feel physically ill and am actually quite relieved to be leaving it behind, albeit temporarily. Find my decent looking 2nd level bed for the night easily enough, but am anxious about having to keep my luggage beneath the lower bunk...gotta trust the guy below who speaks no english not to rummage through my bag and to wake up to let me get it out when i arrive at Nha Trang, the first stop of many for the re-unification express, which runs the whole length of Vietnam: HCMC to Hanoi!