Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Vietnam - Day 2
The 2nd morning, I had a rude awakening. "The first thing I see in the morning is Charles." Add to that a really satisfied smile, really turn off man. If it were a girl, I think it would be alright, but my dearest brother.
My roommate, and bed buddy.
Breakfast was provided, although it was a simple omelette with french loaf, but it was surprisingly tasty. After that we walked over to the market about 500m away, really good to see all the beautiful colours of fruit along the street. It's been a long time since I've been to a wet market, but the one there isn't very much different from Singapore. Fish, meats, vegetables all over the place, but they're very organised - all the same produce are found in the same section. There was a lot of live fish and frogs at the fish section, really cool how a pan can fit so many live fish. There's a 'hawker centre' right beside the market too, and the food there is fantabulous! There was the BBQ chicken and pork that was really really tasty, we couldn't stop eating them, and pretty cheap too.
The fruits along the way to the market.
The fish in the pan!
Really awesome BBQ meats
After breakfast, we started our 2 hour journey to the Củ Chi Tunnels. These were using during the Vietnam war by the Viet Cong as their base of operations. The entrances to the tunnels are really tiny. Even the tunnels were so small that you've got to bend over to move around, if not you've got to be on your knees. The other main highlight there is that you get to fire real weapons that were used in the war. Although all the weapons were mounted on a wall, but if you've never fired a weapon before, I guess this is one of those rare chances you'll get. Oh the most turn off thing about the place was the video that introduces the place, propaganda again man. It's actually hilarious when you watch it, but I doubt it would be very nice to laugh while watching it there. We spent about 2 hours there before heading back to HCM for a really late lunch.
Tiny entrance...really tiny
Inside the tunnel.
When we returned, we had lunch at Pho 2000, it's where Bill Clinton had pho during his official visit to Vietnam as President of The United States. I won't say the pho was fantastic, but it was still really really good. One large bowl of beef pho was good enough to appease any empty stomach. After that we went across the street to Ben Thanh Market. It's a very touristy place, lots of clothing and fabrics and souvenirs. Did I mention that EVERYTHING you get in Vietnam must be bargained,food aside though. Seriously, start lower than half the price, and you will not be disappointed. At the market I decided to tailor a few shirts, they only cost me SGD35 a piece, although the workmanship wasn't excellent, but for that price, I cant complain.
Pho at Pho2000. Really good, I need to find a good palce in Singapore that sells Pho.
After we tailored our shirts, we headed back to the guesthouse. A few of us decided to chill on the rooftop. Really nice place, on the 7th floor, with good company and some beer, really really nice. Made new friends too, like really got to know people better. After that we had dinner at a nice little Vietnamese - Italian restaurant. Food was really good, although small in portion, but hard to complain. Then the party started! Crazy Buffalo and Pink Cadillac, we visited these two places. Despite the cheap price of beer along the streets of HCM, the clubs were priced pretty much like Singapore. Frankly speaking, the crowd just wasn't good that night, so it wasn't as fun as we would have expected, at the same time the company was still good.
That was the end of Day 2, or should I say the start of Day 3.