Mission Vietnam
Vietnam is a hotchpotch of old and new, with everything from cultural and historical attractions to dynamic, modern cities. Join Jacqueli and Joubert Tulleken as they traverse the country from south to north.
When you look at a world map, Vietnam is an S-shaped land mass next to the South China Sea, bordered by China to the north and Cambodia and Laos to the west.
We flew from Denpasar in Bali (see go! #172) to Ho Chi Minh City. The humidity smacked us in the face when we stepped out of the air-conditioned Tan Son Nhat International Airport – it felt like walking into a sauna. It was late September, the wettest month in Ho Chi Minh.
We took a bus from the airport to the city centre and the first thing we noticed was how many motorbikes and scooters there were – apparently, upward of eight million on the streets of Ho Chi Minh City alone. You can imagine the chaos! Motorbikes are the most common mode of transport. It’s funny and impressive to see what people manage to transport on two wheels: dogs, chickens, vegetables, fruit, children – up to five at a time!
Ho Chi Minh City, formerly Saigon, is the biggest city in Vietnam and situated in the south of the country. (Smaller Hanoi in the north is the capital city.) In 1975, after the Vietnam War had ended, Saigon was renamed after the Vietnamese revolutionary leader Ho Chi Minh. Now the city is a busy metropole and the economic heartbeat of the country, where modern skyscrapers stand side by side with historical French colonial buildings like the pink Saigon Notre Dame Cathedral and the Museum of Fine Arts.
We dropped our backpacks off at our Airbnb apartment, had a quick shower and hit the streets. Many of the tourist attractions are close together and we explored a big part of the city on foot.
Our first stop was the War Remnants Museum, where an arsenal of military equipment greets you at the entrance, including an American M48 Patton tank and a Bell UH-1 helicopter – the famous “Huey” of the Vietnam War. Inside, there were three floors filled with photos, anti-war posters, firearms and artefacts.
Before our visit to Vietnam, our knowledge of the war was based mostly on Hollywood films like We Were Soldiers and Good Morning,
Vietnam. It was amazing to see the war from the Vietnamese perspective, especially the lasting impact of something like the herbicide Agent Orange, which Americans sprayed on farm fields and forests with abandon during the war, and which had devastating consequences for the civilians who were exposed to it.
After the museum, we wandered around the streets, past neon-lit buildings and shopfronts. Ho Chi Minh City overwhelms your senses with colours, smells and sounds. Food is prepared on the pavements and the drone of motorbikes is a constant background noise.
We bought lunch from a banh mi food stall – banh mi is a kind of Vietnamese sandwich. Behind the glass screen was a heap of bread rolls that looked like baguettes, a bowl full of eggs and plastic containers with things like pickled white radish, carrots, cucumber, coriander and different kinds of meat. The woman running the stall couldn’t speak a word of English, but she could tell we were hungry. She pointed to every ingredient with her spatula and asked in Vietnamese whether we wanted it on our roll. We’d nod and she’d add that ingredient to a wok. She fried everything then put it in the baguette and rounded it off with a squirt of chilli sauce. On that busy street corner, we had the best sandwich of our lives! And so cheap, too: banh mi generally costs anything from VND10 000 – 30 000 (R7 – R22; VND stands for Vietnamese dong).
For the next part of our tour, we were going to be joined by Joubert’s friend Wessel van Wyk and his fiancée Shivani Ghai. Wessel’s flight from South Africa had been delayed by a day, but we met up with Shivani who had flown out a week before.
She’s an experienced traveller and suggested we browse the city’s night markets. We were hungry again and Vietnam is known for its street food, so we headed to the Cô Giang Quán street food market in the back alleys of District 1. Here, we tasted traditional dishes like ðc (sea snails), goi cuðn (spring rolls) and bo la lot (mince wrapped in betel leaves and cooked over a fire). The food was delicious and the beer was cold. We hung out while the occasional rain shower drenched the noisy city. Wessel landed the next day and we carried on exploring together. We visited the trendy Ben Thanh Market, where we drank cà phê đá in one of the cafés – strong iced coffee often served with condensed milk.
Our first big day outing was to the Cu Chi Tunnels and the Mekong Delta. We had made friends with a Grab driver (the local version of Uber) the previous night and he offered to be our guide for the day.
The tunnels are about an hour outside the city – they were used during the war to distribute medicine, food and ammunition, and also served as shelter for the Viet Cong fighters.
During the guided tour, we got to crawl through a narrow section of the tunnels. It was harrowing and would definitely be a challenge for people with claustrophobia, or for taller or bigger people. Wessel and Joubert also did some target shooting with an AK47…
The Mekong River is the 12th longest river in the world. It rises in the Himalayas in Tibet and flows through five countries before it reaches Vietnam. We took a boat ride on the canals that wind through dense palm forests, and we visited many islands in the vast delta. We also tasted coconut candy and watched a live music performance.
We only returned to Ho Chi Minh City after dark and went straight to bed. You don’t visit Vietnam to rest – you’re active and on your feet all day long!