After a month travelling from Hanoi in northern Vietnam, we spent one evening and one day in this southern, cosmopolitan city before returning home.
With an evening flight home booked from Ho Chi Minh City, we chose to just spend one evening and day here before we left Vietnam. For us we think this was the right choice but we met several other people on our trip who had planned to stay several days. There’s certainly enough to keep you busy for a while but we didn’t want to spend too long in a big, noisy and polluted city. On top of that prices are higher in Ho Chi Minh City, and we wanted to avoid too much last-minute spending.
Fusion cuisine in Ho Chi Minh City
We did splash out for our last dinner, eating at Eleven fusion restaurant and spending more on the bill than a bed for the night. The service was excellent, the staff spoke very good English and the food was presented beautifully. There wasn’t even a chopstick in sight… It felt strangely like we were already halfway home. And that for me pretty much summed up Ho Chi Minh City. It didn’t feel very Vietnamese at all, more like a Singapore trying to be the best of Asia and the rest of the world all at the same time. With big brand name shops, restaurants with English menus and nobody staring at us, it felt easy and normal, especially after our several days standing out like sore thumbs in Ha Tien.
After dinner we went on the search for some craft beer, stopping at Pasteur Street Brewing to check our beer taste buds were still there.
War Remnants Museum
The next day we did a little walking tour, visiting the square where Thích Quảng Đức (see featured image) had set himself on fire in 1963 before reaching the War Remnants Museum. For 40,000d (1.51 EUR) we spent a good 3 hours looking at the mainly photograph displays covering an overview of the ‘American War’ (that’s how the Vietnamese refer to it – fair enough), and the crimes committed by the Americans including a pretty graphic display of the Orange Agent used and the effect it had and is still having today. I would definitely recommend visiting this museum, but bring a strong stomach.
Time to leave
We had a pretty sad little last lunch at Propaganda Cafe. It’s a very popular bistro but if you’ve eaten in the sticks you’ll realise that what they serve really isn’t that authentic at all. When I order lemongrass and chilli whatever, I expect it to taste of something. After lunch we returned via the very relaxing Tao Dan Park to our hotel for the slowest taxi ride ever through the rush-hour traffic to the airport. Those scooters escorted us all the way and we had a moment outside the airport to soak up the heat, knowing that we’d be landing very early the next morning in 5 degrees Belgium.