Thanh Pho Ho Chi Minh (Ho Chi Minh City) is the official name of the big city in southern Vietnam, but no one calls it that. Not tourists, not locals. I shall hereafter refer to it as Saigon, not because I'm taking a stand one way or the other, but mostly because it's easier to type and I'm lazy.
Among the things Saigon is famous for is its traffic. I've read that there are anywhere from three to six million motorbikes in the city. Believe it.
Everywhere in Southeast Asia you can hire a moto taxi, which is a fancy way of saying you pay a guy to drive you around on his motorbike. It's the fastest way to get around the city, and it can be quite ... thrilling.
Here we are on the wrong side of the road.
Here is a pretty typical intersection crossing.
Something I've seen in Saigon that I haven't seen in any other city are the crazy bundles and nests of electrical wires everywhere. This intersection is a block from my guest house.
I stayed in the Pham Ngu Lao section of town. It's my favorite backpacker ghetto so far. It's not as sleazy or crowded as Thamel in Kathmandu or Khao San Road in Bangkok. Oddly, though, most of the bars close at 1 a.m.
One of the main tourist attractions is the Reunification Palace. It was the capital of the south during the American War (as it's called here). It was left as it was when Soviet tanks crashed through the gate in 1975. Now it's used for ceremonial purposes.
In the US we refer to this event as the Fall of Saigon. In Vietnam it's known as the Liberation of Saigon.
I was expecting opulence like I'd seen at the palace in Beijing or even Phnom Penh. What I saw was more like Graceland. It's decorated like a 1970s-era club basement, or a set from The Sopranos.
The exterior of the building was designed to incorporate Chinese characters. Here's the front.
And here are the characters it's supposed to represent.
It was pretty cool, though, wandering through the military rooms in the underground bunkers.
I couldn't help laughing when I thought of the line from President Merkin Muffley in "Dr. Strangelove":
Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the war room!
I felt sorry, though, for the poor guy who worked at the one lonely desk in the Crypto Section.
He must have been really good at his job.
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