Vietnam: Ho Chi Minh City - a cultural shock
- Where To Go Next By I&P
- Jan 30, 2023
- 5 min read
We once again took a bus from the Giant Ibis company to go from Phnom Penh to Ho Chi Minh City (or HCMC) in Vietnam for 35USD/pax, for an 8h ride.
They picked us up at our hotel in Phnom Penh 45mins before and took us to the main bus station. Unfortunately, the bus was delayed and we didn't leave until 9am, 1h after the scheduled departure time.
5h later, after exiting Cambodia and having lunch in between borders, the lady from the bus company who had kept all the passports after exiting Cambodia, went to have all the passports stamped to enter Vietnam.
Contrary to what we had read online, we did not have to pay extra (but maybe it was included in the ticket price already? 😐) to bribe the Vietnamese officials.
She still had to wait for all passports to be stamped before we could pass. But every person that approached the immigration officer had, for some reason, priority over her (maybe the guy was indeed not bribed!). So we had to wait more than 30min there.
Good afternoon, Vietnam! (raise your hand if you read that like Robin Williams 😅).
We finally arrived at the Sept 23rd Park in HCMC at 5pm, after taking over 1h to go through the city. We must have spent at least 15mins just to cross one of the intersections.
Even before we arrived at the city center, we could already see a lot of stores with neon signs, several highrises and malls.
But what was really remarkable was the number of scooters! Everyone is riding one - young people, workers, business women in heels and even babies (with their parents of course 🤣). They ride between cars but also on the sidewalks and they sometimes respect the traffic lights! But that did not prevent the amount of traffic to get in the city.
Our hotel is on a tiny street close to the Sept 23rd Park but also close to a very crowded street full of restaurants, Duong Bui Vien, which is extremely busy and noisy at night, so much so that we had the feeling all our energy was completely drained just by walking around. Fortunately, the hotel itself, the White Guesthouse, is relatively protected from the noise of the area and hosted by the nicest family. You are still awakened by some old dude riding around with a speaker announcing his arrival to sell something at 6 in the morning. Still, it changed from the mosques' early morning call to prayer 😅
The following day, we decided to do a walking tour of the city.
We found out that there is an underground mall and food court under the Sept 23rd Park.
We continued towards the Ben Thanh Market where you can find stalls selling tourist souvenirs and clothes such as the Ao Dai, one of those beautiful and colorful dresses that a lot of Vietnamese women used to wear.
We passed by the Saigon opera house and the People's Committee Hall.
The Notre Dame Cathedral was being renovated so we could not go inside (it seems to be common among Notre Dames 🤣) but we went into the Central post office close by. On the outside it looks like a train station but the interior looks like a bank. The building was designed by Eiffel and displays names of famous scientists such as Volta, Faraday, Ampère, among others.
Then we went to visit the Independence Palace (40k VND/pax) which is the former headquarters of the South Vietnam government during the Vietnam War. This place fell to the North Vietnam army on April 30, 1975. This army is called the liberation army, which it's not exactly how Western movies would depict North Vietnam during the war. It was eye opening to read the history as it is told here.
Of course, we also spent our time enjoying Vietnamese food which is very cheap here!
Another thing that is cheap is the Grab to go around the city. But you need a SIM card, so we bought one from Viettel for 170k VND.
The following day, we went to walk along the river Saigon. We passed the second highest tower in HCMH, called Bitexco Financial tower.
Then we arrived at the Tuong Tran Hung Dao (TTHD) plaza where an historic military leader from the 13th century points his finger at you as if he was accusing you of something.
In front of the square, you can take a boat ride for 15k VND/pax, one way. We bought a ticket and got off at the next stop where we could admire the highest tower in HCMC called Vincom Landmark 81, which weirdly resembled the Burj Khalifa (far smaller though - only 461m).
We even met the heroes of the movie Avatar on the water!
Once back at the TTHD plaza, we had to cross a wide avenue and it was quite an experience because cars and motorcycles would not stop, even if the traffic light was red for them. No one cared! We had the same problem on almost every street but this avenue was quite long and vehicles were coming in pretty fast. Every time you cross the street, you feel like you’re in a video game (like River Crossing, Overcooked or even Moving Out!) trying to reach the other side safely. 🫣
The next day, we were supposed to leave at 3pm but our flight, which was booked on Vietnam Airlines' website but operated by a shady company called Pacific airlines, was delayed by 9h, changing our departure to midnight. 🤦♂️
All flights being full we had to wait but we still were given priority passage through the security gates. There, we experienced again the Vietnameses' different social behavior: they kept cutting the line, even if we had already put our stuff in the tray, people still tried to step in the middle. It was crazy to see this!
The worst part is that the flight got delayed again (!!) after we had already boarded due to supposedly bad weather. 🤦♂️ They said that there was some fog in Da Nang but not enough to prevent other airlines from departing.
We had to get off the plane (to make things worse, we had to take a bus where they squeezed us in like cattle) and board a new plane 4h later, which hinted to the fact that the problem was the plane all along and not the weather. But because the airline said the issue was the weather, there was no compensation whatsoever and our flight ended up landing 12h after the original arrival time. 🤦♂️
Overall, Ho Chi Minh City was not a good experience for us, and we could only dread what would come next in Da Nang!
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