Ho chi minh

Notebook

Ho Chi Minh City OCTOBER 2013

PR ELUDE

Ho Chi Minh Two-wheeled Maniacs in the City of Chill — While I am still trying to find time to properly write about the delights and disasters of the epic excursion, this visual notebook will narrate ahead vignettes of the full story. In the following pages are iPod Touch snaps, a lame-ass way of documenting travel because I was too cheap and lazy to invest in a proper camera. This sorry means of capturing memories will be changed soon.

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TOSS

up Rambo and Miss Saigon and whichever of the two falls splat on your face first would be my strongest

concept of Vietnam. Obviously, this view is ignorant and provincial.

Also, the mere mention of Rambo will give cheeky people a snickerinducing hint as to what decade I grew up in.

Having told B that I will not subject myself to a carefully fine-tuned itinerary, I have suspended all expectations about this trip and let, for once, messed-adventures be my road map.

B grinned. I spotted a glint of vengeance in his wicked, hipster eyes.

The fact that we will be travelling with M and L, one can’t help but anticipate not only a wealth of misfortune but loads of hilarity as well.

First, I am duty-bound to expose M and his outrageous antics.

M is one of my so-called best friends. How we ended in this regret-

table outcome is as complex a phenomenon that approaches the nearmythical proportions of the Higgs boson. M professionally zigzags between fashion and the academe and his First-World tendencies often dilute one’s thirst for “rough-it-up” brand of misadventures.

“No Boutique Hotels!” I yelled at B and M when they were plotting accommodations. “This is a backpacking type of travel and not a pretentiously-posh tourist shit!”

They looked up from their Google maps-splattered screens, shot me contemptuous glares and exhaled dramatically as if I have just suggested that they swim in a river teeming with piranhas.

We touched down Ho Chi Minh City past midnight.

The young-ish immigration officer on owl shift greeted me with a wide, soundless yawn.

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China Girl Ben Thanh Market —

Totally oblivious of pesky, bargain-hunting tourists this yoga-squatting dame was quite enraptured, lost in a mobile-phone game. Having not played any mobile-centric game I restrained from challenging her to a championship round of Candy Crush Saga.

There is something poetic about her alienation and disinterest of potential profit to be had from camera-wielding streams of strangers passing her overspilling shoebox stall. I took a discreet snap using my iPod Touch and hurriedly backed off out of fear of being screamed at in a language that saw historical horrors of war.

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Etch A Stitch Ben Thanh Market —

Joseph and his amazing multicolored coat got steep competition here. One can only marvel at the skilled, occasionally - punctured fingers that threaded these joyful patches of cloth. Do you envision greyed, wrinkled and arthritic grandmothers squatting on bamboo floors on hot summer afternoons as they steadily loop their needles amidst gossips and giggles while passing on the craft to the next generation of fabric stitchers?

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Pots and Fun Ben Thanh Market —

Antidepressants unnecessary in sunny Saigon!

Bursts of color everywhere. This stall of oriental figurines’ no exception! After a block of stalls with colors so bright I think I was already struggling to contain a threat of a migraine. Kidding.

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Dish Dame Ben Thanh Market —

There’s a restaurant rule that if you can’t read the menu your wallet will definitely bleed. This lady will prove otherwise. Her delicious delicacies were prepared with precision, speed and a dignified air from someone who exuded the confidence of a character that cannot be messed with. The exotic herbs and flavors remain a mystery because of our Vietic illiteracy and our language incompatibility.

The consolation was that the dishes were cheap and, of course, theres that malicious satisfaction of seeing our friend M squirm at the thought of eating street food but were left with no other choice.

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Crustacean Chow Ben Thanh Market —

Inability to pronounce the name of the dish was not a hindrance to enjoying authentic flavor. This was my lunch. I don’t know what it was or what’s in it. I have no inclination to know. All I know is that this indecipherable jumble of ingredients was an explosion of flavors. Note the fractured, grimy tiles of the serving counter. Gave M the creeps. We ignored him. Lunch was good.

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People Powered Bui Vien Street —

Siklo is a locomotive Frankenstein of improvised rickshaw, bicycle/tricycle powered by earnest, persuasive pedal pushers who keep battered notebooks with testimonials of previous clients from every nation. We were sold by this merry quartet of drivers to a city tour for 400 Dong. “What a funtastic way to see the urban fabric via three hundred sixty degrees wide open transportation!” we excitedly agreed amongst ourselves. Our collective excitement was soon replaced by naked terror of gazillion motorcyclists who view traffic lights as a mere form of suggestion instead of civilized urban law! While our lungs deteriorate from the motorcycle exhausts, our faces thickened with traffic toxins. On the bright side we need not apply sunblocks - smog got us all covered!

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Concrete Hall of Horrors The War Remnants Museum, 28 Vo Van Tan —

Ferried by our four Sikloteers, we found ourselves drifting from various exposition halls of one of mankind’s dark hours. Not quite (but close to) a spiritual moment rushed over me at the War Remnants Museum. Something - a sudden wave of anger, sadness and loss stirred in me. The horrors and atrocities of war were showcased and preserved as reminders of things that should never be repeated.

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Not-So-Pearly Shells The War Remnants Museum, 28 Vo Van Tan —

They look harmless, empty, forgotten. Yet you can almost still hear the ghostly cries of anguish ricocheting inside their vacant shells.

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Vietnamese Strokes The War Remnants Museum, 28 Vo Van Tan —

How can such a beauty be found in the chamber memorializing countless deaths and suffering?! This calligraphic banner fascinated me endlessly.

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Graphic Content The War Remnants Museum, 28 Vo Van Tan —

I wasn’t supposed to but I found myself carefully scrutinizing the typography, grid and palette of these war propaganda posters. After admiring their graphic beauty I felt so dirty afterwards.

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Windows To Warring Worlds The War Remnants Museum —

These photographs reawakened my momentarily - neglected aspirations for art photography. I may not achieve the photo caliber worthy of Magnum but I know the day will eventually come I’ll be telling stories without words.

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Strange Combo Meets Full Bodied Brew Go2 Bui Vien Street —

Reeling from the confrontational, emotionally-

pineapple and crispy apple pizza — odd combo

stirring side trip at the War remnants museum we

but yummy beyond belief! It’s downed with the

went back and had a break at Go2 along Bui Vien

painfully-tedious coffee process but the terrific

Street. I had the Dried coconut, crane lizard

brew is worth the wait.

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Art Attack Bao Tang My Thuat Fine Arts Museum —

“Whenever I hear the word ‘culture’ I reach for my revolver. ” This quote is often mistakenly attributed to leading Nazi Hermann Goering, but according to Wikipedia is “in fact, it is a line uttered by the character Thiemann in Act 1, Scene 1 of the play Schlageter, written by Hanns Johst. ” Not that I was planning to run amok in a country that saw misguided maniacs emptying artilleries at will, but the soul of the place can often be gleaned in the genius of its citizens. So we paid Bao Tang My Thuat a visit. Here my keffiyeh scarf blends with the very graphic painting in the background.

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Typografitti Diamond Plaza —

In the district dotted with luxurious emporiums like Chanel, Dior etc. my fashion-fatigued eyes instead automatically zeroed in on this typeface-emblazoned window. Ok, so my type fetish striked again. Sue me.

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Alcohol & Random Strangers Bui Vien Street —

Exotic street food, cheap local beer and a dizzying horde of tourists, backpackers and locals made Bui Vien Street at night sound like either the biblical confusion that ensued afoot the Tower of Babel or could pass as an inebriated version of The Pentecost - everyone was speaking in tongues at decibels comparable to either that of a mardi gras in full swing, a political rally or the concert of One Direction. M and L, being natural spoilsports, slept instead of people-watching and having hilarious drunken conversations with random strangers (which B and I did amidst a cluster of Eastern Europeans, Middle Eastern and North Americans).

For some weird coincidence we had an enraptured conversation with an Australian guy who puts people to sleep. Before you shift uneasily let it be clear that he was a sleep technician! (Will blog more about this). We staggered back to the hotel, the din of incomprehensible conversations roared behind us.

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