The Heat is On in Saigon

From the sublime to the ridiculous sums up our transition from the rustic tranquillity of our little island to arriving in HCMC. It is chaos here! But in a cool way.  We’re staying right in the heart of District 1 in the touristy area of Do Quang Dau street. Crossing the road is an adventure in itself every time. You can’t wait for a break so you just have to avoid cars and then walk into a thousand oncoming motorbikes who somehow seem to weave around you. This little exotic cull de sac is teeming with Vietnamese and tourists alike as everything from sunglasses to fake Crumpler bags to fruit is exchanged at a dizzying pace to the soundtrack of millions of car and bike horns.  

Beer costs around $2 US and goes down a treat with some incredible Vietnamese food after a day of trekking around galleries, museums, markets and shops. By night this area of a glo with neon lights, bars spruiking cold beer, scantily clad women waving you inside, tantalising smells, bad western pop songs and of course, motorbikes. Our room is dingy but neat and comfortable. You access it via a dark alleyway, past a small kitchen that looks like it hasn’t changed in two hundred years and up some stairs where I have to bend in half to get past the landing.

As I became intoxicated by the sights and smells (and maybe a bit of the local beer) I decided to finally get the tattoo I’ve been thinking about for nearly a year. The artist’s work seemed decent and his implements sterile so I studied the peeling paint and wallpaper with great detail as buzz by buzz, a very neat symmetrical black compass rose materialised on my right shoulder.

HCMC or Saigon as it is still called in many quarters has been a thoroughly exciting and insightful place to cool our heels. It is a city that is constantly on the move and the thriving trade in retail and various modes of transport render it communist in name only. The scars of the American war are still abundantly evident in the deformed people operating three wheeled contraptions with their arms and in the museums and galleries where shocking and poignant images greet you on every wall. The city has charmed me will always be an exceptionally fun memory of such a wild metropolis.