Flying off to HCMC

Since our HCMC-bound flight was in the afternoon, I had some time to settle stuffs in Seremban in the morning.

After lunch my parents sent us to the Low Cost Terminal (LCCT) to catch the AirAsia flight to HCMC.

Ryan was quite excited at first.

Then he started to cry in the plane. "I want my adik ".

Didn't need any in-flight entertainment this time. Ryan slept well throughout the 1 hour 50 minutes flight. So, going to HCMC was actually nearer than me going back to Kota Kinabalu.

The plane descending. Was that the Saigon river?

HCMC seemed like a very densely populated place.

At the Tan Son Nhat airport, Vietnam's largest international airport. At the airport we greeted by a rude immigration guy who was obviously frustrated at his boring job.

The airport was located about 6km north of HCMC city centre. After reading multiple reports of taxi cheating scams on the Lonely Planet forum, we decided to walk over to the Domestic Terminal to take a Mai Linh taxi into town. The Mai Linh and Vinasun fleets of taxis were said to be more reliable, and tourist were less likely to encounter unscrupulous taxi drivers who overcharge by bringing tourists for joyrides or using rigged meters.

The trip into town usually takes less than 30 minutes. Unfortunately, we were caught in the after-work-going-home traffic.

Our first taste of the traffic in HCMC: motorbikes everywhere.

Endless streams of beeping motorbikes surrounding the taxi.

The trip to city center took longer than usual, and the taxi fare came to USD$10 on the meter, a bit more than the flat rate of $8 for an airport taxi.

We dropped off at Pham Ngu Lao street, the backpackers' haven of HCMC. Something akin to the Khao San Road of Bangkok, or Petaling Street of KL. It was dark already when we reached. And I couldn't find the hotel than I booked on the internet (hahahaha...). So we just settled for a simple room above a tailor shop in De Tham street. It turned out to be a good deal anyway. For $15 a night we got a very spacious air-con room with two queen-sized beds, wifi in the room, a huge window and balcony, and an extremely central location.

Quickly took a bath, and went down to look for dinner. Had our first dinner at Kim Cafe along the same street as our hotel, based on recommendation of our hotel receptionist. Even though the shop was packed with tourists, the food wasn't great.

Ryan had a beef burger. Ah there was the last picture we had of his toy car given by grandma, which he then lost somewhere in HCMC.

I wanted to try something Vietnamese, so I ordered a Vietnamese pancake. It's like a thosai made of crispy flour, with fillings consisted of lots of beansprouts, vegetables, and a couple of shrimps. Notice the plate of vegetables which accompanied the pancake. Ryan's mum had beef fried rice (not very interesting, didn't take any photo).

Vietnamese beer was cheap. Cheaper than can drinks. Cost less than RM2 for a bottle.

After dinner, we walked around De Tham street to check out the neighbourhood. We found a nice yogurt shop nearby...

Many Vietnamese families and youngsters were hanging out in the yogurt shop. There were vending machines where you could choose and mix your own flavors of yogurt and toppings, then head for the cashier who would then weight your cup and charge accordingly. I think it was 15k dongs for 100g. By the way, 10k dongs was equivalent to about RM1.70.

Yummy!

Then we walked back to De Tham street, to check out the many travel agencies there. Well, almost every other shop was a travel agency, and they offered similar local tour packages, with slight difference in prices.

I was initially planning to travel on our own, at our own pace. But seeing that Ryan could hardly tolerate much walking, taking local tours seemed to be the next best option.

Read somewhere that Saigon was a city that never sleeps. All night we heard motorbikes and beeps on the street downstairs. The downside of being in a central location.