TacoCat’s Travels #179 (Ho Chi Minh): A New Adventure with Friends and Scammers?

September 2022 · 9 min read · Ho Chi Minh City

Hey Hive!

So if you missed the last post, I just finished recounting our last trip to Japan in July 2019 when we traveled to Hokkaido for the first time! It was right in the middle of summer in Japan and we learned from experience that Japan summers are brutal but we figured it'd be more tolerable in Hokkaido.

We had so much fun exploring Sapporo and even traveling to see the beautiful flower fields in Shikisai Hills! I think that was definitely the highlight of the trip for me. But we also traveled to a few new places while also revisiting some places we knew and ate a lot of delicious food! All in all, an awesome trip for sure!

Little did we know that was the last trip to Japan we'd ever take for a few years since we got busy and covid became a thing and Japan has been closed off to tourists ever since. We're still waiting for the day that they fully reopen so we can visit again.

Anyway, we only had a few weeks until Sean was scheduled to start his full-time job so we went on a short getaway to Vietnam to see more of Ho Chi Minh City and also visit a friend!

This would be our second trip to Ho Chi Minh but the first actual holiday there since the last time we visited was on a volunteer trip in 2016 to teach kids English! It was a short trip and we were pretty busy volunteering at the time so we didn't have much time to do any sightseeing.

But now that we had a Vietnamese friend who's local and visiting his family, he offered to show us around too so we were pretty excited!

20 July 2019. Saturday.

Our flight was fairly early in the morning since we wanted to enjoy the weekend there so we arrived at the airport at 9am and boarded the plane at about 10am. The flight is only about 2 hours so by the time we arrived and took a cab into the city it was 1:30pm.

To be honest I couldn't remember a lot of what the city looked like other than the neighbourhood near our hotel the last time we came here. So I made sure to take more photos this time.

We actually passed by quite a few interesting buildings on the way.

And of course the traffic was insane as always with a lot of motorbikes around just driving willy-nilly. We were surprised when we actually saw people stopping at the red lights. Maybe the traffic laws improved since the last time we arrived?

We saw this very pink church that looked pretty cool! Its formal name is Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Apparently it was built in 1876 when Vietnam was part of French Indochina and is the second largest church in Ho Chi Minh City!

I'm not sure if we could have visited it but its bright pink paint definitely stood out a lot.

We were staying at a boutique hotel called Roseland Sweet Hotel that was in the middle of the city but in a different neighbourhood than the one we stayed in in 2016.

We were actually meeting a friend of ours who was from Malaysia and also traveling to Vietnam for holiday with his family and meeting a mutual friend of ours. So we all decided to stay at the same hotel to make it more convenient to meet up.

We arrived slightly earlier than our Malaysian friends though so we waited for a bit in the lobby for them to arrive and for our room to be ready.

Just a few minutes later, our room was ready so we headed on up while waiting for our friends to arrive and check in as well.

It was actually quite a decent hotel. Everything was nice and clean and it looked pretty modern too.

It was a pretty standard hotel room and felt quite clean especially since the floors weren't carpeted, which I prefer.

Our friend and his family arrived soon after and we got to meet them for the first time and also check out their bigger suite. After an hour or so when everyone was situated, we all went to lunch at this hole-in-the-wall restaurant across the road from our hotel.

I wish I'd taken a photo of the actual place from the outside but it was really just a hole-in-the-wall there wasn't even any signage or anything. But the menu featured some standard street food like Com Tam aka Broken Rice.

We weren't sure what was Broken Rice but apparently its popular type of white rice served with many Vietnamese dishes. The reason for its name is bacause the rice grains get “broken” or fractured during the milling process. The broken grains are deemed inferior, and so, are separated from the whole grains and sold as “Broken Rice”.

We ordered the broken rice with chicken and it was basically just rice with a fried chicken drumstick with some vegetable sides, sweet chili sauce and soup.

The rice itself didn't have much seasoning and tasted just like normal white rice. The chicken was pretty average but was still kinda tender. It was something to fill our stomachs I guess since we were all pretty hungry.

We also each bought drinks since it was absolutely scorching outside.

After that I think our friend Dean's mum wanted to go get something from the hotel so he went back while we waited outside and there was an altercation with his dad and some scammers loitering outside the hotel.

I'm not sure what happened exactly but I think Dean's brother got approached by these people who offered to clean his shoes for him and they were basically forced to pay for their shoes to get cleaned. I'm not even sure if they did a good job but I remember Dean's dad getting very angry and cursing at them for their scummy ways. It got so bad even the hotel manager got involved and tried to mediate the situation.

Just a little advice - don't wear expensive looking shoes, clothing and jewelry whenever you're visiting foreign countries. Especially those with pretty high risks of getting scammed or robbed. Sean and I were dressed really casually in just T-shirts and shorts and wearing slippers so no one will bother to approach us even if we look like tourists.

After about 15 minutes or so, everything was resolved somewhat and we decided to go take a walk around the neighbourhood.

We passed by quite a few European-looking buildings like this theater house?

And this shopping distric. We tried to stay in the shade as much as possible since the sun was relentless.

Then we came to this little shopping street with some small boutique shops along the road that looked more intriguing than big name stores imo.

And of course we saw the famous Trung Nguyen coffee shop. It's a famous coffee brand in Vietnam and can be found practically everywhere there.

There was also what looked like an Avengers tower in the background. With the shape and the landing pad and everything it looked just like the movie!

The overall architecture in the city was such a mix bag; there were more traditional looking street stalls and street peddlers in front of bigger department stores interjected with some hipster-looking cafes and boutiques. It was truly unique compared to most places in Singapore.

Speaking of comparing to Singapore, we actually saw a Lucky Plaza on the way too! Which is ironic since we actually have a Lucky Plaza shopping center in Singapore too.

We came across this grander looking place called Times Square Saigon which was one of the bigger buildings we came across.

But we decided to go visit the Lucky Plaza first to cool off since it was way too hot to be walking around for long periods of time.

The ground floor of the place looked just like a night market or pasar malam with so many stalls with knock-off clothes brands.

They had everything from clothes to shoes, bags and accessories. Pretty typical of Asian markets.

They probably get a lot of tourists here as they were also selling lots of luggage.

We soon found they had a supermarket here and of course we had to stop by and get some drinks and snacks.

There was a lot of different types of coffee as well but the prices here might be a little hiked up since their main clientele is tourists. And since we were still going to be walking we decided to keep it light and just buy a drink or two.

Since it was so hot I thought we'd get a ice cream treat! They had this special Milo popsicle and since I'd never tried it it seemed like the perfect time.

It was actually really sweet! Especially the center since it was filled with condensed milk in the middle. But the outer chocolatey part was pretty good, although it did taste a little like it's been kept for a while. Still alright though.

After about 15 minutes or so we went back out into the street.