Vietnam : Tour NO Duty...

My first experience in a foreign land where English is considered invalid....
English = Leave it in hotel, Sign Language Required.

Welcome to Ho Chi Minh City.

It's such a relief to know that my Vietnam friends could converse quite well in English.

The city is buzzing with bikes and never-ending honkings...

Being really nice host, they so kindly obliged to my request on going around town endlessly covering every street and letting me press on the horn for fun sake! *LOL

And off we go the very next morning to eat fur... ('Pho') a.k.a Beef noodles

Here's riding with my chauffeur, Bryan, joining the crazy traffic going places around the city throughout the day.

First stop is the Notre Dame ...... built in the 1800's by the French.

Located right in the middle of the city's Central District 1, this church is still being used and it's also a common place for wedding photo shoots. I was told that there's on average, 2 weddings every weekend!

Just right beside, is a park in the middle of the city where everyone hangs-out.........to drink coffee =.="

Seriously, I was being offered coffee for breakfast, mid-morning, lunch, tea-time, dinner and supper!
It's just something interesting in Viets that coffee is a MUST HAVE.

Here's us at the park

My Vietnam buddies




Youth Centre

Vietnamese teens gather here at nite and over the weekends for their extra-curricular activities. I was in there checking out some bands and while walking past a classroom, I overheard an English tutor 'lecturing' some students and he went like "U must let heart english SPEAK.. heart let out SPEAK engrishh" ....OMG!

Anyway, just a few blocks away was another tourist attraction

Ho Chi Minh's General Post Office



The interior of the post office with it's retro 1940's architecture and unique half-pipe roof design. Reasonably priced souvenirs are sold in here.





If there's any place that one shouldn't miss while touring HCM, its gotta be this:

Ngon Restaurant

Featuring the Best & Finest Vietnam cuisines. It's a MUST visit for every tourist and dine-in is only possible with reservations.





At the other part of town is this ice-cream parlour which serves ice-cream in all uniquely-delicious ways possible.

As seen in this pix, I was having this dessert served with fresh fruits IN a coconut. Not sure if there's any of this in KL, but lemme know if u've had any around town =)

Will be checking out more on the interiors and Hanoi on my next trip to Vietnam.

There's only so much for now, more pix in my Facebook album (click!)