Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon, as it was known prior to 1975), is the most insane city I have ever spent time in! Really, I'm not kidding it really is! I arrived first from Hue for a weekend of mayhem and lots of walking and my main aim was to get out the way all the tourist stuff within walking distance and then fly to Phu Quoc for R&R.

I first went to the Re-unification Palace where democracy officially ended in Vietnam by North Vietnamese (Communist) tanks driving through the gates and into the grounds of the new palacial HQ of South Vietnam. The President surrendered control here and that was that.

The palace itself was built after the first palace built by the French in the 1800's was blown up in the French conflict in 1954 and a new palace of modern design was build in its place then named the Independance Palace as its symbol of overcoming the French.

For modern design it really is nice and has a real 1960's feel to it. It really uses natural light giving it a bright and airy atmosphere and won various design awards. The place has loads of reception rooms seemly depending on how much the president liked his guest a particular room was used. There is also a floor just for entertaining with a cinema, 4th floor garden and a function room complete with bar and stage for those boogy woogy guests. No modern home is complete without a rooftop helipad. Wouldnt everyone be lost without one? Oh and there was a bunker too.

Next I went to the War remnants museum where Vietnam could really show their erm dissatisfaction of American Foreign policy. It showed off an array of captured weaponry and equipment including a 3.5m tall bomb capable of wiping out anything in a 100m radius and doing real damage to anything in 1km radius! Christ!!!

The Museum also featured a really insightful collection of journalists reports and journals in the field of action and give a brutal yet seemingly honest account of the American conflict. Many of them never survived and portrayed the real horrors of the war including what atrocities American forcies carried out on civillians and Vietcong alike but also the terrible plight the troops were under. It was extremely moving and a pungent reminder of the true horrors of war.

Also they showed the human costs of Napalm and Agent Orange on the Vietnamese population. Thank god those weapons are now banned and no other country will have to go throught the horrors of these weapons then and now as the scars of these still affect many today.

This is my first of two stays in Saigon