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So 2 has become 3 now that we've got to Saigon and Em has flown out to join us for a couple of weeks! It was exciting waiting for her at the airport and we had a big running hug when she came through the gate - so nice to see a familiar face after all this time!
We had arrived Saigon the night before and as soon as we got off the bus we were accosted by a tout who was a big beefcake of a woman and who led us, somewhat aggressively, round some of the dodgiest little backstreets looking at hostels! In one place, the gran o the family would be sleeping below us! In the end we actually bumped into Leo (again) and stayed at the same place as him which was much nicer.... Much to the disappointment of the scary tout! We then headed straight for Pizza Hut which was amazing, even if we did feel a bit guilty! Was particularly amusing though when when we were told by the waitress that our pizza would be ready in 17 minutes!
After picking Em up and getting her settled in, we went to a PARTICULARLY nice cafe then spent a bit of time planning our next few days at the Cu Chi tunnels and our trip through the Mekong Delta to get to Cambodia. The rest of the afternoon was spent doing a walking tour of some of the main sights such as the Notre Dame cathedral (where we had the most amazing spring rolls from a street stall), Independence Palace and the indoor market. It was also a good chance for me to show off my much improved map reading skills to Em as I took us 1.5k in the wrong direction, standard!!
That night we had a meal on a little balcony overlooking the "higgledy piggledy" buildings and taking in the atmosphere, which was buzzing! We pulled up a pew at the big crossroads in our district and watched the world go by (with random things like dried out squid and weighing scales constantly being touted!) over a few more drinks before heading to bed, leaving Jonny to stay up for Utd at 2am! But when he didn't rock in until 6am he became very well acquainted with the dog house!
Next morning we were up bright and early (well, one of us definitely wasn't bright, leaving the flat without shoes for a start) to go to the Cu Chi tunnels which the Viet Cong used in the American War. It was fascinating to learn about how the tunnel system was made and unbelievable to think that people actually lived in them, particularly when we were all struggling (aching and profuse sweating) after crawling through them for two minutes!
After the tunnels we continued the cultural fix (no one can ever call me a philistine again) by visiting the war remnants museum. It was well worth the visit and frightening to think it all happened so recently. The anti- American propaganda was obvious right from the outset, but the particularly graphic and disturbing Agent Orange Exhibit sort of explained why!
In the evening we went for a meal and made sightings of both rats and cockroaches (think Em must have brought them with her in her back pack as never had any issues up until now) and then had a couple of drinks (well, no beers for Jonny as he had only just sobered up from the night before) to round off our short but very sweet time in Saigon!
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