Miss Saigon

Today we took a full day tour of Ho Chi Mihn City, which used to be called Saigon before the Vietnam War. It was renamed after Ho Chi Mihn, the leader of the Communist North Vietnam.  What a great trip. We were very impressed by the beauty of the city with its old French architectural style. However, there is also a lot of new modern high rise development going on and the city is full of people on motor bikes (over 5+ million).

We spent time at the Reunification Square (the old Palace, which is now a museum), which is where the South had their bunker and ran the war. We also went to a place where they make traditional Vietnamese lacquer art works and bought a painting (very Picasso like). We then went to the 200+ year old Taoist Shrine, the Cathedral & old Post Office. We also saw a show of water puppets, which is an old art form done by farmers.

Rice paddies along the road into the city.

Modern apartment blocks similar to China

Motor bikes everywhere we went, cutting in and out of traffic

The Vietnamese lacquer art works were very impresive

A lot of manual labour went into creating the finishing product

Our Picasso that we bought

The Presidential Palace where south they ran the war

The tank that ran through the palace gates at the of the was to liberate the country

The presidential receiving room

Maps and equipment in the war bunker

The bunker had several tunnels to connect the various sections

Having Vietnamese coffee 

The motor bikes were used for every purpose. 

The scariest was transporting babies without helmets

Big boxes and farm produce

Everything was transported in motor bikes, including trees and sacks of grain

The Taoist monastery had lots of burning incense

The water puppets were an entertaining art form originating in the countryside by farmers

The Catholic Cathedrale from the French influence

The old post office building with a giant picture of Ho Chi Mihn