Sai Gon (Ho Chi Minh city)

Sai Gon city

I had booked an overnight train down to Saigon (or Sai Gon as the locals write) so checked out of the hotel. When I took the room I had agreed a price of $6 a night, so when I was told I owed $14 for 2 nights there was a bit of an argument but the git had my passport and just laughed. Fifteen minutes later I got screwed over again. The cyclo driver said he'd take me to the train station for 5,000 dong (20p) but then when we got there he demanded 10,000! Still pissed off about the hotel, I refused to pay the extra amount so he grabbed my bag. I grabbed it back and then, hidden below the handlebars, he pulled out his trusty Stupid Tourist Whacking Board . It looked well-used, and now a crowd had begun to gather. Oh Christ, I'm gonna get smacked upside the head for 20p! Belying my tough guy image that you all admire, I threw another 5,000 dong note at him, grabbed my bag and ran inside the station. (Thinking about it later, I decided I couldn't blame the guy and if I was in his sandals I would probably have hit me. Cyclo drivers work something like 14 hour days, 7 days a week and are still quite poor. He knew that I had more money in my wallet then he'd probably see in a couple of months, and he knew that I knew that he knew that. But it's the principle, plus the fact that 5,000 of anything sounds like alot.)

Upon entering the station I found out that my train had been cancelled. There then ensued a scrum that Martin Johnson would have enjoyed to get tickets changed to the later train. After pushing a few old ladies out the way I managed to get a sleeper on the 8:03 arriving in Sai Gon at 4am. In reality it came at 9:15 and got to Sai Gon at 7am. Luckily, I slept all the way.

After a good night's kip on the train and getting a room sorted I decided to go for a wander around the city (since 1976 Ho Chi Minh City has been used to describe the whole sprawling metropolis, but District 1 is still called Sai Gon) . First impression [in comedy Oriental accent]: "Where you go now?" which I think is the new national slogan. I found out that if you walk in the opposite direction of the traffic on a one way street then you only get hassled about twice a minute instead of the usual four.

HCMC - with Sai Gon at it's heart - is the commercial centre of Viet Nam. Whilst Hanoi, the capital, still has a certain small-town charm (albeit hidden amongst the traffic) Sai Gon is quickly becoming your typical modern urban sprawling city, with a hefty bit of Frenchiness thrown in. Wide tree-lined boulevards, cafes and restaurants on the streets, and the twin-spired cathedral of Notre Dame all give big clues to its colonial past. I walked past the Reunification Palace (formerly the Presidential Palace where the Commie tanks stormed through the gates in 1976) before coming to the War Remnants Museum. Up until 1996 it was called the American War Crime Museum, so no prizes for guessing what it's all about. In the section called Military Truth the walls are covered in numerous pictures of battles, dismembered bodies and grinning GIs (of course there were no pictures of the Viet Cong doing the same thing). It was all very grim, but the worst part was the display of the effects of Agent Orange and napalm. There were pictures of deformed babies and - rather unnecessary, this - actual pickled deformed foetuses in jars. It definitely put me off my pho.

Whilst looking at an array of US bombshells and captured tanks and helicopters there was a soft tap on my shoulder. I turned round to see this fairly young guy selling books about the war. He had no hands or forearms, a hair lip and only one eye. Judging by his age I assumed his mother had been exposed to Agent Orange. He then introduced himself in halting English and then thrust out an 'arm' for me to shake. What could I do? I couldn't leave him hanging so I grabbed the end, gave it a little wiggle and, unprompted, said: "I'm from England." I didn't want a book but he gave me one to look at anyway. As you all know, any attempt to focus on the one good eye will only mean that you'll stare even more at the bad one, so I said no thanks before Horribly Callous Westerner went looking for homeless kids to teach English to for the rest of the day to make himself feel better.