Leaving Saigon

Sunday, 30 December 2007

For our last night in Saigon we decided to escape the dreadful backpacker's grotto-hell and have a nice drink at some hotel in the nice part of town before eating at another restaurant nearby. After having the exasperating experience of dishonest taxi and moto drivers earlier in the day (see previous post) I was determined to not allow us to be in that position again. It's a real stressful pain to have to know you are going to be dicked around. But, surprisingly enough the cab driver said "$2.00" right away when I told him where we wanted to go. When he asked where we were from we stated, "Canada" right off the bat and he surprised us by going on about how superior "Canadian pot" was to the stuff he normally got in Vietnam!

After dropping us off at the hotel we soon discovered an entirely new side to this city. Lots of expensive department stores and huge hotels -- we could have been walking down a pricey part of Manhattan. There just wasn't a lot of character to it -- it could have been any glitzy city in any city in any country.

The directions we had from the guide book weren't too specific on the restaurant and the three conflicting pieces of advice we received from hotel people and security weren't too reassuring as we walked back and forth on these city streets. An American couple around our age bumped into us. The girl asked, "Are you looking for your restaurant too?" They were in the same boat, looking for a restaurant next door to ours! It was like something out of a "Seinfeld" episode as we joined forces only to get conflicting information from yet another doorman. You'd think people who worked in this area would know where a major restaurant was a block away?? Finally, we found their restaurant -- but it was full. They were told about another restaurant around the corner and at this point the couple, Eric and Shannon, asked if we wanted to join them. We gladly agreed -- it was nice to hang out with Americans again, having seen only one in the last week since Siem Reap.

The restaurant wasn't great, although the rice-wine margarita Charles had was excellent. Haven't seen rice wine used for this particular drink before or after but if you ever see it on a beverage menu we suggest you order it! Over dinner and drinks we shared travel tales with Eric and Shannon. They were going in the opposite direction, having started in Hanoi and would end up in Siem Reap. We traded tips and suggestions -- it was these kind of conversations, more than any (mostly useless) advice from "Lonely Planet" that really helped out on this trip. After leaving the restaurant we marveled at all the lights that were put up in this neighborhood celebrating Christmas and New Year's Eve.

After getting a cab ride back to our hotel (where the driver again tried to rip us off but was set in his place by the doorman at the hotel near our restaurant) we made hotel reservations for Hoi An. The next morning at the miserable breakfast set out in the lobby (decor consisted of beach chairs and small tables and the food was little more than plain white bread, a Laughing Cow cheese-knockoff and fruit) we were joined by Maria, a very friendly tourist from Barcelona. We shared food and advice; like our companions from the night previous, Maria was also making the trek from the North to the South so she could give us advice on places she had just been and which we were about to visit. Our taxi to the airport arrived so we exchanged business cards and said goodbye but we were lucky enough to have made a real cool Barcelona connection should we ever be lucky enough to visit Spain!