VIETNAM: HO CHI MINH CITY

When we moved to Indonesia, we decided one of our vacations would have to be to Vietnam.  Tanner served a Vietnamese speaking mission in Houston, Texas, and he has always wanted to visit the country so many of the people he taught had come from.  We flew directly into Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) and spent the first couple of walking and touring around the city.  The place we stayed was within walking distance of some interesting sites including the Reunification Palace.  When the communists took over Saigon, they renamed it Ho Chi Minh and also renamed the palace as a symbol that the North and South had been “reunified”.  There is quite a lot of propaganda and it was interesting taking a tour as an American since so much of it was about defeating the American ‘invaders’.  The kids had fun talking with some of the locals, and of course they had to stop and pose with some school kids for pictures.  They are kind of used to it from being stopped all the time in Indonesia too.

 

And what boy does not love a big ‘ol tank! 

This is what Andrew thought of the tour.

The palace wasn’t anything too special…mostly full of 1960s and 70s era furniture, but I did take a pic of the radio equipment that they have kept in the basement of the palace from the U.S.  We gave it to the South to help fight against the VietCong. 

After the tour of the Reunification Palace we headed over to Ben Thanh Market.  They have tons of trinkets and souvenirs.  Tanner just had to buy the boys and himself a hat.  We went back at the end of our trip and I bought a jewelery box.  Then we headed over to a Pho 24 and had lunch.  It was YUMMY!  The kids loved it too and really liked the coconut milk!

(Yummy looking fruit stands outside the market)

It rained most of the rest of the day so we headed back to our hotel and later that night we went out and walked around for a bit.  Good first day!!!