Saigon

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15th November 2006

Early in the morning I was having coffee at a footpath stall – there I met two middle-aged gentlemen – one from Perth in Australia and another from the USA. Both are married to Vietnamese women and now spend half of the year in Vietnam. They both have houses here and have comfortably adapted to the Vietnamese life.

I spend the rest of the day loitering around central Saigon, trying to capture interesting moments daily life in Saigon – there is no shortage of it. Compared to the mechanical life styles of the developed countries, life is so vibrant, colourful and diverse here – I hope my photos will elaborate it better.

16th November 2006

It was my last day in Vietnam. I did the same today - trying to capture interesting moments daily life in another part of Saigon – Saigon’s Cholon district or old china town. I hired a cyclo for the trip – I mainly visited a number of very colourfully decorated Chinse temples and the huge Binh Tay Market.

While I was having lunch at a restaurant at Pham Ngu Lao area, I met a Swedish journalist who was also having lunch there. He was making a documentary on ‘Vietnam now and then during the war’ for a Swedish TV channel. What an interesting topic – I told him If I did not have to leave today, I would have asked him to consider me taking me along as a volunteer assistant – he said he would not have any problem with that – I regretted the missed opportunity.

I took the 8:30 PM flight to Sydney – wishing I could spend a month or so more in Vietnam – covering more places and the opportunity to linger a longer in Saigon, Hanoi, Hoi An and Hue. May be, one day I will come back again.