Entry the Second: Red October Sky

As we descended through those red October skies my body clock was thrown out of alignment. It was almost 10am here in Vietnam, but only about 4 back in the UK, and I had been awake for at least a couple of hours. Miraculously, although tired, I didn’t feel quite as much like death as I expected to.

My initial three month extendable entry visa got me through passport control easily, although I’m going to have to flagpole through Cambodia or somewhere come December. I hit a wall of heat as I left the terminal and began to navigate through the thronging crowds waiting for arrivals. Mercifully, Tien had agreed to meet me on the airport, and he found me on his last lap of the Terminal thoroughfare. We’d had some trouble getting in contact as I drifted further from the fading tendrils of terminal wifi, my O2 roaming refusing to cooperate. Almost immediately, we walked through the centre of a busy junction, laden with suitcases; Tien assuring me that it was fine.

How do you cross the road in Ho Chi Minh City? You just cross the road. Don't think too hard about it. They can sense your fear.

Perhaps now is the time to say something about the traffic and the city in general. Ho Chi Minh City is hot and busy. I knew it would be of course, but what makes it more noticeably different than other cities I’ve been to is the two wheeled transport. Mopeds, scooters, call them what you will, throng the street in a manic but organic mess. Somehow it seems to work, if only due to the lack of larger vehicles on the road, although the occasional large truck or bus will come thundering along, vying for right of way. There were shades of this in China, but anyone expecting to find a billion bicycles in Beijing these days would be disappointed by now-ubiquitous cars. After five minutes in Saigon, there’s no doubt that the moped reigns supreme.

But don't despair! Conventional pedestrian crossings do exist! They're few and far between, yes, but here's the proof!

It was great to have been met by someone, as it helped to dispel some of the inevitable apprehension felt upon stepping out into a new country alone. We had a chat over some iced coffee; as it was still early, we both had time to linger. He even loaned me the taxi fare to the hotel and recommended a good exchange bureau, as I had eschewed the undoubtedly inflated rates at the airport and had no local currency. So with a few hundred thousand dong in my pocket, Tien saw me into a taxi and I headed straight for the hotel.

The address of the hotel was Saigon Inn, 265/7/55 Pham Ngu Lao. This means it’s somewhere near 265 Pham Ngu Lao Street, in the heart of the area popularly known as the backpacker’ or foreigner’s district, where hostels, bars, travel agencies, hawkers and tourist abound. Every non-Vietnamese person I talked to here was a day away from their bus to Phnom Penh or schlep up to Hanoi.

This is in fact the first photo I took, from the window of my room shortly before I collapsed.

The 7/55 in the address attempts to describe the network of steadily narrowing alleyways leading to the hotel, but it was well signposted and helpful locals hanging out of their front windows or sitting in the street pointed my in the right direction the whole way. Here, living rooms front out to the alley, doors flung wide against the stifling heat, and moped drivers continue to navigate the maze. With all the trapping of life so closely packed together, and the wall of the building opposite only metres away, I almost felt like I was on a film set. Maybe the jet lag was doing the thinking.

"I almost felt like I was on a film set."

Inside, I went through the usual check-in rigmarole. The hotel employees were all very friendly, chatty and helpful, offering my advice and taking my bags to the room where I promptly collapsed for most of the afternoon. When I stirred to check my messages, I saw that Tom had managed to get some work done and suggested we meet for dinner. We met out on the main street, and he presented me with a helmet. Yes, I was going to be whisked through the streets of Saigon on the back of a moped on my very first night!

It was an exciting experience, even if you could taste the exhaust fumes on every breath. I felt much more stable than I expected to, and without having to actually drive through the traffic myself, I enjoyed being immersed in the chaos. It was invigorating after a long flight; every sight, smell and sound was something new, especially coming after week upon week of the familiarity of my room and computer back home, where all preliminary research, applications and document sorting necessarily take place.

We ate Vietnamese barbecue, where a selection of meaty bits and vegetables were cooked in front of us on a grill in the centre of the table. I don’t recall the exact price, but it was cheap, with the food, a couple of beers, and some bottled water coming to under 100 000 ₫ (about £3).

A possible result of the Communist obligation to provide near 100% employment to its citizens is the noticeably high number of employees manning each shift in a restaurant. Even at busy times, you’ll rarely wait long for service. Similarly, even the narrowest shop front on a street of similar shops has its own security guard to watch the bikes parked outside.

My final thoughts on that first day in Vietnam were as I poked my head out into that film set of an alleyway under the foreboding red October sky. Whether it was smog, light pollution, or the sign of an approaching thunderstorm to cut through that muggy air, I didn’t know. It was probably all three.

"My final thoughts on that first day in Vietnam were as I poked my head out into that film set of an alleyway under the foreboding red October sky."