I’d have to say that I after the trip to South Vietnam, I can definitely say that I feel a lot safer in Hanoi than I did in Saigon. On two separate occasions, Irene and Mindy almost got their purse stolen. According to John who got his information from a taxi driver, the reason why Saigon we saw more thefts in Saigon than Hanoi was because all the bandits from Hanoi relocated to Saigon. The reason for this being was because Saigon is located next to Cambodia and there are many casinos there so…it just made sense that there would be of them in Saigon.
BUT aside from all that, I’d have to say that I love Saigon.
For once in a long time, I felt as if I was home and EVERYONE could understand what I was trying to say. It got to a point where people didn’t believe that I was a foreigner. LOL, the ironic thing is that when people think I’m a foreigner, I always wished that they thought I was a local and when people think that I’m a local, I always wished that they thought I was a foreigner. Call me bi-polar but yeah…
Anyways, one of the best parts of the southern trip was the fact that I was finally able to see my cousin, Chế Ngọc after thirteen long-ass years. She came to the Đoàn 30, the famous military hotel, to pick me up.
I heard a knock and my hotel room and it was Chế Ngọc. I tried to give her a hug because I missed her but it was note reciprocated. Apparently, Vietnamese people do not hug, I think they closest thing to a hug in Vietnam is a handshake and that is on rare occasions—usually you just make eye-contact or bow their heads. It was really nice seeing some familiar faces after three months in Hanoi <3
One major aspect of the south that I noticed the most was the fact that there were more beggars there than in my entire stay in Hanoi. And generally speaking, there were more youthful, elderly, and handicapped beggars.
Kids as young as five or six were roaming the streets of Lông Xuyên selling lottery tickets instead of being at home watching tv or playing like I was when I was that young. They were trying to sell us lottery tickets for a good half an hour. When we were at the café shop, they stuck around to the point where Anh Khoi asked the store owners to tell the kids to leave us alone because we do not play lottery here. SO instead of buying the lottery tickets from them, some of us bought them toy cars and dolls. For a brief time, they were just able to be kids again. I felt like they were stripped of their childhood, but I do understand that family constraints restrict what you can do and what is needed of you to survive.
I forgot what it felt like to be a kid myself :D just seeing the kids’ faces glow was priceless.
No comments:
Post a Comment