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| Dawn along the Saigon River |
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| A typical row of houses in Saigon |
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| Buddhist temple in Saigon |
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| "Uncle Ho" statue with Central Committee Building |
After only one day at sea between Singapore and Vietnam, we sailed up the Saigon River at dawn on November 3rd to Ho Chi Minh City (which the locals still call Saigon). On the first day we toured the city and saw a Buddhist temple, and the former Presidential Palace (now called the Reunification Palace), where the North Vietnamese tanks crashed through the gates in 1975 when Saigon fell. At the palace we saw the underground war rooms that still had maps posted from wartime. We also drove past some of the major buildings in downtown Saigon, some of which remain from French colonial times. Saigon is now a bustling major city, with chaotic traffic. Like China, the Vietnamese have embraced free market capitalism in their economy, while still maintaining a communist government. After our tour, we met Nga, a high school classmate of one of our Randolph College students from Saigon, and she took us to one of her favorite restaurants. The food was great and we only paid a little over $25 for six people! More about Nga after Cambodia....
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