Day 2 - Thursday 8 May 2014

Shopping

We awoke to the distant sound of motorbike horns - the general background sound of Ho Chi Minh City, we've discovered.

After a sumptuous buffet breakfast (these Vietnamese know how to do a good breakfast), we headed out into the bustling busy city.

It takes a bit of getting used to for soft Westerners. Bikes all over the place going in every direction and cars doing much the same.

You just have to stride out into the road and traffic swerves (very politely) around you. But you're not safe on the footpath either. It's not uncommon for a bike to be heading straight towards you as you pause to look in a shop window. (That's if you can even look into the shop, with the bikes parked out front).

I have to admit, this is not my photo - but this is what it is like! 



We walked around, got hopelessly lost, and then took a taxi to our destination for the grand sum of $1 AUD.

Our destination was a multi-storey shopping mall full of little stalls selling fake absolutely everything you might ever want. Some of the fakes are so good, I'm sure they're actually made in the factories that make the real thing.

20,000 Vietnamese Dong is equivalent to 1 Australian dollar - and it kind of does your head in to be asked to pay 400,000 Dong for something - only to realise it means $20. Lots of internal calculations have to go on - but I'm sure we'll get used to it.

Jim bought t-shirts, underwear, a couple of fake watches and some parts for his camera. I just strolled around and looked at everything. It's a bit overwhelming at first so my shopping will come later I think.

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Jim just came back to the hotel after a solo shopping expedition sporting a big cut above his left eye. He was in the lift with a loud American who was waving his arms around bang! Hit him on the temple with his watch. 
I obviously can't leave him alone for 5 minutes! 

The hotel reception staff fussed around with antiseptic and bandages - and he went off to get his camera battery pack looking like he'd been in the wars.

Jim's comment on the expedition was that the little Vietnamese man in the camera shop had the softest hands he'd ever come across - and he hates Americans.