Saigon aka Motorcycle City

Within this school year's six week summer break, I was granted two weeks of vacation between English camps that I was working. Talking it over with Nick, we decided to take our trip back to southeast Asia like we had done over winter vacation (Thailand). This time however, we wanted to visit Vietnam and Cambodia. And because our time off only overlapped for one week, we would have a short time to do it. Only about 8 days for me.

Our flight arrived into Saigon or Ho Chi Minh City on a Saturday night around 10:00. We were armed with a Lonely Planet book and a decent number of cocktails but not much else. We soon found a cheap hotel for us to stay that night. The nightlife that existed in the surrounding area was nothing to comment on.

Outside of our hotel. Backpacker district.

When a country is as poor as Vietnam can be....you tend to notice more stuff like this.

We were able to dig into our first real authentic bowl of Vietnamese Pho.
Nick of course is on the left and his sister is on the right. She was out visiting Korea from Long Beach and consequently came along with us on our trip. It was definitely a good addition.

Nick. Looking like a creeper (pony-tail and all).

As a last minute decision. Our good friend from here in Korea, Seung Ju, decided to come along with. Seung Ju is quite possibly the most easy going and indifferent person on this planet so we were stoked to have him on board. He's a homie for life.

Ari.

Saigon is filled to the brim with motorcycles. It is by far the primary mode of transportation. Throughout the city, there are these large roundabouts that seem to be the definitive version of organized chaos.




There are definite traces of French culture, food, architecture, etc. left from Vietnam's colony days.






Vietnam War Museum. Rough.
Not ready.
Ready












Wheelin and dealin.


We crashed in this guys hotel room for the night.
Seung Ju dealing with the heat.

Museum Day

Recently Shin (a good CA-native friend of mine here in Korea) and I had a week off from work and were actually in Korea to enjoy it. Not wanting to stray too far from the Seoul Metropolitan area, we decided to head just north to an area called Haewha. Known as a young, quaint, and artsy theater district....Shin and I decided to check out its few museums. With open minds and a small amount of Won, we charged it. Little did we know, we would soon encounter utter disappointment.

The day started out nice. We made a small hike to a mountain-top park. The views were sweet, despite the heavy blanket of haze.



Namsan Tower in the distance.



Some art.


Throwback to SF streets

Now, I know that it's going to sound like a bad idea right off the bat but our first museum stop was the world's only lock museum (as in "lock your door" or "lock up the ancient fortress dynasty gate").
Armed with an open mind (REALLY open) and a free brochure, we entered.
We soon exited with the knowledge that: No matter how old the lock is, it's still not that impressive.
You can see how excited Shin is to be in the presence of the locks.
Needless to say, we passed on the "I Survived the Haewha Lock Museum" t-shirts on the way out.


In order to counteract our previous museum experience, we decided to head toward the Robot Museum. I don't care who you are, that never sounds like a bad idea.....Plus, futuristic artificial beings sound incredible after having spent the last 45 minutes in the 12th century looking at skeleton keys. But disappointment struck again; this time, maybe harder considering the high hopes.
The museum consisted of any TOY that ever even came close to resembling a robot.
This is a picture of Shin as a victim of false advertisement.

Two things to note:
1. Seeing the Schlitz robot did dry up a few tears for me. Beer and robots together are pretty cool.
2. Apparently, Superman is a robot.

It was nice to finally see Robo-Raptor get the credit he deserves. For any Fell St. frequenters, you know that this guy did a lot for the household and the community. He may have even walked you home at some point.