Ho Chi Minh City

*Note: we're actually currently in Kampot, Cambodia, having crossed the border earlier today. But this post is about Ho Chi Minh City.

HCMC used to be called Saigon, when it was the capital of capitalist South Vietnam (boo, hiss), ruled by the iron fist of a couple of CIA puppets. The first of these villains, President Diem, was assassinated in a CIA-backed coup when he got too big for his boots. The second, President Thieu, fled to Taiwan and then the US at the end of the Vietnam war. It's Thieu whose palace, now named the Reunification Palace, is now one of the main sights to see in HCMC, along with the War Remnants Museum, showcasing the horrors committed by the US-backed forces in this part of the world.


The Palace is slightly disappointing - one expects a CIA-baked ruler of a developing country to live in much more pomp and circumstance than Thieu seems to have. Probably much of his stuff was pinched when Saigon fell. But if the wages of sin are this low (what's that you say? death?) I wonder what the point of it all is. At least Gaddaffi had solid gold statues and so on (though he didn't get to die aged 78 in a medical institution in Boston). Still, Thieu did have his own nightclub a few floors above his living quarters, and it's still standing, which is more than Noriega can say. He also had his own cinema at a time when there weren't too many in Vietnam.

The War Remnants Museum is shocking stuff. What Agent Orange did and continues to do to the people, water supply, and ecosystems of Vietnam is completely appalling. The companies responsible for manufacturing this chemical paid out-of-court settlements to the poor US soldiers whose health has been destroyed by handling their toxic products, but I rather suspect that the people it was used on will not be quite so lucky. All's fair in war, you might say, but the contamination is ongoing, and still causes numerous congenital diseases today. The museum is propagandist in tone, but then history is written by the victors. Stirring stuff.

Apart from that, Saigon had another major attraction: our good friend Miss Shalinee Singh, coincidentally also in Vietnam, with whom we shared a lovely couple of days. A highlight being the consumption of a lot of snails in the market. Yum yum.

Right, must be off, got to relax in Kampot. Ta ta.