xin chào SAIGON 2014 - Day 2

Waking up, nice and fresh and we headed upstairs for buffet breakfast (daily complimentary from the hotel).

Breakfast time!!!

Pho!!!

You can even order PHO upon request, though it wasn't as fantastic as the ones we had on the first day. 

After filling our stomach with a sumptuous meal, we headed off for our first itinerary of the day - onwards to the Women's Museum. This is one of the under-rated museum when you Google for places to visit in Ho Chi Minh. As this is located in District 3 of the city, we took a cab there and it didn't cost us as much, and the journey was about 10-15 minutes. 

200-202 Vo Thi Sau St

Iconic of the museum

Southern Women's Museum of Vietnam

The first level of the exhibition was quite light-hearted, mostly exhibiting the daily lives of Vietnamese women and what they do and how they dress generally.

 As you progress onto the higher levels of the museum, you will be welcomed by the roles Vietnamese women played back in war times, and I found them pretty heavy-hearted.

Panoramic of the last level of the museum 

Women's Museum
Entry fee: FOC

200-202 Vo Thi Sau St
Ward 7, Dist. 3,
Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Opening hours:
7:30 am to noon & 1:30 pm to 5:00 pm (Monday to Friday)
They close promptly for lunch from 12-1.30pm.

After which we took a taxi to the nearby Honey Nail for a pampering session of Medicure and Pedicure. This is not the usual place tourist would look for for nails services, but since it was recommended by our friend residing in HCM, we decided to give it a try. It is tucked away in a alley, so be prepared to explore a bit to find this parlour. When we entered the shop, there was only one staff who could not speak English so she called her Lady Boss and she very kindly came over to the branch we were at (there are two branches of Honey Nail). 

The shop

Receipt

Our pretty nails!

My gelish medicure even up until today (4 weeks since) is still lasting and pretty. The top two in the above photos are mine and the bottom two is LY's and it was LY's first time trying nail art and she loved it! My gelish medicure and colourful pedicure only cost me 330,000VND (~SGD$20)!!! So cost-worthy that I think if I lived in HCM, I would probably visit every other week to pamper myself. 

For more of their pretty nail artwork, follow them on instagram at @thihoneynail. 

Honey Nail

(1) 46/2/10 vườn chuối, P.4, Q.3 và 

(2)150 Lê Quang Định.P14.BT, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Opening Hours: 9am - 8.30pm daily

The lady boss of Honey Nails was really friendly and she even recommended us to Ngon 138 restaurant for meals so that became our lunch destination! We were trying to cross opposite the road to get to the restaurant when a police officer helped us to stop the vehicles and guided us across the road... 

We had a sumptuous meal as you can see from the beautiful pictures above. Apparently this is not the best place for Vietnamese food, but the good thing is that they have a wide variety of Vietnaese food so at least we got to try other Vietnamese food besides PHO!!!

Ngon 138 Restaurant 
138 Nam Kỳ Khởi Nghĩa,
Bến Nghé, Quận 1,
Ho Chi Minh City
Vietnam

Opening hours:
7am - 10pm

Wifi available: Yes, simply ask for password
Clean Toilet: Yes

We saw that the rain was invading soon, so we walked quickly to the War Remnants Museum, which was just a 10 mins walk from our restaurant.

Entrance Tickets

There were two levels of very organised exhibition of the history behind the Vietnam War. It was an informative museum and the photos exhibited made it feel as if we were right there during the war times. The section that caught me the most was the Agent Orange segment, whereby the Agent Orange was disseminate into Vietnam and not only people during the war times were affected, the chemical had side effects and even generations today have been affected. From the exhibition, you can truly feel the cruelty of war, the peace that we have now was paid with a high price by numerous countless heroic lives.

It would be recommended to visit the War Remnants Museum before going for the Chu Chi Tunnels.

War Remnants Museum
28 Võ Văn Tần,
phường 6, Quận 3,
Hồ Chí Minh, Vietnam

Opening hours:
7:30 am to noon & 1:30 pm to 5:00 pm (daily)

Entrance fee:
15,000VND (~SGD$0.90)

After going through the history of Vietnam, we walked towards the Golden Dragon Water Puppet Theatre and bought our tickets for the 5pm show. And since it was still early, we decided to chill by the cafe beside the theatre, mainly to make use of the wifi available.

Cafe beside theatre

Our drinks

Theatre entrance

Our show tickets

Water Puppet Show

The show was interesting, but I didn't quite understand the show, but many people reviewed it to be a good show to watch. The show cost 160,000VND (~SGD$10) each pax.

For more information, check out their website at: http://www.goldendragonwaterpuppet.com/

Golden Dragon Water Puppet Theatre
55B Nguyen Thi Minh Khai St.
Dist. 1, Ho Chi Minh City

Show times: 5 PM , 6:30 PM, 7:45PM
- 50 minutes show with no intermission

When we came out of the show when it ended around 6pm, the sky was already all dark and the streets were filled with even more motorbikes and it became even more challenging for us to even be on the streets. Onto a taxi we hopped and we went to an eatery famous for Banh Mi (otherwise known as their Vietnamese Baguette).

Bánh Mì Huỳnh Hoa
26 Lê Thị Riêng,
Bến Thành, 1,
Hồ Chí Minh,
Vietnam

Opening hours: 3.30pm - midnight

We packed a baguette each (costing 30,000VND, ~SGD$1.80) and also some other food we found along the street before hopping on the taxi and heading back to our hotel.

Before dinner began, we went opposite to Cafe Benne to grab a cup of my Sweet Potato Latte as well as change money at a money changer nearby. They were right when they said that the exchange rates are so much better in HCM then in Singapore. I had already gone to my favourite money changer in Chinatown in Singapore (known for their good rates) and yet the one we went to in HCM was still able to beat that.

Money Changer

The money changer is right opposite Sheraton so it should not be difficult to spot.

And finally after all the errands were done, we finally had time for dinner!

Our dinner, see if you can spot the baguette

My Sweet Potato Latte for Day 2

The baguette

Deliciously Filled

LY and I were busy talking and we started our dinner pretty late, and even though it was hours after we ate the baguette from when it was made, the baguette still tasted heavenly nice!!! The one taste that I can't forget from this trip has got to be this. From understanding, this is also the most expensive Vietnamese Baguette you can find in HCM, though it is just SGD$1.80 but to the locals, this is actually quite a luxurious one.

That was our interesting Day 2 in Saigon!!!