Second day in Ho Chi Mihn City

On my second full day here in Vietnam, I've figured out what it smells like. FINALLY- and it is something that most everyone can relate to.
You know when you go swimming- say at a public pool, and you bring a plastic bag to put your wet clothes in? Naturally you forget to air that bag of wetness out when you get home, and it sits somewhere in your room- until a week later when you stumble across it.
When you open the bag, you get that warm wet clothes-that have been festering in their own moisture- smell. Bingo!- that's what Vietnam smells like. Its not overly terrible, but aggressive enough to make you feel super grungy after a day walking around. To make matters worse, there seems to be garbage everywhere- which smells awful.
Ho Chi Mihn city actually reminds me a bit of 31 hales (my old Guelph house shared with Alex and Steve) the day I 'moved in'.
I distinctively remember asking Alex if the house was clean- because Christina was subletting from me that summer, and I couldn't have it looking like a mess. He gave me a resounding 'yes!- I cleaned it myself'.
I remember walking into the house and feeling completely hopeless. With mom in the car- I couldn't bare her see the place I was going to live. It was filthy!
The most humorous part about things was that Alex  had attempted to clean up. In fact- he swept. His problem was however, that he didn't have a dust pan... So there were piles of dustbunnies and floor sweepings in all the corners of the house.
Well- Vietnam has this problem too. People attempt to clean the streets and make things look nice, but rather then finishing the job (much like Alex)- they leave their (in this case) piles of garbage in random places along the sidewalks, streets, and outside their houses.
It is almost as though people here do not have pride in the beauty that surrounds them. Visual appearance of anything (buildings, clothing, homes) doesn't seem to be a factor in their day-to-day lives.
They to have beautiful parks though!

The filth factor (FF)  is something I just can't get used to. I feel as though everything I touch is dirty. There is a definitely a 'getting used to things' phase- and I'm not quite there yet.
One thing in particular struck me as odd. I find it so gross- and I know that Mom would agree with me here. In fact every time I see this, I think of her and wonder what her facial expression would be.
Steve doesn't find it that weird... So maybe its just me.
It seems the locals eat and drink everything out of plastics bags- sealed with elastic bands.
Picture the stereotypical goldfish bag, but rather then clean water and a cute orange fish- imagine boiled water, with mushrooms, bok choy, and some type of meat jammed in there all day, until it makes a yellowish type of water colour. Filled right to the brim and tied off with an elastic. After the bag has been baking in the sun all day, then imagine taking it, sucking out the water, and then opening the bag to eat what's inside. Bleck!
I just can't get over how gross it looks. People carry around hundreds of these bags, and sell them on the streets. They hang off the little vendor carts. Its something I will not be purchasing while I'm here.

I've really given Vietnam a bag rep as of now- and that really isn't fair. Overlooking the incessant beeping, rooster coockledoodledooing, dog barking, and filth- there are still some really nice things about this place.
As I mentioned before, the parks are breathtaking. Because it is so hot and humid here, as because it rains so often all the vegetation has a chance to grow to unbelievable heights. The trees here are massive, and each of their leaves are the size of my head. Plus they have flowers galore here. Every colour.
Ho Chi Mihn city does have a lot to offer, and Steve and I have been touring around a lot (by foot- we dare not attempt to ride a scooter in the city!).
Today we went to see the War Museum, Notre Dame Cathedral, the post office, and the reunification palace.
The war museum was very hard to take in. We knew going in that there was going to be some very heavy material to both see and read about. It was worse then we had imagined though. In particular all the information about agent orange was the most bothersome. In the museum they even had real fermented fetuses and babies on display. I couldn't really handle most of it. I was thanking Darwin that Tash wasn't with me. She would have been a heap on the floor.
From there we went to the Notre Dame cathedral. You couldn't actually go inside. But it was beautiful to see. It seemed so out of place though. As if a church from Europe had just been plunked down in the middle of Ho Chi Mihn city. Strange.
Right across the street (and don't forget each street is a near death experience and takes up 15 minutes to cross), was the post office. This is the most huge post office I've ever seen- and it is gorgeous. It looks like a palace from the outside. Inside there are a million booths with people busily working.
The reunification palace was big too- but it was much more modern when compared to the three other venues I had mentioned. Here we weren't allowed to touch anything, and we weren't even really allowed to talk much. It was interesting to see where, historically, many political decisions regarding Vietnam were made.
It was a sweltering 46 degrees on our walk back to our hotel- and our feet were about to fall off. Considering the night before we fell asleep at five and forgot about dinner all together, we vowed we'd make it out tonight.
We ended up going to a little vegetarian place just ten minutes up the street.
To be honest- the food wasn't really that good. We haven't been all that impressed by the Vietnamese cuisine- but hopefully that will change soon.