Vietnam trip (Day 4)

9 June 2014 (I don't know what happened to the date of posting when I upload the pics in Malaysia T^T )
Ho Chi Minh City

Independence Palace + Hard Rock Cafe + Fine Arts Museum + Thien Hau Temple + Phuong Nam Lacquerware + Russian market

You may see our tour seems a little more flexible as we book our own private tour so it would be more easy and more free style for us.

Not much pictures this time. Would upload it when I'm back to Malaysia as I could only upload the photos from the camera. A bit of Malaysia's type of speaking English with larhhh(s) and bahh(s) etcetera. 

We woke up at around 7:00 am and then after awhile of lazy-ing around. We went down for breakfast. I finally had the intention of eating the jelly there, it looks like Malaysia's agar-agar. The reason why I usually don't have the intention in having it is that I'm afraid it taste too jelly. But when I tried it, it tasted delicious. Like they put passion fruit and dragon fruit in it and its sweet (not that sweet larhh, just right !) but when I went back the second time, there's no more left there. So again I had some sushi(s). Oh and this time I didn't toast the bread two times for my melted cheese. I just straight use fresh bread and put cheese in it and I toast it, however the cheese doesn't really melt finish. So yeahh, it taste very solid cheese like plastic ? I think maybe should straight melt it next time then toasting it.

So after eating, we start our tour ! First of all, we went to the Independence Palace. 

This palace was rebuilt in the 1962 as the original one was destroyed. So the new one was better larhh as it is bulletproof etcetera. Vietnamese culture is almost alike to Chinese one. Like they believe in Fengshui and Yin and Yang. Yin represents ladies which is also moon which is also white which is also right which is also deep. While Yang represents men which is also sun which is also red which is also left which is also high. ETC LARHHH. That's why their ladies toilet is usually only the right side while men's are on the left. Interesting sia. They also believe that 5, 9, 13, 17, 21, 25 etc is a good number, as long as you add 4 after 5. Why five ? Because they believe in the circle of life. It's like number 1, you were born, number 2, you grew up, number 3, you turned old, number 3, you passed away and finally number 5, you go through the process of recarnation. They think that like 12, 16, 20 etc doesn't brings good luck and it would bring bad luck. So they would count their staircase's steps and make sure it's those lucky number. If it's not, they would either cut the few steps into half to make it into the number they like, although it may look uneven but they believe the number is lucky. 

The tour guide even told us that his friend's new house (like around 1 year +) staircase has only 20 steps. So he asked his friend whether is there anything that happened to him since he moved in. Then he said no. Then when he asked about his family, he said his dad passed away 3 months after they moved in. He said his father doesn't have any sickness and he was strong but don't know why, he just passed away suddenly. 

You may be wondering why don't all the Vietnam house's staircase be built in a way that all the houses own the lucky number. Well, the tour guide told us that rumors said that the builders would actually build the houses in a way that every 3 - 4 houses would have one houses that owns the unlucky number as the unlucky house could give the other 3 - 4 houses their luck. Quite a special culture ehh.

Furthermore, they also believe that dragons with 2 eyes represents the king, dragons without any eyes are normal citizen. The king dragon actually have 5 fingers while the prince have 4 fingers and finally the citizen dragon have 3 fingers. 

Some beliefs here and there. Vietnamese also take turtle, unicorn, dragon and phoenix are their 4 holy animals. That's why last time they would get 4 big turtles and put those carpet, and even mattress on them and take them as their bed stand or those carpet supporter (I don't what it's called). Of course the big type of turtle larh. BUT STILL TORTURING SIAA. So heavy like that, some more the turtles won't get squashed to death. They couldn't get freedom at all sia, it's like they would support the thing till their death. Furthermore, I couldn't understand why they take it as a holy animal but don't feed them. LIKE SERIOUS TORTURE SIA. So the turtles would always open their mouth waiting those flies to enter their mouth so they could eat. How could they do so to them ? T^T Luckily they don't do it now anymore. 

Okay back to the palace topic, we spent the whole morning there. Going here and there. Honestly the palace here in Vietmam is better than the one in Malaysia. But the one in Malaysia got air cond larhh ahahaha. Even Thailand one also cannot fight. You may think Malaysia's palace is better, but I don't think so lurhh because orhh the one in Malaysia expensive only, it's make of good etc but Vietnam's palace have more facilities like they have their theatre and projector room. They even have an underground basement that there is some pathway still not yet discovered by the local as the person who planned this already passed away before it is fully built so yeahh, no one knows how the underground basement works. As some of the people believe that there is a secret passage for the kind to come out from the other side when some one came and fight in the palace. But some believe that it is only planned only, it isn't built. So no one knows larhh. 

Ho Chi Minh statue (replica). The right flag at the back is Vietnam's national flag while the left one their local communist flag which is make up of a sickle which represents the farmer and an axe which represents the worker

Our tour guide 

I find this cute and yes it's not real elephant's foot, I'm not that cruel in liking those stuff that has something to do with animal cruelty

Oh yeah, we saw this amazing people together making some words on the field outside the Indepence Palace building so I took a pic of it as it's really quite rare to see it now HAHAHAHA 

I was at the rooftop (half open concept) of the building. TL4 sia, wonder what it stands for ? xD

Enough of palace talking. So after it, we went to the Hard Rock Cafe. We didn't spent much time there. As the Hard Rock Cafe in Ho Chi Minh City have only their shop and the restaurant, there isn't a hotel. Therefore, we just went there to take some pictures and shop awhile.

Cute teddy bears that wear hoodies

After that, we went for lunch ! We ate at Lemongrass restaurant. So I ordered sweet and sour sea bass fish soup. And I add on rice larhh. The taste is quite special and it's nice. It's a local dish and I like the taste of the soup, really sweet and sourish taste in a good way.

After lunch, we went to the Fine Arts Museum. It's kinda surprising to the tour guide that we want to go there because he himself had only go there 3 times as there is like almost 0 tourist that wants to visit that place. As people who usually come to Ho Chi Minh City around 3 - 4 days, so that's why we are the considered in the less tourist group that comes for 5 days 4 nights and are even considered the 1 % for tourists that wants to of to the Art Museum. I think my dad wants to go and relax gua ? So we went there. And the good thing there is you could snap the pictures of the art sculpture, paintings etcetera. I must admit I love paintings and all those art sculpture a lot. I don't know why larhh, I think it's interesting to look at them one by one and to think of the character of that particular painting or art sculpture and to also see how the color contrast and the way the thing is present. That's the beauty of art. It's like you could see everything in that piece of art. His character, feelings, personality, moods and all these. I just like to see all this. Especially paintings and art sculpture larhh I must say, those antique pots, vase etc isn't really my style. But those funny and unique art sculptures are my favourite, while as for paintings, I like those painting with the cultures of the particular country or those random beautiful people doing something random or those un-understandable arts or those scenery with simple trees or something else. 

So I actually took a lot of pictures in there until I noticed the memory is already full. Oopssss, so I ended up deleting those I don't really like for the sake of saving more memories for other places :/

A painting that expresses the feeling of the situation during the war

Art sculpture of 6 people

Unique teapot

Cute looking art sculpture, it looks like a robot ( ^ω^ )

An art sculpture full of feelings about the starve that the citizens faced during the war

What I see is there is 3 people in this family. A dad, a mum and a baby

After visiting the Art Museum, we went to 天后宫, they call it Thien Hau Temple which is Malaysia's version of Tian Hou Gong. The locals call it Thien Hau Tu and it could also be called as Thien Hau Pagoda which is actually a Chinese temple located in China town of Vietnam. We didn't went shopping in China town as the stuffs there are sold in wholesale way. 

We didnt spent much time in Thien Hau Tu as most of us are Christians. But my dad ain't, so he asked for blessings for our family by donating 1 USD to get a kind of smoking conicals incense coils and you actually write your name (my dad's only then) on a red piece of paper (they provide) and you write the date on too. So you hang it on a kind of smoking conicals incense coils (that you later burn it) and finally you hang it infront of the main temple. 

The huge smoking conicals incense coils on the middle right is the one my dad hung

After it, we went to Phuong Nam Lacquerware. It's a place where you can see them making paintings out of egg shells and lacquer. Quite interesting and I must admit it needs a lot of patience as it needs about 3 months for those waiting here and there larhh, so they usually one short make a lot de. 

After that, we went to Russian market, nothing much extraordinary there. Just an ordinary shopping centre, we requested to go there as we thought it would be like Ben Thanh market. But it turns out no. So forget about it larhh. 

Then we went back to the hotel to have a rest for 2 hours.

After our not really nap time (I was typing this blog till the paragraph above), we planned to go for dinner at 7:00 pm. So we actually asked the tour information of our hotel for nice food nearby that is within walking distance. She actually recommend us to eat Lemongrass HAHAHAHA, then we told her we already had our lunch there. And finally she recommend us to eat at Restaurant Ngon 138. I must admit it is a really scary way walking over there. It's definitely not really safe as the nearby street lights were burnt off or something but there is no lights on on that few particular streets. And it's kinda late already, around 8:00 pm ++ Malaysia time. I'm starving and on the way there, there is 2 barbecue restaurant that smells so good and is actually fully packed. So I'm kinda jealous and I'm starting to beg my dad that we could eat there. It's a 20 minutes walk (the girl just that actually estimated that we would use 10 minutes only), after walking and stopping and looking at the map. We finally did reach there ! (´∀｀=) 

The restaurant here is very special, it really makes me feel surprised as they have two floors. And the middle part of the lower floor is for the chef to cook. They actually cook open air. I first thought it's a buffet meal HAHAHAHA yeapp those kind of concept, very neatly organized into a few stations. Like a station of fried stuff, another for noodles etcetera. You could actually go and observe how they cook but you know I don't know it as I'm at the upper floor waiting for food. After considering for a long time on what to eat, I finally choose to try 'Fresh Vermicelli with Fish and Dill'. I wasn't sure on what's vermicelli and dill, this two words. But the picture on the menu looks quite special so after asking the waitress what's both the two terms (I shall call it). They told me that vermicelli is their kind of noodles and dill is their Vietnamese vege. I guess it's okay with me then HAHAHAHA. 

So this is it. The soup taste really nice, a little sourish type, like laksa but it's not spicy. And the noodle aka vermicelli is so delicious and slippery, just like laksa noodles. SUPER LIKE IT. Furthermore, the fish doesn't smells although it looks like it will. The vege was okay, raw type, just like those any other. But the fishballs. Oh my, so freaking nice. I must say I don't like fishballs at all, but this, I could eat it everyday. I FREAKING RATE THIS AS THE BEST VIETNAM DISH I HAVE EVER TRIED IN MY WHOLE LIFE. 

After that, we walked back home. 

I just bathe, and I don't know why, I put the temperature in between hot and cold (like what I did usually). And the moment I step into the bathtub, I find it cold, only that second, but when it comes to my senses, true senses, wheww, super hot sia. Like I'm dancing naked in the bathroom just now HAHAHAHA (of course with no audience larhh, siao merhh, I'm not that open siol). It's as hot as those sizzling claypot noodle ya know ? the temperature of the soup inside :/ Okayy so I'm like letting the water flow with a cold water and the water draining out for around 15 minutes, like seriously I kept on checking continuously but on the 15 minute only I find myself comfortably warm in the bathtub. LIKE SERIOUSY I WOULD TURN INTO A ROASTED CHICKEN IF I PUT THE TEMPERATURE TO THE MAXIMUM ONE.