In my last post we were in Nha Trang and preparing to leave for HCMC. On our last day in Nha Trang we hung out and saw the Po Nagar Tower. This tower was built between the 7th and 12th century and is named for a goddess of local origin who is said to have created the earth, eaglewood, and rice. The temple was built during the Hindu period of Champa; the image of the goddess takes the form of Uma, wife of Siva. From there we took an overnight train to Ho Chi Minh City. It was SO much better than the bus! We had a room with four beds in it and even though I didn't have a great sleep, it wasn't interrupted by random stops in the middle of the night, and I at least didn't have to put scented lip balm under my nose to lessen the severity of the stench of urine coming from the toilet. After an adventure to find our hotel, which is in a side alley off a side alley, we scoped out an amazing bakery right across the street from our hotel (so much for healthy eating...this place is a goldmine of delicious baked treats!) and checked out the Ben Thanh market, which is pretty huge! We walked away with some random stuff. I bought a cheezy souvenir shirt and a super cute purse. We also checked out a culinary festival, tried some treats and walked around HCMC.
Nevermind NYC; HCMC is the place to be for NYE! The city is beautiful decorated with flower lights on a lot of the streets; the main street has light decorations everywhere. We take it as a good sign of the year to come that 2012 is the year of the dragon for Chinese New Year and we are in Vietnam where the dragon is a huge part of architecture, symbolism and culture. To Vietnamese people, the dragon brings rain, essential for agriculture. It represents the emperor, the prosperity and power of the nation. The Vietnamese dragon is the symbol of yang, representing the universe, life, existence, and growth.
We had a bit of an adventure trying to find the pagodas (and trying to find someone to speak enough English to direct us to see the pagodas!), but we found them. They were beautiful! Everywhere, but especially the roofs, are amazing. Figures and dragons are carved everywhere and like snowflakes, no two pagodas are the same. You could spend hours just describing the amount of detail in the carvings. From there we met up for lunch with my good friend Rheanne from my grad school days. We even found an American cupcake store. Yes, I may be going to hell after all of the junk food that I have eaten on this trip. It is a new year tomorrow though and I know it's just a matter of time before I am back to eating healthy when I get home.
Tonight we are all meeting up for dinner and likely a club after. It's going to be a rough morning tomorrow as we leave for Thailand really early but it'll be worth it to spend a great evening with friends to welcome in the new year before heading off for the final leg of our journey.
We wish you an amazing end to 2011 and hope that 2012 brings you everything that you asked for, and more! :)






From top (left to right): My Son temple in Hoi An; Po Nagar temple in Nha Trang; Yosha with a great view of Nha Trang in the background; our "room" in the train (it's no Hogwarts train but it's about as close as you can get I reckon!); the countdown to the new year in HCMC - if you look closely, you can see two bright dots in Vietnam. I imagine those are for Hanoi and HCMC; me near a hokey New Year sign; Yosha with the beautiful lights on the street; me having my absolute favourite meal: Vietnamese sandwich on the street! For all the French did a lot of awful things to the Vietnamese, the one good thing that they brought was absolutely amazing crusty bread!