Pre-trip jitters

I woke up after a bit of a lie-in this morning with a slight twinge of fear - today is the day the tour starts! What if they don't like me? What if I don't like them? What if they're all a bunch of 18 year old toss-pots? How will I ever survive?

But first, more important things. Breakfast, check out of hotel, negotiate traffic and taxi touts, and check in to new hotel. So I loaded up my pack horse (aka me) and set off.

The new hotel is very lovely, much more upmarket than I had been paying (but then it would want to be, for the the price). After I settled in, I gathered up my stuff for the day and headed off. I knew that I needed to be back for the group meeting at 6pm. I set off with the intention of seeing the Ben Thanh market, the War Remnants museum, and if time, the Reunification Palace. I did however get somewhat side tracked as I headed to the Ben Thanh markets and ended up spending perhaps a bit longer than I had intended at this stage. It was complete and utter madhouse. Packed to the rafters with silk stalls, cloth stalls, souvenir stalls and general tat, hand bags, luggage - and that was just the textiles section. Then you had all the smelly food with all the kamikaze butchers. The smell was astonishing. I ended up purchasing a backpack, as mine has been breaking for some time now. It's a north face one, and hopefully, judging from the price I paid for it, real. The lady was happy enough to move on price for the fake ones but wouldn't budge on this one - so I guess thats proof. I was probably ripped off though. Personally I hate bargaining, as if anyone is going to be ripped off, it's going to be me. The secret to bargaining is to pick a price in your head that you would be happy to pay, and then realize you're probably not going to get it - so decide if you really want the item, or the price - if you really want the item, you won't mind if the price is a whisker more than you want - if it's the price you're after, walk away. If they're losing money they won't come after you. And the final thing, there will always be someone who got a better deal, so don't talk about it afterwards - realize that you will always pay more because you are Western, and that even if you feel you got "ripped off", you wouldn't have got it any cheaper at home, right? So shut up and be happy. After this I headed up towards the War Remnants museum but decided to visit a pagoda before hand. En route I encountered the strangest little woman. She wanted to know where I was from - I got the distinct impression though that it wouldn't matter where I said - it would be what she wanted to hear. I told her Australia and she started on about some aunt of hers who is moving there, and could she talk with me about it, and get advice for her aunt and so on. She wanted to meet up the next day when I said I didn't have any time today - I told her I would have to see if my friends were free at that time but she insisted on making arrangements. I felt bad as I knew I wouldn't be keeping them - but what can you do? It was all just a bit too surreal. By this point though the day was getting away and I still hadn't been to the War Remnants museum, or even the pagoda I was looking for. I eventually found the pagoda after dragging my sweaty self down the smelliest street in Ho Chi Minh (I renamed it "Urine St", it smelled so bad) - and when i got there you couldn't go in anyway, so what was the point of that?! When I then arrived at the War Remnants museum I was most upset to see that it was closing in 30 minutes - most of the museums do in the middle of the day - so it was off to Gloria Jeans (nearly dying in the traffic en route) for a coffee and cake pick me up, then a quick walk around to see Notre Dame cathedral (complete with random singers out the front - not even Christmas carols, just some strange Vietnamese songs) and then a visit to the ornate interior of the Post Office, which was very beautiful. By then both the Reunification Palace and the War Museum had reopened, so I started off at the palace. This place is exactly as it was in 1975 - they haven't changed a single thing. It was very interesting though, if not terribly hot inside. I got on a free English tour which was good. Then it was off to the War Remnants museum. This was an entirely different kettle of fish. It left me feeling quite sick afterwards, seeing the jars of deformed fetuses in formaldehyde (victims of agent orange), the photos and instruments of torture, pictures of war victims, war scenes and generally the whole unpleasantness that was the Vietnam War (or as the Vietnamese like to say, the American war). Just senseless. After this sobering encounter I made my way back to the hotel to prepare for the tour meeting, feeling very trepidatious..,