3 Tage Ho-Chi-Minh-City (HCMC)

We spent a total of three days in HCMC, Vietnam's largest city with around 10 million inhabitants, and - apart from the bus routes - we found our way around very well. Unlike other tonal languages, Vietnamese no longer uses written characters, but rather the Latin alphabet with various accents to indicate tonality. This means that you can at least read the words (but have no idea how to pronounce them correctly).

From the middle of the 19th century, Vietnam was under French colonial rule for almost 100 years. Churches were built in Vietnam so that the French colonists could go to church despite Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism being more widespread at the time. And in HCMC, a cathedral was actually called Notre-Dame of Saigon (unfortunately, it is currently (since 2017) completely covered in scaffolding for renovation purposes).

Instead, we were able to see the Jade Emperor Pagoda. Of course, it has its own scooter parking area, as there are residential buildings all around it.

Otherwise, HCMC has a botanical garden with an attached zoo, but unfortunately it is far from European standards when it comes to animal husbandry. The large Binh Tay market was originally set up by the French in a Chinese-style building. In terms of textiles, it is comparable to the Dong Xuan Center in Leipzig, but the food is in a different league. And the Historical Museum exhibits, among other things, a coin of Marcus Aurelius that was found in Vietnam.

On our last day in HCMC, the monsoon rain finally brought some cooling.