Saigon

Motorbike Madness!

If I take away only one thing from Saigon it will be the masses of motorbikes cruising the streets. With no exaggeration I can say that crossing a busy street required dodging hundreds of motorbikes. There are three common strategies to crossing a street in Saigon. The first one is to cross it as you would in the states, wait until there is a gap in the bikes and then move quickly across. This technique ends with a splat, some curse words being yelled in at least 3 languages and then everyone going about their business with several bruises and no love for the other party. There are just too many motorbikes and they are almost always coming from at least 3 directions. The second technique, which luckily we had already had some experience with, is a little more successful and a little more scary. This strategy involves waiting until there is a solid stream of motorbikes, this ensures that the motorbikes are not speeding and can definitely see you. You then step out and walk as slowly as you can, half walking, half dodging, half spinning your way through the blurs of bikes whizzing past you. The odds of success using this strategy can be greatly improved upon by employing a human shield or carrying out "operation human shield" as I like to call it. this involves walking directly next to a local in the hopes that if there is a collision that they will take the hit and you can go merrily on your way. There are further wrinkles to using the human shield which are basically adding more and more shields in every direction. 

The 3rd technique which would have become a personal favorite had I stayed longer is to just basically close your eyes and walk across in a straight line. No changing speeds, no changing direction. Just be confident and make it happen. Whats that saying? "out of sight out of mind" I feel like this was probably written by someone who had perfected technique no. 3. and wanted to share their advice with the world.

Saigon had plenty more to offer than just the street crossing adventures. It had lots and lots of food. Ryan and I had read about a Brazilian steakhouse a few weeks before and I think saliva had been slowly building in my mouth since. For those of you that don't know, a Brazilian steakhouse is an all you can eat affair where the waiters (gauchos I think) walk around with skewered meats and shave them onto your plate. You are provided with a two sided disk, one side is green, one is red. Just like back home green means go and red means stop. Our disk was green for a solid hour. 4.5 pounds of delicious meats later I was unbuttoning my pants (they are already elastic) so that my stomach could breathe. The food included bacon wrapped shrimp, two different types of fillet, lamb, chicken, sausage and more. They also had salad and fruits. This feast was followed the next day (we skipped breakfast) by a double dose of kebab sandwiches. This is meat that is slowly turning on a spit, shaved onto a pita or kebab bread (I don't know the name) and topped with a yogurt sauce. Its not even close to Vietnamese but its very very good. Not only did Saigon have great foreign foods, they also served up some delicious Vietnamese dishes. Two of the classics that we enjoyed in the city were Pho and Bahn Mi which are a beef noodle dish and a baguette stuffed with local meats, sauces and veggies.

Saigon is definitely a city worth checking out. Even without the food and the crazy streets I would have had a great time. I have realized some cities are just easy to like and Saigon is one of them.

Hope everyone in Lexington gets a chance to enjoy the World Equestrian Games (WEG) which start this week. Miss and love everyone. 

Kyle

A few images below sort of help to illustrate what I talked about but don't do it full justice.