Cholon

Without wanting to sound like a cliched magazine article, District 5 has a real mix of old, quite old and not old at all. It is true that the 'daily hustle and bustle' exists. For those who know the Chinese, their entrepreneurship within the family is visually obvious as every building is selling something, and inside behind the fluttering flags or bags of rice there's a bank, a clinic, an insurance company or a dentist in operation. Here you can see row after row of open fronted buildings below small apartments.

For the really old stuff, pagodas are the thing. Towards the beginning of Nguyen Trai St (no 802) is Ha Chuong Hai Quan, a 200 year old temple. It's under renovation at the moment.

Number 12 Lao Tu is where you'll find Quan Am, since 1816. It is the home of the Goddess of Mercy. Three adjectives I find noted down in my exercise book are 'decorative', 'active' and 'colorful'. From the outside....

Stepping inside, a large alter dominates the main hall. Step through to the rear of the building and numerous shrines line the walls. Here are some pics from this temple Quan Am, also know as Chua On Lang.

Across the street sits a garden with some lovely fountains......

And some obviously lethal water......

This next one is called Ong Bon. Quiet, with a large concrete courtyard out front.

Perhaps someone could explain to me the relevance of all the little tortoises in the enclosure around the back. Living below this Chinese mural depicting ancient shenanigans, I haven't had the will nor inclination to find out the reason for the little shelled reptiles.

Now to the not so old stuff in D5, An Dong market built in the early 1990's, looks like a Russian train station (in my imagination, never been to Russia).

Now it's on to the very new, Huong Vuong plaza, opened in June 2007.

To cut a long story short, it's got to be the flashiest department store in Ho Chi Minh City to date. There's a modern Singapore style food court on the 4th floor and Vietnam's first California WOW gymnasium, as well as all the fashion labels and brands you'll find in Diamond. Posh stuff, posh prices, but looks good. Seems to be the first place EVER in Vietnam that has been designed with the concept that people need SPACE - nothing more stressful than elbowing your way through a crowd just to get to a bargin bin of undercrackers.