Good Morning Vietnam!

I have arrived safely in Vietnam! It took somewhere in the ballpark of 36 hours of travel to get here but I have arrived and am very well (after adjusting to the 12 hour time change that is).

Right now we are in Saigon (offically renamed Ho Chi Minh City after 1975 when the North Vietnamese Communists captured the city.) Because our trip is based mostly on the American War here, today we visited the Independence Palace that was the home of the South Vietnamese Government until it fell in 75 when the Communists crashed through the front gate with tanks. We then visited the "War Remnants Museum." Coming from a liberal, Western Democracy made this propoganda-filled museum a little tough to swallow (the first section entitled "War Crimes of the Occupation - meaning the Americans) but I guess its all part of learning the culture.

Today we also ate Pho, a traditional dish consisting mostly of broth, rice noodles, vegetables and chicken. It was amazing! We also rode in a bicycle "ricket" which is a bicycle with a cart on the front of it for passengers. I'm pretty sure we got ripped off, as we paid 100,000 Dong (around $5) but its ok, because it was a great experience.

The traffic here is crazy and I've already almost been hit by a scooter (by far the most popular form of transportation) a car and a truck, but pedestrians wandering into the streets is a common thing, and the drivers, crazy as they may be, are pretty alert.

I think I'm sunburned already, despite my 45 SPF, and its as hot and humid as I expected it to be, but so far the novelty of a completely different culture, political system and being halfway around the world has me captivated. Unfortunately I forgot my cable to upload any pictures today, but hopefully soon I'll try to get some. Tonight we're off to eat at a nice French resturaunt (the French were the original colonizers of Vietnam, so some of their culture remains) and then in the morning we're getting on another plane and heading North to Hanoi!

Feel free to make some comments on here, I don't have a whole lot of access to internet, but would love to hear from you!