Monday, November 30, 2009

Arborist Vina style


We have a construction site across the road from work and it was interesting to watch this bloke cut down a tree with an axe. It was not that he was barefoot, wearing no harness or any other safety gear, but that for the most part other workers were not standing under the tree and endangering themselves. An oddity

Sunday, November 29, 2009

Friday, November 27, 2009

New Mekong highway


I travel down to the mekong delta regularly and the current road is ridiculously over crowded and congested. It is expected that the new highway will change this as there wont be many on/off ramps. A bigger bonus is that they are planning to not allow vendors on the side of the road either, which will probably make the most difference

Thursday, November 26, 2009

Live mollusks


I love Asian restaurants were the seafood is live and you choose your seafood directly. Everyone wins

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Thin hotels


With the rise in popularity of the mini hotel you can see many examples where there are only two rooms per floor (at front and back) and the lift and staircase in the middle. Le Thanh Ton st is full of them

Sunday, November 22, 2009

Awaiting collection


One of the things I really like here is the delivery of decent food to your door, in fact there is not one outlet I know of that does not deliver. However the cheapest (and possibly tastiest) are noodle dishes that turn up hot, cost around a $1 and then you just leave the bowl outside for the vendor to collect later. Easy

Saturday, November 21, 2009

New Zealand Natural Ice Cream


This is my kind of advertising, so woeful it makes you laugh out loud. Especially the putz on the left sitting on a watermelon, is that even a flavour?

Friday, November 20, 2009

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Monday, November 16, 2009

Saturday, November 14, 2009

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Saigon Paragon


Built in the swamps of District 7, the Saigon Paragon shopping mall (centre) takes up space between the Saigon Exhibition and Convention Centre (left) and the Lawrence S Ting building (right). The top end shopping mall is aimed at the burgeoning market of Phu My Hung but on the day I went inside there was not another soul to be seen.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

More glass windows






















Another view of yesterdays building showing a the windows tint in a different shade of green

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Sunday, November 08, 2009

Specializing in boats, plant, motorcycle and mickey mouse


I love these type of stores that sell seemingly unrelated goods. I would love to know how they decided on each

Saturday, November 07, 2009

Working at height


It is good to see safety improving on construction sites here. Of the 20 odd workers in this photo, only one is not wearing a hard hat. Although those in the know will probably point to the fact most of them will be wearing some form of plastic open-toed footwear

Friday, November 06, 2009

Thursday, November 05, 2009

District 7 and Phu My Hung


The new urban developments such as Phu My Hung in District 7 make HCMC look so organised from the air. Canals, green space, wide roads - its enough to make you want to live there, as opposed to somewhere down in here

Wednesday, November 04, 2009

Tuesday, November 03, 2009

Halloween in Saigon






















There are parts of Saigon that go to extraordinary lengths for Halloween. Our kids went trick or treating on Saturday night and came across a few houses where people had set up more than just pumpkins and lanterns. These guys had trucked a graveyard and smoke machine all the way from the US. Impressive dedication

Monday, November 02, 2009

November Monthly Theme Day - Doorways






















A day late as we did not have any access to the internet over the weekend. This is a photo of a gate to a rather large house around the corner from us.
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