I know a post is overdue but Phu Quoc is too close to my heart to be written about at the moment.
Here are the pictures though.. hundreds of them. Just for the sake of a memory and a date entry.
http://picasaweb.google.com/Pulkit.Vasudha/PhuQuoc
I had two days off.. believe it or not.. it was my first two days off in a row since I started working at ILA. So we took off to Vung Tau, a small seaside town about 125 km from Saigon.
We’d heard the hydrofoil was the romantic way to head to Vung Tau, so we headed to the riverside early Thursday morning, hoping to catch the next hydrofoil.. apparently they run every hour. Well, our xe om drivers dropped us off at Greenlines Hydrofoil kiosk and we found out that one boat had just left and the next one would leave two hours from now, i.e. around 12.30. We guessed there would be other hydrofoil companies along the riverside, but the heat and humidity of Saigon does not really support adventure. We bought two tix for 12.30 and headed into downtown (along the river).
The Saigon downtown is huge.. it spans at least 2-3 square kms. There are an endless number of shops, restaurants, souvenir stores, salons and street-sellers. P and I have been to downtown several times since January, when we moved to Saigon, but we still found a few new streets to explore in the two hours we had. Read More…
…women dare to walk about in dirty, stinking feet.
Vietnam is a country of salon services. Manicures and pedicures can cost as little as 10,000 dong (or 50 cents) each, feet cleaning costs about 60,000 dong ($3), hair cuts cost 40,000 dong ($2), and getting your nails done (which is a mani/pedi plus painting the nails with intricate designs) costs 25,000 dong ($1.25). Sure, these are your basic, hole-in-the-wall salon rates, but the services offered are at par with the $22 manicure I used to get at Rivermark Nails in Santa Clara. Mind you, all the staff was Vietnamese there too!
Now, why, in a country like this, does one need to scrimp on personal hygiene. I don’t believe there’s ever a reason to scrimp on personal hygiene, but really, in a country like Vietnam, where it’s so cheap to keep your feet fungus-free, and stink-free! I could post some pictures of disgusting feet, but I wouldn’t want you to be turned off, and I wouldn’t want to have ‘Happy Feet’ Google ads spamming my blog. Read More…
Well, considering I’m not doing much with it anyway, and it is slipping away from me for lack of practice. 
I really don’t mind doing a language exchange with people who want to learn Hindi. At the very least, you could learn a few useful phrases for when you’re traveling in India, and I will not forget them.
Sad state of affairs, especially because I used to be a Hindi topper in school (if any school buddies are reading this, remember you have no right to dispute anything on this blog.. I know too many of your dark secrets. grrr..)
Both P and I have noticed a sharp decline in our usage of Hindi in the last year or so but the beast has been rearing its ugly fangs once too often in the last month. We’ve always been more comfortable conversing in english, reserving our depleting hindi vocabulary for rainy moments, i.e. when we need to communicate secretly in the presence of non-Hindi speakers. But then, you can easily get away with speedy Hinglish too. Read More…
Surprisingly unmentioned in guide books and expat magazines in Saigon, Akbar Ali has been around for a good number of years and serves a smashing chicken curry.
Akbar Ali is located at 240 Bui Vien, in the Pham Ngu Lao (backpacker) area of Ho Chi Minh City.
I have to say, Akbar Ali is our most frequented Indian restaurant in this city. Not too expensive, not too tourist-ized – and by that I mean, the food tastes authentic. There’s enough spice, and it’s not all hot, which wins a point, especially from me.
The chicken do pyaza, I must say, is my favorite dish at Akbar Ali. Chicken do pyaza is a spicy chicken curry made in yogurt, with lightly sauteed onions for texture. Every single time I’ve had this dish at Ali’s, I’m left smacking my lips and licking my fingers clean in my mouth.
The tandoori roti here is cheaper than most Indo-Pakistani restaurants in Saigon, at 14,000 dong per roti. Roti is a healthier alternative to naan, which is intensely popular among most non-Indians/Pakistanis that I know. Even at 14,000 dongs, I think breads are way more expensive than they should be, especially at $ restaurants such as Akbar Ali.
I wouldn’t really advise you to venture into the kebab section of the menu here. Despite Ali’s experience (he’s been in the restaurant business for more than 20 years), he hasn’t quite mastered the art of a melt-in-the-mouth kebab. We tried the chicken tikka here and were sorely disappointed. The meat inside was as white as the day it died (sic). With the marinade barely having kissed the outer layers, there was really no flavor to talk about.
On a vegetarian note, there are plenty of options here, and some really delicious ones too. A personal favorite is navratan korma, a healthy preparation full of colorful vegetables (always good to get a dose of vitamins) and enough spice to sate my palate. The vegetables are never too mush, which would really spoil the fun.
Another vegetarian dish, which is actually quite a difficult one to make, is Kashmiri dum aloo – a mildly spiced dish of baby potatoes cooked in a yogurt based curry. Ali adds his own twist to the dum aloo, stuffing the potatoes with crushed dry fruits and spices – not bad at all, but not really what I was looking for.
The ambience works for us because P and Ali chatter on in Bengali about life in Vietnam, but it’s not chic at all. Good value for the money though, and good food for the most part. And they deliver!
3.5 stars I’d say. (the food deserves a four, but ambiance matters too)
Our three week quest for good kebabs came to an end last night at Shahi Quila, or Royal Fort restaurant.
Shahi Quila is located at 226 Bui Vien, in the Pham Ngu Lao area of Ho Chi Minh City.
The chicken tikka kebabs were so good, they inspired (sic) me to write a review. Soft and succulent, marinated to perfection, and flavor even in the aftertaste. Not something a lot of restaurants can boast of in an area choc-a-bloc with budget restaurants with 18 page menus!
Shahi Quila, incidentally, is owned by the same guy who made Mumtaz, the other Indian/Pakistani restaurant on Bui Vien, such a fixture in guidebooks such as Lonely Planet, Let’s Go Vietnam. Two years ago, he sold the restaurant to another guy, South Indian Christian apparently, who expanded the menu to include South Indian specialties such as Dosas and Idlis, while the quality of food did a nose-dive.
Anyway, this is not a review of the Mumtaz, which I will write soon..
I had read online that the airports of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City are just ramshackle buildings with few flights taking off the tarmac on any given day. Imagine my surprise, when we stepped off our (very colorful) Thai Airways flight, through the aerobridge, and entered an airport which could’ve been anywhere in N.America or Europe!
It was at the Saigon International airport that I saw the first of many sweepers in orange overalls. This is one sight that dominates my notion of Ho Chi Minh City – a city in a state of rapid flux. A city smoothening, if not shedding, its wrinkled landscape.. fattening itself on Viet Kieu money to fill out its sunken hollows.
Stepping out of the airport, there were no ‘hundreds of taxi drivers’ milling around you offering a ride (metaphorically, more than literally). Maybe it had something to do with the time of the day.. we landed at about 7.30 p.m. local time. There was a line of taxis waiting at the curb. A fellow teacher, who had been assigned to pick us up, called one of the taxis and we headed into the madness that is Saigon.
Except that the madness seemed familiar. So familiar, that it felt mundane.
May all your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view, where something strange and more beautiful and more full of wonder than your deepest dreams waits for you.
IMAGINE.
Of the gladdest moment in human life, methinks, is the departure upon a distant journey into unknown lands. Shaking off with one mighty effort the fetters of habit, the leaden weight of routine, the cloak of many cares and the slavery of civilization, man feels once again happy.
Recently, someone said