Viet Nam

[Guest]

Hi,

I plan a trip to Viet Nam in September.

Do you have any informations about nightlife in Ho Chi Minh City: bars, discos, girls, prices, security, guest policy in hotels...

Thanks a lot for your answers.

David

[Guest]

Some useful stuff on Vietnam on the Delphi board at www.vietnamfun.com

[Guest]

Sorry gave the wrong url in my last post, should have been http://forums.delphi.com/vietnamfun/

[Guest]

Also look at www.worldsexguide.com. sanuk information and trip reports from around the world.

[Guest]

I can't help you with Vietnam - but if you want to experience Vietnamese girls, they can easily be found in KL - Health Centers: many HC's are offering at the moment Vietnamese girls for a discounted rate of 140..160.- MYR (some 40.-$) for a package session, i.e. 1 hour all included with her on the HC-premises.

Once you make your way to KL, don't miss that!

[Sukhumvit]

Bit of a delayed reaction this one.

In Ho Chi Minh City it's fairly easy to get picked up by a cyclo driver who will find you a taxi girl (so called 'cos you pay for the ride). One way of doing business is for the cyclo driver to pedal along and suddenly a little honda moped will pull alongside with a pimp and his chick riding pillion. If you like the look of her then it's off to a short time hotel. Beware the police.

Lots of westerners in the closest Hoville gets to Khao San Road = De Tham. It's a street just of Pham Ngu Lao where Prince Hotel, Vien Dong Hotel etc are. Kim Cafe, Sinh Cafe and the cheap traveller hotels are all round here. Souvenir shops. Get yourself a genuine Hilltribes cd case and fill it with Viet copy cds for 2-3 bucks each.

Around that area there are a few reasonable restaurants including an Indian, a Japanese place where they do the trick of cooking the food on a hot metal plate in front of you.

You get taxi girls in a couple of the bars along PNL. They like to shoot pool before work. Friendly girls but not as good looking as the girls you'll see in similar establishments in Thailand. Quite like the ambiance though of these places. In one of them, I think it's Kim Bar, you can hire vintage Vespas and Lambrettas. (there's a little barsteward on Nguyen Van Cu who runs a moto shop and was going to arrange a deal with me back in 97/98 to buy a Lambretta and ship it to the UK. Very good price. Numbah one. Same same England... First time in country and got ripped off. A friend still promises to send his sister in law along to sort him out for me.)

One of the most famous of the clubs where expats and tourists go is Apocalypse Now. Can't remember the name of the street now (haven't been there since Easter 99). It's in all the guidebooks. Pool playing available. Rock videos on tvs. Lots of freelancers in there. Again, some of them are true hedgepigs. There's a little courtyard there and it's pretty packed on a busy night. You may strike lucky. Just up the same street as Apocalypse is a little door behind which lies La Violet. Quiet but very good to relax. No tourists apart from me and a friend. We were taken there by an expat we met in Bob & Hien's Place. You get a few taxi girls in there and if they like you they'll give you the usual line "I go with you for free." It can be quiet and it's not everyone's idea of fun.

For discos there's a couple of good ones in the same area of town as Bob & Hien's and Apocalypse. You'll see loads of mopeds outside the trendiest. There was one I remember called Rainforest. Great light show and music. Viet chicks grooving on podiums. Not pole dancing go-go girls though. Met a couple of Viet Kieu in there who'd returned from the States. No more than a handful of westerners in there. I was approached in there by a small mammoth and declined. Just up the main drag near the junction that Rainforest is close to you'll also find a number of karaoke bars.

The thing with VN was that the nightlife is a lot less obvious than LOS. People with a lot more experience than me will probably be able to point you in the direction of the sleaziest karaoke bar where you get your nuts painted blue but it's not as easy to find the true LOS g/f experience as the peelers are a bit stricter than LOS. Had a funny night on De Tham watching the local plods turn up and confiscate the plastic bar furniture from bars that were using the pavement as overspill. Wasn't so funny when they came to our bar. Perhaps it was 'cos the American guy we were drinking with was singing country music at the top of his voice.

Have experienced the fun of Vung Tau by night which I may one day do a post about. Also in the Mekong Delta you'll get approached by taxi girls and sometimes pimps. Over past Cantho, towards the Cambodian border, by Sam Mountain, again there are likely looking shacks but it's difficult to be certain. In some of these places it all ends fairly early so they can get up at 5 am to do their calisthenics.

Anyway, beginning to ramble now. Maybe I can have a search through my old souvenir business cards at the weekend and post some addresses of hotels etc.

Finally here's a couple of useful phrases:

Anh u em = Man loves woman (basically, I fancy getting into your knickers)

Di bow xem em dep = I'm going walking looking at the pretty ladies (useful to say to get rid of pesky cyclo drivers who follow you hoping you'll take a ride. Gives them a grin.)

Toi khong mwa = I don't buy (use it for street hawkers when you want them to go forth and multiply.)

[Guest]

While in HCMC a couple of months ago I stayed at the Palace Hotel in district one. Great place, close to all the action and at a great price. Try their massage parlor on the second floor. Some of the best looking girls I've ever seen in Asia, and yes you can get full service there.

[ June 27, 2001: Message edited by: Tom 8383 ]

[Guest]

There are quite a few different kinds of places to find the girls in HCMC. A lot of bars around Hai Ba Trung near the opera house have 6-15 girls, one must buy a certain amount of drinks for them to get them out. The most famous one is the Monkey Bar, green sign, right on the corner of Hai Ba Trung behind the opera house. Also on the same street as Apocolypse, between there and the Violet Bar, there are two such establishments, and one has a short time room or two. My personal favorite for this kind of "girly bar" in this area is on Mac Thi Buoi, just to the left as you walk out of the Hard Rock Cafe, which one can find in most guide books.

For better looking girls, and of course more costly, there is a good Karaoke joint behind the Amara hotel. A lot of very good looking girls. The minimum for a karaoke room is $100 tab, but one can sit in a stall in the main bar area and pick one of the girls as they do their "dance" every half hour or so.

Have fun in Ho Chi Minh Ville.