When you get into town and check into your hotel, exchange US$100 at the cashier’s desk (or at the money changer down the street). Immediately, you get handed Dong 1.53 million. Voila! You’re a millionaire – in Vietnamese Dong. That’s the local currency.
In time, you’ll be able to figure out how far your tourist dollar goes. A buck gets you 15,300 Dong. Dong 200,000 equals roughly $18. A million Dong is equivalent to about $70.
Can you expect to pay more for what you buy? Of course. You’re a tourist. You must bargain fiercely. But they deal with you here with pleasant smiles.
There are many wonderful souvenirs and works of art to purchase within a two-block radius of your hotel. The Vietnamese, so formidable in war, are also the world’s most consummate artists: They paint, lacquer, do terrific silverwork (though much of their craft comes from Cambodia), ceramics — you name it. They can fake almost everything to perfection, too – including fake Zippo lighters with the emblems of American regiments and units, as if they had been captured by Viet Cong (their dads) or North Vietnamese Army soldiers on the battlefield.
They’ve even captured the hearts of their former foes, the Americans. The biggest investors in Vietnam today, I’m told by our businessmen friends here (Pinoys who run very successful enterprises themselves, like our mega-export San Miguel beer) are the Americans. As tourists, they’re coming in, as well, in droves. There are even tearful reunions between former protagonists on bloody battlefields of the Vietnam War, the officers and men on both sides. American who were prisoners of war even bring their children to visit the prisons and sites of concentration camps in which they were incarcerated, and underwent torture and privation, like the grim prison near the capital called the Hanoi Hilton. The war’s not over: It’s become a Tourist Attraction and a Retro Class Act.
It makes sense, indeed, to come to Ho Chi Minh – or Saigon. This city of seven million people is one of the safest in the globe. The policemen walk around without guns, but don’t be deceived. If trouble erupts, there’ll be heavily armed police reaction teams on the scene within minutes. And the cops here aren’t gentle when provoked. I’m informed that they don’t hesitate to beat the shit out of troublemakers and criminals. Or even rowdy Caucasians, who get treated sometimes with kid gloves back home. The Vietnamese have no complex. After all, they whipped the French, and then the Americans, not even bothering to change from their pajamas (black) when doing so. French and American tourists love it here. The former Viet Cong and their children greet them with friendly grins, instead of AK-47s. The kids zip around on Honda , or Yamaha, or Isuzu motorbikes, wearing USA and I Love New York t-shirts. In the shops, they sell Good Morning Vietnam and Hard Rock Café Saigon t-shirts.
One sign of prosperity is the fact that when we were living in Saigon in the old days, everybody was on a bicycle (with families of six, often enough, balanced on a single bike). The high school girls in their characteristic white ao dais darted around like brave dragon-flys, their graceful tails flirting, on their bicycles.
Last night, I watched hundreds of motorbikes come roaring down Dong Khoi, the main drag, which borders my hotel. (Dong Khoi, which used to be named Duong Tu-do, "Freedom", during the Suth Vietnamese government but was more famed as the Rue Catinat during the French Indo-China empire days, retains its spell.)
These days, the demand for motorbikess is so geat that Honda and Yamaha have set up plants here. Their bikes sell for between $2,500 to $7,000, prices affordable to the upmarket Vietnamese. (The Chinese are smuggling in their even more "affordable" rip-off, a bike they’ve mischievously named Hongda which can be acquired for as low as $350, with its "better" model going for $700. However, they’re not as sturdy as the Japanese – but, if you’re an impecunious but aspiring student, who cares? In a nation of 77 million, which is beginning to surge with prosperity, there will surely be a Honda in that student’s future.)
Why is it safe? The authorities brook no nonsense. They crack down on whomever or whatever and the heck with all the legal mumbo-jumbo. After all, the people who used to be called "terrorists" during the Vietnam War are running the place. They know how to cope with terrorism.
During the Vietnam War, when this correspondent lived here, Saigon was a dangerous place. Those Zambo, Kidapawan and Metro Manila bombings were nothing to what we had to contend with from day to day. Foreign correspondents were targeted here in the Caravelle hotel (where I’m now booked, and it’s been rebuilt to the status of amazingly modern and slick – a Furama hotel) or the Continental Palace across the square, where I also stayed during the "Tet" offensive of 1968. There were booby traps everywhere. Today, you can walk around here, day and night, without fear. You need beware of nothing – except, of course, the speeding motorbike, or careening taxicab, and the occasional light-fingered outpurse out to snatch your cellphone. (They have this thing about cellphones over here, too.)
Why are the streets of Ho Chi Minh so secure? Because the authorities are tough on crime. The thoroughfares and boulevards are squeaky clean, too. Every stallholder or shopkeeper, every householder, is held responsible for garbage disposal and for keeping his or her space tidy. If not, it’s off to the hoosegow. The last time I visited here, seven years ago, the economy which had begun to perk up was stagnating. This was owing to growing corruption in the bureaucracy, as well as in high places. Hanoi grew alarmed when investment started fleeing. Even the Viet Kieu, the Balikbayan investors, were beginning to be turned off. The higher authorities put a stop to this climate of sleaze in a very direct manner. Certain ranking government officials were arrested, crooked businessmen and bureaucrats were picked up. There were quick trials, and even quicker executions. The one-bullet approach yelded immediate results. Investment is now coming back, Skyscrapers have gone up. Foreign firms are setting up here by the dozen. Danang is no longer the battlefield we knew — it’s become a booming industrial zone!
The relentless battle against criminality goes on, waged without mercy. A few months ago, the Racket King – a cheeky 34-year old Gang Boss named Nam Cam who had taken overall the syndicates, Mafia-style, and controlled drugs, smuggling, prostitution and other rackets in Ho Chi Minh – was arrested. The Mekong Delta police, dispatched by Hanoi, also arrested the Chief of Police and many policemen – who had been Cam’s protectors and hirelings. No wonder that arrogant fellow had been so free to strut around, and had seemed untouchable!
We ought to learn a lesson from Vietnam. What are we doing to those PNP men who permitted the GenSan bomber to escape? If that had happened in Vietnam, the careless cops, and their commanding officer would have been shot. Here, I kidd thee not, there are no mysterious "escapes". Disappearances, perhaps. It’s the hoodlums, however, who disappear – and are never seen again.