lazy summer
I'm still amused by how I blog obsessively during school term (and especially during exam periods) while I procrastinate documenting everything on my blog during the summer holidays because it just feels like a lazy summer. It almost feels like working any quicker, or not wasting my time away idling around, is a crime during summer.
However, I've come to realize that I have a few friends who are headed to HCM, Vietnam in the coming weeks and I cannot help but want to share my experiences + also document down the mad fun I had while I was there so that when I'm old with Alzheimers I can have a reference as to what I did in the past (forward thinking is totally the way to go)
I'm certain I've blogged about this market place before - it's one of the must-dos I listed out in 2 posts before.
This alley is basically the way towards the wet market and is located beside the shopping center connected to the Windsor Plaza Hotel - fyi, this area is chinatown, so if you're fluent in cantonese you've hit jackpot because tonnes of the locals here speak cantonese
My parents and I visited the market place 3 out of the 5 days that we were there and we had a ball of a time going around a market which is packed mostly with locals (for that matter we didn't see any foreigners beside ourselves). The food was excellent and cheap and the people were absolutely lovely - I don't think a trip to HCM is entirely worthwhile unless you've paid a visit to one of their local markets and hung out with the locals for a bit - be it over some super yummy champagne durian seeds or beautifully cut mangosteens
our favourite hang out at the market was at a drink stall further in run by this lady known as "Ah Ling". She is a gorgeous sweet little lady who has a drink stall in the market and makes the yummiest lime and sour plum drinks - I had at least 3-4 cups of these amazing tasting drinks. Near her stall was a little street side stall with a lady selling natural agar agar (which is actually a form of seaweed) and we bought a pack of it and tossed it into our drinks - trust me, that would be some kickass tasting bubble tea combo.
finally on our last day there, we took a photo with Ah Ling and I think it became apparent to all of us at that point how very tiny and petite-sized she is. FYI most of the vietnamese are tiny, but they are truly lovely people (and based on my experience at the cu chi tunnels I can entirely understand why they are so tiny)
Ah ling is 38 years old but barely looks a day over thirty - I on the other hand, am not even 21 but have the eye bags and eye rings of an 60 yr old lady. fml
Also.. i am madly amused by how I look like a Big Friendly Giant beside her and how she kept muttering about how tall i am as we were taking the picture.. it had never occurred to me how small sized she is until we took this picture and it never occurred to me how massive an asian I am because I was already bending my knees (plus the fact that my arm looks like the size of an elephant's leg.. )
while you're there you should seize the opportunity to indulge in some lovely fruit from the stall just beside ah ling - i can't even stress how amazing his fruits are. Furthermore, if you want to talk about organic, vietnam is truly the place to go - their fruits are plucked from their own village backyards and gardens and they taste simply divine!
Believe me when I say this, I am not the biggest fan of durian in terms of both smell and taste - however, I fell in love with the durians in Vietnam because they are so different from the ones we get in Singapore from Malaysia. My mum says that these durians are known as champagne durians and have a slight alochol taste. Unlike the durians in Singapore, the durians in Vietnam have smaller sized seeds and the smell is not pungent but almost fragrant instead. The flesh is creamy and tasty but surprisingly, unlike most durians, did not leave me feeling sick and uncomfortable like I normally do with the ones back home.
That being said, i maintain that 3 people to one durian is a tad of an overkill
their mangosteens are simply divine, they've got the perfect balance of flavours and the seeds are nice and small
we bought back 5kg worth of mangosteens because we were addikted - if you intend to do so, don't forget that they need to be handcarried because if you attempt to check them in, these fragile fruits will squish and turn into mush - and I'm pretty sure the other people with luggages sharing the conveyer belt with your mush of mangosteen won't be too pleased!
they sell pho everywhere in HCM and they've even got fast food pho outlets - more famously known as pho 24 - but trust me, the real deal can only be found at street sides or in the wet market - it's a habit we picked up in Singapore: If the locals seem happy to order from that store you can't go off track and indeed we didn't.
At 40 000 Dong a bowl (it's a min of 69 000 in most other places), they give you a massive serving of pho, a generous serving of beef slices and tendon. It's served with a plate of fresh leaves and herbs such as basil that should be mixed in with the noodles.
(other street food you should try at their local markets, i'd love to write more about the food but I'm super sleepy + buddy sleeping next to me doesn't help because every time I look at him i feel like curling up and sleeping too.. sigh sleeping is infectious)
here's another market which is a must-go and I'm pretty certain anybody who finds a map/ googles hcm will already know about this place - the all famous ben thanh market.... all i can say is brace yourself for the chaos inside.. which is actually really manageable on weekdays! So i reckon you should just avoid it during the weekends
also note that crossing the roads to get there is absolute mayhem.. so i recommend you close your eyes, take a deep breath and just cross.
there are a few must dos in Ben Thanh
1. buy things (such as coffee, roasted lotus seeds and rice paper to make your own spring rolls at home)
2. bargain, they're all about artificially raising the prices there
3. choose your coffee wisely - if you're wondering why the weasel and traditional viet coffee beans look so glossy and smell so fragrant, it's because the beans are fried in butter before they're sold.. just an fyi for people like me who aren't too keen on buttery coffee
4. look for this lady and try her banh minh (viet roll) I can't say she's the most hygenic vendor around but her rolls are sure yummy! also she doesn't have her own stall, she just sits outside stalls and sells them!
hygiene is a necessary sacrifice in vietnam.
look for the dessert stall which is normally packed with people and has a lady boss walking around it with a giant fan - she's really fierce and all about yelling at her workers so please don't bother bargaining with her!
We spoke to some of the locals there and found out it's a pretty famous stall known for its traditional vietnamese desserts and the locals there apparently visit the market often for a taste of her desserts in a glass cup.
A traditional vietnamese dessert is '3 colours' - it's red beans with mashed mung bean and tapioca gems + sweet coconut milk and ice shards. very yummy and perfect for a hot and humid afternoon.
this is completely unrelated to how yummy the dessert is but it's just a note to make me feel happy - at the stall there's a bloke washing the dishes and he's a vietnamese university student working there to earn some pocket money. we were directed to sit in front of his washing station and ordered our desserts from him. he took a keen interest in striking a conversation with our family. We found him to be another sweet vietnamese with a keen interest in knowing more about the world (more specifically singapore in our case) and seeking opportunities to converse in English to improve his language abilities. About 2 minutes into conversing with my mum he looked at me and looked back at my mum and said "she is very beautiful! how old is she!" - and no sooner did I realize that he had been taking sneaky looks at me and not actually listening to anything i said (may i add here that my mother got all excited and attempted to trade me off for free desserts.. i feel so loved in this family). Unfortunately! His fierce lady boss proceeded to scold him relentlessly when she found out that he had been talking to my mum rather frequently and that brought an end to their conversation and my mother's attempt to trade me away. Nonetheless, it was a really awkward 20 minutes for me, as I sat in front of him slurping down my dessert as he continuously glanced at me.
CAN I JUST SAY that I recounted the whole story not because I think I'm all fabulous looking and shit - because I know i look as haggard as an 80 yr old grandma who's been through numerous wars + my complexion is so bad it amazes my sister - but because it made me feel so good about myself!! Can you believe it?! the last time someone took interest in me was about 1.5 yrs ago and that was mark shan.... which is really worrying since I've come to realize that he's got an awful sense of taste (he has a few pairs of horrendous looking jeans I have since banned and I don't even know where to begin for some of his favourite shirts and shoes.. they are so special my mother couldn't even comment)... so yay!!!!! but ya.. that's about him.. story of my life. while others get picked up every other day/ second of their lives, i get picked up once every 1.5 years.. damn tragic.
anyway (if you read the afore paragraph congrats! you are truly a loyal reader! if you didn't, good for you!) after ben thanh it was off to find some of the must-go-too restaurants as recommended by travel advisor.
Before we headed to dinner we made a detour to the notre dame cathedral - it's located at district 1 which the locals refer to as the french sector because the french developed the area as its headquarters in the past when vietnam was still its colony.
Beside the cathedral you'll find a massive french-styled building which is their local post office!
the architecture is simply gorgeous and with their lighting at the front, the building is perfect for a night shoot (with a compact camera.. can you imagine how lovely it would have looked with a dslr??)
If you're following tripadvisor.com - here's my little tip: forget about searching for the restaurant hoa tuc because it's been closed!!! We spent a good 2 days searching for it until the 7th person we asked for directions finally revealed to us that it was gone for good and recommended us to Vietnam House along Dong Khoi street
Vietnam House is a slightly more upmarket vietnamese restaurant with a pianist playing, waitresses decked out in the traditional vietnamese costumes and proper dinner layouts etc.
TBH the food is actually reasonably priced and really quite excellent. Although I was severely underdressed compared to all the other patrons, the staff were very gracious about it and ignored my complete lack of graciousness (oops)
Spring rolls
packed with fresh and perfectly combined ingredients
LOVE THIS. I love vietnamese pancake. it is like the yummiest thing on earth and I've eaten this at least 5 times (including 3 times in Melbourne and twice in Vietnam) and Vietnam House's one wins HANDS DOWN.
the sides are crisp, the pancake is thin and well seasoned + the stuffing is near perfectly cooked (and I don't even know where to begin for the sauce.. it was so delicious it was ridiculous)
another must try - their lotus leaf rice with chicken.
My parents loved it and gobbled it down rather quickly.. I on the other hand (no surprises) wasn't a fan of the chicken although it was admittedly well cooked but the rice was super yummy and fragrant I couldn't resist stealing spoonfuls of it despite having a giant bowl of pho as well!
i love pho!!!
I'd love to blog more about vietnam (and trust me I've got so much more to go through it might take me days) but I've really got to go sleep so that I can finish up some work i promised myself I'd do today but clearly procrastinated and didn't finish.
Nonetheless here's a pointer on what NOT to do:
Like my realization that ladyironchef isn't always right after visiting prive, on this trip I realized that the people commenting on tripadvisor.com must surely have different taste buds from me or they must have had a completely different experience from the one I had at the restaurants they recommended travellers to go to -
1.
if I'm not wrong this is one of the top rated restaurants on tripadvisor.com and tbh it was disappointing.
The food not only tasted blahh (and far worse from the ones we had at the market and at Vietnam House), it was also packed with MSG - unfortunately for me, that meant that my allergy acted up and I felt sick and uncomfortable for the rest of the day
Also, the service is crap and the place is so commercialized I can imagine how it must have been a good restaurant but unfortunately lost it's touch when it expanded.
2.
Une Journee a Paris
We trudged through some mad weather and crazy traffic + got lost attempting to find this place at 234 Le Thanh Ton
My recommendation - forget about it and don't bother going if you live in Singapore.
I think that once can easily get better tarts and cakes at bakeries like sweetspot and cedele + their coffee was so madly diluted my mum and I half thought that they forgot to add the coffee to the milk
Furthermore, their sandwiches are rather pathetic looking and put simply, not worth the effort of trudging through mother nature's angsty rain + vietnam's mad traffic for. And their croissants.. was.. well.. I'd rather just go to choupinette at bukit timah road for a croissant or my usual chocolate chouchou.
Also.. because we had the world's lousiest map, i reckon you should get yourself a proper one to avoid making rounds and getting lost in a country where people are willing to help... but cannot actually understand you.
FINALLY. HERE'S AN ANNOUNCEMENT THAT WILL MAKE ALL NUS LAW STUDENTS HAPPY :)
Welcoming us back to school at the summit next semester...
ADAM ROAD FISHBALL NOODLES!!!!
:) The couple who own adam road fishball noodles at Adam Road Food Centre have taken over the noodles stall at the summit and I'm stoked!!! I love their food and am extremely pleased that I won't have to endure the blazing heat to get my fishball noodles during school term!
Here's my prediction - based on my last sem's obsession with their dry fishball tang hoon with extra chilli & extra vinegar plus fish dumplings ($4 - a dollar for the fish dumplings - their fish dumplings fyi are a gazillion times better than the ones served at Meng's Kitchen along Upper Thomson.. those ones are rather dubious looking and tasting imo), i think there's a 100% chance I'm going to put on 5kg with their move to the summit. FML
However, I've come to realize that I have a few friends who are headed to HCM, Vietnam in the coming weeks and I cannot help but want to share my experiences + also document down the mad fun I had while I was there so that when I'm old with Alzheimers I can have a reference as to what I did in the past (forward thinking is totally the way to go)
I'm certain I've blogged about this market place before - it's one of the must-dos I listed out in 2 posts before.
This alley is basically the way towards the wet market and is located beside the shopping center connected to the Windsor Plaza Hotel - fyi, this area is chinatown, so if you're fluent in cantonese you've hit jackpot because tonnes of the locals here speak cantonese
My parents and I visited the market place 3 out of the 5 days that we were there and we had a ball of a time going around a market which is packed mostly with locals (for that matter we didn't see any foreigners beside ourselves). The food was excellent and cheap and the people were absolutely lovely - I don't think a trip to HCM is entirely worthwhile unless you've paid a visit to one of their local markets and hung out with the locals for a bit - be it over some super yummy champagne durian seeds or beautifully cut mangosteens
our favourite hang out at the market was at a drink stall further in run by this lady known as "Ah Ling". She is a gorgeous sweet little lady who has a drink stall in the market and makes the yummiest lime and sour plum drinks - I had at least 3-4 cups of these amazing tasting drinks. Near her stall was a little street side stall with a lady selling natural agar agar (which is actually a form of seaweed) and we bought a pack of it and tossed it into our drinks - trust me, that would be some kickass tasting bubble tea combo.
finally on our last day there, we took a photo with Ah Ling and I think it became apparent to all of us at that point how very tiny and petite-sized she is. FYI most of the vietnamese are tiny, but they are truly lovely people (and based on my experience at the cu chi tunnels I can entirely understand why they are so tiny)
Ah ling is 38 years old but barely looks a day over thirty - I on the other hand, am not even 21 but have the eye bags and eye rings of an 60 yr old lady. fml
Also.. i am madly amused by how I look like a Big Friendly Giant beside her and how she kept muttering about how tall i am as we were taking the picture.. it had never occurred to me how small sized she is until we took this picture and it never occurred to me how massive an asian I am because I was already bending my knees (plus the fact that my arm looks like the size of an elephant's leg.. )
while you're there you should seize the opportunity to indulge in some lovely fruit from the stall just beside ah ling - i can't even stress how amazing his fruits are. Furthermore, if you want to talk about organic, vietnam is truly the place to go - their fruits are plucked from their own village backyards and gardens and they taste simply divine!
Believe me when I say this, I am not the biggest fan of durian in terms of both smell and taste - however, I fell in love with the durians in Vietnam because they are so different from the ones we get in Singapore from Malaysia. My mum says that these durians are known as champagne durians and have a slight alochol taste. Unlike the durians in Singapore, the durians in Vietnam have smaller sized seeds and the smell is not pungent but almost fragrant instead. The flesh is creamy and tasty but surprisingly, unlike most durians, did not leave me feeling sick and uncomfortable like I normally do with the ones back home.
That being said, i maintain that 3 people to one durian is a tad of an overkill
their mangosteens are simply divine, they've got the perfect balance of flavours and the seeds are nice and small
we bought back 5kg worth of mangosteens because we were addikted - if you intend to do so, don't forget that they need to be handcarried because if you attempt to check them in, these fragile fruits will squish and turn into mush - and I'm pretty sure the other people with luggages sharing the conveyer belt with your mush of mangosteen won't be too pleased!
they sell pho everywhere in HCM and they've even got fast food pho outlets - more famously known as pho 24 - but trust me, the real deal can only be found at street sides or in the wet market - it's a habit we picked up in Singapore: If the locals seem happy to order from that store you can't go off track and indeed we didn't.
At 40 000 Dong a bowl (it's a min of 69 000 in most other places), they give you a massive serving of pho, a generous serving of beef slices and tendon. It's served with a plate of fresh leaves and herbs such as basil that should be mixed in with the noodles.
(other street food you should try at their local markets, i'd love to write more about the food but I'm super sleepy + buddy sleeping next to me doesn't help because every time I look at him i feel like curling up and sleeping too.. sigh sleeping is infectious)
here's another market which is a must-go and I'm pretty certain anybody who finds a map/ googles hcm will already know about this place - the all famous ben thanh market.... all i can say is brace yourself for the chaos inside.. which is actually really manageable on weekdays! So i reckon you should just avoid it during the weekends
also note that crossing the roads to get there is absolute mayhem.. so i recommend you close your eyes, take a deep breath and just cross.
there are a few must dos in Ben Thanh
1. buy things (such as coffee, roasted lotus seeds and rice paper to make your own spring rolls at home)
2. bargain, they're all about artificially raising the prices there
3. choose your coffee wisely - if you're wondering why the weasel and traditional viet coffee beans look so glossy and smell so fragrant, it's because the beans are fried in butter before they're sold.. just an fyi for people like me who aren't too keen on buttery coffee
4. look for this lady and try her banh minh (viet roll) I can't say she's the most hygenic vendor around but her rolls are sure yummy! also she doesn't have her own stall, she just sits outside stalls and sells them!
hygiene is a necessary sacrifice in vietnam.
look for the dessert stall which is normally packed with people and has a lady boss walking around it with a giant fan - she's really fierce and all about yelling at her workers so please don't bother bargaining with her!
We spoke to some of the locals there and found out it's a pretty famous stall known for its traditional vietnamese desserts and the locals there apparently visit the market often for a taste of her desserts in a glass cup.
A traditional vietnamese dessert is '3 colours' - it's red beans with mashed mung bean and tapioca gems + sweet coconut milk and ice shards. very yummy and perfect for a hot and humid afternoon.
this is completely unrelated to how yummy the dessert is but it's just a note to make me feel happy - at the stall there's a bloke washing the dishes and he's a vietnamese university student working there to earn some pocket money. we were directed to sit in front of his washing station and ordered our desserts from him. he took a keen interest in striking a conversation with our family. We found him to be another sweet vietnamese with a keen interest in knowing more about the world (more specifically singapore in our case) and seeking opportunities to converse in English to improve his language abilities. About 2 minutes into conversing with my mum he looked at me and looked back at my mum and said "she is very beautiful! how old is she!" - and no sooner did I realize that he had been taking sneaky looks at me and not actually listening to anything i said (may i add here that my mother got all excited and attempted to trade me off for free desserts.. i feel so loved in this family). Unfortunately! His fierce lady boss proceeded to scold him relentlessly when she found out that he had been talking to my mum rather frequently and that brought an end to their conversation and my mother's attempt to trade me away. Nonetheless, it was a really awkward 20 minutes for me, as I sat in front of him slurping down my dessert as he continuously glanced at me.
CAN I JUST SAY that I recounted the whole story not because I think I'm all fabulous looking and shit - because I know i look as haggard as an 80 yr old grandma who's been through numerous wars + my complexion is so bad it amazes my sister - but because it made me feel so good about myself!! Can you believe it?! the last time someone took interest in me was about 1.5 yrs ago and that was mark shan.... which is really worrying since I've come to realize that he's got an awful sense of taste (he has a few pairs of horrendous looking jeans I have since banned and I don't even know where to begin for some of his favourite shirts and shoes.. they are so special my mother couldn't even comment)... so yay!!!!! but ya.. that's about him.. story of my life. while others get picked up every other day/ second of their lives, i get picked up once every 1.5 years.. damn tragic.
anyway (if you read the afore paragraph congrats! you are truly a loyal reader! if you didn't, good for you!) after ben thanh it was off to find some of the must-go-too restaurants as recommended by travel advisor.
Before we headed to dinner we made a detour to the notre dame cathedral - it's located at district 1 which the locals refer to as the french sector because the french developed the area as its headquarters in the past when vietnam was still its colony.
Beside the cathedral you'll find a massive french-styled building which is their local post office!
the architecture is simply gorgeous and with their lighting at the front, the building is perfect for a night shoot (with a compact camera.. can you imagine how lovely it would have looked with a dslr??)
If you're following tripadvisor.com - here's my little tip: forget about searching for the restaurant hoa tuc because it's been closed!!! We spent a good 2 days searching for it until the 7th person we asked for directions finally revealed to us that it was gone for good and recommended us to Vietnam House along Dong Khoi street
Vietnam House is a slightly more upmarket vietnamese restaurant with a pianist playing, waitresses decked out in the traditional vietnamese costumes and proper dinner layouts etc.
TBH the food is actually reasonably priced and really quite excellent. Although I was severely underdressed compared to all the other patrons, the staff were very gracious about it and ignored my complete lack of graciousness (oops)
Spring rolls
packed with fresh and perfectly combined ingredients
LOVE THIS. I love vietnamese pancake. it is like the yummiest thing on earth and I've eaten this at least 5 times (including 3 times in Melbourne and twice in Vietnam) and Vietnam House's one wins HANDS DOWN.
the sides are crisp, the pancake is thin and well seasoned + the stuffing is near perfectly cooked (and I don't even know where to begin for the sauce.. it was so delicious it was ridiculous)
another must try - their lotus leaf rice with chicken.
My parents loved it and gobbled it down rather quickly.. I on the other hand (no surprises) wasn't a fan of the chicken although it was admittedly well cooked but the rice was super yummy and fragrant I couldn't resist stealing spoonfuls of it despite having a giant bowl of pho as well!
i love pho!!!
I'd love to blog more about vietnam (and trust me I've got so much more to go through it might take me days) but I've really got to go sleep so that I can finish up some work i promised myself I'd do today but clearly procrastinated and didn't finish.
Nonetheless here's a pointer on what NOT to do:
Like my realization that ladyironchef isn't always right after visiting prive, on this trip I realized that the people commenting on tripadvisor.com must surely have different taste buds from me or they must have had a completely different experience from the one I had at the restaurants they recommended travellers to go to -
1.
if I'm not wrong this is one of the top rated restaurants on tripadvisor.com and tbh it was disappointing.
The food not only tasted blahh (and far worse from the ones we had at the market and at Vietnam House), it was also packed with MSG - unfortunately for me, that meant that my allergy acted up and I felt sick and uncomfortable for the rest of the day
Also, the service is crap and the place is so commercialized I can imagine how it must have been a good restaurant but unfortunately lost it's touch when it expanded.
2.
Une Journee a Paris
We trudged through some mad weather and crazy traffic + got lost attempting to find this place at 234 Le Thanh Ton
My recommendation - forget about it and don't bother going if you live in Singapore.
I think that once can easily get better tarts and cakes at bakeries like sweetspot and cedele + their coffee was so madly diluted my mum and I half thought that they forgot to add the coffee to the milk
Furthermore, their sandwiches are rather pathetic looking and put simply, not worth the effort of trudging through mother nature's angsty rain + vietnam's mad traffic for. And their croissants.. was.. well.. I'd rather just go to choupinette at bukit timah road for a croissant or my usual chocolate chouchou.
Also.. because we had the world's lousiest map, i reckon you should get yourself a proper one to avoid making rounds and getting lost in a country where people are willing to help... but cannot actually understand you.
FINALLY. HERE'S AN ANNOUNCEMENT THAT WILL MAKE ALL NUS LAW STUDENTS HAPPY :)
Welcoming us back to school at the summit next semester...
ADAM ROAD FISHBALL NOODLES!!!!
:) The couple who own adam road fishball noodles at Adam Road Food Centre have taken over the noodles stall at the summit and I'm stoked!!! I love their food and am extremely pleased that I won't have to endure the blazing heat to get my fishball noodles during school term!
Here's my prediction - based on my last sem's obsession with their dry fishball tang hoon with extra chilli & extra vinegar plus fish dumplings ($4 - a dollar for the fish dumplings - their fish dumplings fyi are a gazillion times better than the ones served at Meng's Kitchen along Upper Thomson.. those ones are rather dubious looking and tasting imo), i think there's a 100% chance I'm going to put on 5kg with their move to the summit. FML