Bikes I like

Brand new Attila Elizabeths coloured like cheap sweeties.


Why stick to the one theme when there are so many to choose from?


Purists may scoff but I love these old scooters all faffed up for today's modern motorbike driver.


Here scooters are personal.

Fake Mexicans at the Opera House

Sunday the 9th of November, 8:30 am at the top of Le Loi on the steps of the Opera House I spied (well I could hardly miss them) people dressed in sombreros playing vaguely Latin American music. Who? Why? No idea but it fairly brightened up the morning for me.

Here they are from across the road the better to admire the newly refurbished Opera House.



Closer so you can fully appreciate the sombreros.


For some reason windmill salesmen always get in on the act.



And since it's "nearly" Christmas the Santa baloons have been dusted off for another year.



I was starting to think I was getting a little complacent about Vietnam, how wrong can you get?

Ganesh Indian Restaurant, HCMC

Found on Le Than Thon a recently opened Indian Restaurant. (This was initialy written a long time ago, see the update at the bottom of this post for a more recent review)



The food is very good and I'm particularly taken by their thalis.





Ganesh vies for first place on my list of favourite Indian restaurants in Saigon with Mumtaz in the backpacker area barely winning in the tase stakes but Ganesh wins hands down on the decor front.

Update Edit I've been feeling bad.
I recently had a look at the blog stats, not something I often do, and found that this post was the top hit. I have to come clean and admit that I stopped eating here a long time ago, around the time the dahl started to be sweet, the vegetable dishes started to be over salted and bland and the staff started saying "I'll talk to the chef" when I returned my inedible dishes and still put them on the bill. I tried the Phu My Hung outlet more than a few times, it was equally poor. I'm not saying Ganesh is bad, just that in my opinion it's become dumbed down and formulaeic and probably serving food that lots of people like, just not me. Mumtaz eventually won out for tasty, reliable food but has been surpassed now that Robin the long term manager of Mumtaz has set up his own Baba's Kitchen near the old place. Where do I eat now? Mumbai mainly, it's not a curry restaurant in HCMC but the city in India that I relocated to.

Phu Quoc

Phu Quoc. It's a Vietnamese island in the Gulf of Thailand just a few miles off the coast of Cambodia. It has clean beaches, warm waters, lovely scenery and incredible sunsets and you'd beter get yourself there now before the international airport the cruise ship docking facilities and the mega casino do.













A fifty minute flight from HCMC.