Ho Chih Minh Sights - 1

The Church of Madonna in District 3,modelled after the Notre Dame
Basillica Cathedral in Paris, France.

After a packed day of customer visit and discussions,my friend and I made our way down to the city centre,where we viewed the magnificent Church of Madonna, which is modelled after the Notre Dame in Paris.It is also called the Notre Dame Basillica Cathedral of Saigon (old name of Ho Chi Minh).The Vietnamese are free to worship and religion is dominated by Buddhists (60%), Catholics (20%) and the Christian Protestants. Many Vietnamese originate from China Guangzhou and other Southern provinces from the 1700s onwards. The Church in the picture was restored by the Government and there are about 10 small churches in various parts of Ho Chih Minh.


Stanley Wong outside the Catholic Church of Madonna

Crossing roads in Ho Chi Minh is very dicey if you new at it. Traffic at road junctions especially small ones are dangerous because the motorists DON'T STOP. They will slow down and dodge past you. It is especially crazy during RUSH HOUR when there are easily thousands of motorcyclists revving their engines and swerving all over the place.


Children playing on the swings,the slide,parallel bars and sand pit ; even in the evening !

The sight of a packed playground caught my eye. I have NEVER seen a playground where every single play station is occupied at every time of day ! We were walking back to our hotel at 9pm at night when I noticed that the playground was still FULL OF PEOPLE ! This reflected to me that the people are so starved of children's play areas in the city that they will spend a good half day traveling to the park and spend a few hours for their children or grandchildren to enjoy themselves before spending another few hours travelling home - home may be in the outskirts of Ho Chih Minh which can be 2 - 3 hours away.


The playground in the main park in Ho Chih Min is packed day and night !

We living in Malaysia and Singapore MUST BE most appreciative and grateful for our Governments with providing the following :

a) excellent infrastructure such as roads,traffic lights and highways
b) parks ,playgrounds and basic amenities such as shops and supermarkets in most housing estates - GOOD TOWN PLANNING
c) SAFE (especially Singapore) environment to bring up our children and families