The Saigon Post Office, Benjamin Franklin, and a Source of Unexpected Pride
It’s not hard to find snippets of America in Saigon.
Food, Art, Heritage and Everything of the Essence in My #SaigonSummer
“In summer, the song sings itself.”― William Carlos Williams
Are We Living in the Final Days of Cô Mía?
They say a person dies twice: once when their heart stops beating and a second time when people stop mentioning their name. If we alter this phrase a bit to include the last time one’s image is seen, ...
An Octopus? In My Cà Mau Swamp? It's More Likely Than You Think.
Worms live in the ground, birds live in the air, cá lóc live in lakes and octopuses live in the ocean, right? Wrong! Octopus can also live in the river.
In Awe of the Mekong Delta's Majestic Sluice Gates
A row of impenetrable watchtowers tasked with inflicting ruthless law and order upon a dystopian borderland seething with marauders, bandits and brigands? No. Sluice gates.
Letter to the People I Met as We Hid From the Rain Under a Bridge Together
“Do not be angry with the rain; it simply does not know how to fall upwards.”— Vladimir Nabokov.
How Saigon's Free Water Coolers Quench Thirst and Spread Kindness
In recent years, stories about climate change's impacts on the lives of Vietnamese people have been increasingly making the news.
The Pedestrian Bridge That Teaches You the Values of Patience
“We need the sweet pain of anticipation to tell us we are really alive.”
Xe Trái Cây: If You Can't Find Lovingly Sliced Fruit at Home, Cart-Bought Is Fine
Nature has numerous ways to make itself known: male peacocks fan out their glorious tail made up of iridescent eye-patterned feathers to attract peafowls; blue-ringed octopuses don’t need to invent an...
Banana Is a Paragon of Neutrality. I Propose Using It as a Metric to Rank All Fruits.
Line up all the world’s fruits, best to worst, taking into account every rateable aspect imaginable including taste, appearance, price, reliability and seasonality — the banana rests at the exact midd...
The Quiet Calm of Hiding From the Heat Under Phan Rang's Grapevines
The punishing mid-day sun dictates the pace of life in the corridor between Phan Rang and Cam Ranh, where locals escape to their living rooms or hammocks, and tourists seek the cooling breeze of the b...
The Curious Case of Quy Hoà Leprosy Colony's Park of Busts
A delightfully bizarre place, Quy Nhơn’s Quy Hoà leprosy colony deserves exploration in full, but clustered in a grove of trees on its outskirts in Nhân Ái Park stands a particularly peculiar assembla...
From Won to Đồng, Bánh Đồng Xu Offers a Slice of Nostalgia in the Digital Age
There was a time when I substituted meals with bánh đồng xu.
Monotonous Viet-Dubbed K-Dramas Were the Soundtrack of My Childhood
When I was growing up, my family owned a broken TV whose screen would unexpectedly go black while the audio continued to play. Turning it off and on again a couple of times would fix the problem, but ...
On Returning to K-Drama, the Glue Bringing My Mom and Me Close Together
Before Squid Game became an international phenomenon and put K-dramas on the world map, audiences in Asian countries including Vietnam were enthralled by Boys Over Flowers, The Medical Brothers, ...
An Ode to Photo Booths, the Korean Trend Preserving Our Memories in Time
How can photo booths be a new trend if they’ve been around forever?
At Bùi Chát's Painting Exhibition, a Freedom to Feel Without Preconceptions
Contemporary art can intimidate viewers. People often think they need familiarity with certain histories, theories, philosophies and biographies to appreciate a painting. I have friends who do not hav...
Every Morning, I'm Grateful for My Carless Ride to Work on Hoàng Sa Street
In the decade-plus of Saigoneer’s existence, we’ve had six offices strewn across different parts of Districts 1 and 3. Over that period, my homes have been located in Bình Thạnh and Thảo Điền, requiri...
Sweating out My Sadness on the Canal's Exercise Machines
We're all unlucky in love sometimes. When I am, I go jogging. The body loses water when you jog, so you have none left for tears.
Charting the Flow of the Nhiêu Lộc Canal From Start to Historical Start
When I fall in love with an album, I seek out the artist's first mixtapes and demos. When I come to admire a poet, I hunt down their early poems and chapbooks. I even linger over the old highlight ree...
How Nam Cao Almost Ruined My Favorite Canal Cafe
Spoilers for an 80-year-old story that every student in the nation is required to read: the dog dies, the old man dies, his son's misfortunes show no sign of abetting. Simply, misery abounds at the en...
The Nhiêu Lộc-Thị Nghè Canal's Comeback Story
Water has no hometown.
Our Toxic Relationship With Saigon Traffic: A Diagnosis
There is no way to describe Saigon traffic literally and have it understood by someone who has not experienced it.
An Homage to the Mekong Delta and Its Bag-Wearing Fruits
Rats, mice, mosquitos, snakes, centipedes, caterpillars, snails, beetles and slugs: the more fertile a region is, the more pests inhabit it.
On Delving Into Vietnam's Eras of Tết Firecrackers via My Family History
Is it a valid reverie or just mere misguided nostalgia to feel a sense of yearning for lives you’ve never lived?
Xông Đất and the Art of Not Letting Randos Into Your Home on Mùng Một
Tết permeates all areas of life this time of the year, from TV programs to online memes and highly detailed charts, tables, and infographics that guide people to participate in a popular new year acti...
In the Year of the Dragon, Confessions of a Supposedly 'Auspicious' Dragon Baby
During high school, I learned that babies born in years of the dragon were thought to be “fortunate” and thus, highly sought-after.
This Tết, I'm Finally Learning Our Family Recipe for Candied Coconut 'Flowers'
Tết is the perfect occasion of the year to go ham on the sugar.
On Warmly Welcoming the Whimsy of Wonky Tết Zodiac Statues
Every Tết arrives accompanied by netizens sharing collections of poorly constructed statues of the year’s zodiac animal. Viewing the online collections with colleagues is one of my favorite holid...
When Lịch Bloc Is Gone, What Will Vietnam Use to Keep Discarded Fish Bones?
I have never bought a lịch bloc, or tear-off calendar, for personal use, because every new year, I'm bound to be gifted a brand-new one. In Vietnam, a calendar is often something one purchases as a pr...
It's Tết: The Liberating Magic of Using Tết as an Excuse for Everything
I hate excuses.
How Choosing My Own Áo Dài Tết Healed My Trauma Over Áo Dài Uniform
High school can be a frustrating time in virtually every culture, as seen from the myriad of coming-of-age movies depicting the range of clichés, stereotypes and expressions of teenage angst we all go...
Did You Know That There's a Mummy on Nguyễn Bỉnh Khiêm Boulevard?
Why is there a mummy on display in Saigon?
Vignette: Local Ox Rampages Airport, Stops Flights, Gets Put in Museum in Huế
Name a famous buffalo.
Vignette: Behold Vietnam's Oldest Rock, a Memento Mori of Human Insignificance
While lamenting how long it had been since I’d last sent a postcard, a coworker at Saigoneer revealed that she is too young to have ever seen a stamp in person, let alone affixed one to a letter. The ...
Vignette: On the North-South Train, a Pastiche of the Human Condition
“Heavy with the thick smell of misery and before even leaving the station, the odor of urine would be palpable throughout the car,” writes author Dạ Ngân of the North-South Train in 1989. Back then, a...
Vignette: How Bình Định's Nón Ngựa Gave Me Hope for the Tourism Industry
In 1964, when Đỗ Văn Lan was only 14 years old, a group of American soldiers spent six months at his family’s Bình Định home learning how to make nón ngựa. Once he learned that I am American, he told ...
The Simple Pleasures of Kite-Flying in Thủ Thiêm
One of the most elegant means to observe the textured heft and untethered strength of otherwise-invisible wind — there is plenty one could say about the poetry of flying kites.
Vignette: Letters to Hàn Mặc Tử
Quy Nhơn residents mentioned Hàn Mặc Tử with great pride and reverence whenever I mentioned enjoying reading and writing poems.
Vignette: For Cafe 81 and the '404 Not Found' Places of Our Lives
We all have them.