Ho Chi Minh City

Paris is a "coup de foudre" - a thunderbolt, love at first sight - but Saigon is more like a shoe that doesnt fit quite right at first. It rubs at you a bit, irritates you, drowns you in noise and flashiness and honking.

But it grows on you, in the back of your mind, working some kind of magic. We're back because it's the hub. If you're going anywhere, you're leaving from here, or else logistics and budgets get blown away.

And then, we find....we're happy to be back! This city breathes and pulses, and draws you in. Sights and sounds you'll never see anywhere else:

Rows of construction workers perched on tiny colourful stools

A worker carefully sweeping the street in front of a hotel with wide broom...directly under a parked car.

Men using their scooters like recliners, resting comfortably against the handlebars.

Young girls everywhere, posing in their best ao Dai, traditional Vietnamese dress for women. It's apparently customary at New Years to dress in your finest and take photos at landmark locations. This would normally annoy me, to be honest, but they are just so young, so pretty, so animated. Surely as a once annual event, we can enjoy their careful posing.

And some of what you don't see. You can buy cigarettes, beer, alcohol from a little stand, or even from someone with a little square of sidewalk set up with their goods. But we don't see drugs, anywhere. I'm sure they're somewhere, but here in the main district 1, the tourism centre....nothing. Or the other 2 or 3 districts we've seen.

We feel safe, even over uncertain paving, even where its dark. Because people here are incredibly friendly. We've been given a corkscrew, because the vendor didn't have one to sell us. He ran across the street, can't back smiling with one in hand, and refused payment.

At a souvenir shop, the sales associate told me to pick out a magnet, for free, after we'd already paid. Insisted I should have it as a souvenir.

That's the takeaway for us. That a city twice the size of Vancouver feels both bigger and smaller at once. Urban amenities offered by people with small town friendliness.

What's not to like about that!Read more