And by the way ...

I have moved to Ho Chi Minh City. More rain, more people, more high rise buildings, more noise, more sweet food... Among the things occupying my mind since coming down here is the southern Vietnamese accent. I had the amusing experience the other day of someone telling me that my Vietnamese accent was very good, but that she still couldn't understand me! It goes back to the inherently arbitrary notion of a 'proper' accent. Today someone compared the northern and southern Vietnamese accents to someone speaking the Queen's English in, say, Alabama. I wouldn't want to push that comparison very far, but it is true that in southern Vietnamese the vowels tend to stretch out and mix together in surprising ways, and the remaining sounds are apparently optional!

Anyway, my first post from Saigon has nothing really to do with crowds or the local accent.

A few photos from Giac Lam Pagoda.

A tree looking at a reflection of a fish ..

And at the zoo they have the most common animal in Vietnam (trừ con chuột, con muỗi..) hands down - penguinular refuse-receptacalus!

As well as more typical zoo animals like tigers

and rhinos.

Along with lotus ponds to sit beside.