Talk:Ho Chi Minh City

Shouldn't this page be at Saigon, per the article naming conventions? Very few travelers call it HCM City, and even official signs and train schedules say "Saigon". I think Saigon is the most common English name for this place. --(WT-en) Evan 16:30, 10 Aug 2004 (EDT)

Yeah, even though (as I recall) I'm the one who started this page as HCM, I think we should just go with Saigon.

Technically, HCM and Saigon are a bit different -- HCM is a municipality which encompasses the district of Saigon. So we could have an HCM article and a Saigon article under it, but I don't think that's necessary. -- (WT-en) Paul Richter 20:10, 10 Aug 2004 (EDT)

I'll cast a dissenting vote here: HCMC is the official name of the city and we should respect that in the title. In the content Saigon can also be used where applicable. (WT-en) Jpatokal 21:55, 10 Aug 2004 (EDT)

"Official" doesn't factor. We use the most common English name for article titles, not the official name. See Project:article naming conventions for discussions about this. --(WT-en) Evan 02:28, 11 Aug 2004 (EDT)

I'm maybe a bit paranoid and over-reacting but I think because the America and some scum bags(note, only SOME, not all) in California don't like the name Ho Chi Minh City (that's why after 30 years IATA code is still "SGN" instead of "HCM"). And to Evan, on the URL to naming convention "This version of Wikivoyage is in English (but see language versions of Wikivoyage), so article names should be in English. If a place doesn't have a name originally in English.." and the official name of the place right NOW is Ho Chi Minh City. Also HCMC beat Saigon on my Google News test (majority of saigon news is miss saigon, beer saigon, or "US Embassy in Saigon, South Vietnam, at 4 am April 30, 1975. It’s the holiday season"..,etc , not the place itself. And also majority if not ALL news services such as CBC, BBC, AP,etc use the word Ho Chi Minh City, not Saigon.

I'd be interested to see some numbers on HCM City being the most common English name for the city. Also, please, don't bandy about the "official" name; it doesn't factor at all. See why Wikivoyage doesn't use official names for details. --(WT-en) Evan 22:09, 11 Dec 2004 (EST)

Update: I did a search on Google News got 1200+ hits for "Ho Chi Minh City", about 1000+ for Saigon (factoring out "Miss Saigon", "Beer Saigon", and "Little Saigon"). Most of the other hits talked about the "fall of Saigon", which would be historically accurate. Anyways, I think that's definitely good enough to leave this article here -- but we should make sure to have a redirect. --(WT-en) Evan 22:15, 11 Dec 2004 (EST)

Weasel coffee

I just googled and found some pages that say that the coffee fruit is eaten by weasels, not rodents. In Indonesia they have kopi luwak, which is passed through civets. Civets and weasels are both carnivores, not rodents. -(WT-en) phma 20:10, 10 Sep 2004 (EDT)

Visas

You can actually obtain a visa at the border if you are a citizen of Sweden, Norway or Denmark and if you intend to stay for less than 15 days. I just did it myself today (Nov 27, 2010) so I am 100% sure it works for at least Swedish citizens coming in by plane. Perhaps it is different crossing the border by land?

Closed listings

The following listings have closed. Should they reopen or relocate, please re-add to the appropriate article:

• Heart Of Darkness [1], 17b Le Thanh Ton. Based on the Cambodian equivalent, this is a friendly mid-range bar. Broadly a dance-centric "teacher-friendly" expat bar, but plays to all-comers.

Renaming of Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City

Until recently, the article said:

Saigon was officially renamed Ho Chi Minh City on May 1st 1975.

This was changed [2] to:

Saigon was officially renamed Ho Chi Minh City in June of 1976.

WikiPedia:Ho_Chi_Minh_City#Current_Vietnamese_name says:

On May 1, 1975, after the fall of South Vietnam, the now ruling communist government renamed the city after the alias of their leader, Ho Chi Minh (chu nom: 胡志明).

So I attempted a compromise:

Saigon was renamed Ho Chi Minh City after the Fall of Saigon in 1975 [3]

That was changed back, so then I tried:

Following the Fall of Saigon in 1975, Saigon was renamed Ho Chi Minh City [4]

Now, the following change has just been made and reverted [5]:

As from June of 1976, the Government of Vietnam decided to change the name of Saigon-Gia Dinh city into Hochiminh city. It's so stupid that someone always states that "Following the Fall of Saigon in 1975" as in this website; if you're a resident of Saigon, you have to know that.

For me at least, "dating" the change with respect to directly related major events/circumstances seems more important than knowing exactly what day of the week it was (especially when it was 30 years ago).

Suggestions welcome. ~ 203.144.143.4 04:13, 23 January 2008 (EST)

Food Prices

130'000 dong is £4, there is no way that's budget in Saigon. You can get food for 30'000 dong in places like the Sinh Cafe, and pretty much all the restaurants we went to in Saigon, even near the Continental we only spent 60k dong for a meal. This was in September 2007 (WT-en) Eraserhead1 16:43, 4 March 2008 (EST)

Tourists/Locals in bars section

Who separated the bars section? It's bad enough just segregating tourists and locals, but to have done such a bad editing job of it. It's embarrasing.

Political debacle

In the Museum of Vietnamese History listing there has been an edit war over this phrase... "unfortunately they are accompanied by signage which is both in poor English and full of risible Marxist distortions. Read up on Vietnamese history first or you'll have no idea what you're looking at." Please discuss any changes to the phrase here, before this turns into a mindless edit war. --(WT-en) Stefan (sertmann) ^Talk 06:43, 22 April 2009 (EDT)

What??? Having been I can confirm the "risible Marxist distortions" do not exist. IF noting how much the country suffered during the 'Vietnam' (or 'American' war) is risible & Marxist then I really wonder about Wikivoyage, and whatever barrow pushing is going on. In fact the signs & guides are very restrained in what they could say. I hope other peopel will keep their political opinions to themselves and just report what may be of use to visitors. —The preceding comment was added by (WT-en) 222.68.248.91 (talk • contribs)

Part of the problem here is that the phrase "risible Marxist distortions" looks troublingly like good travel writing, and that its removal looks motivated by either politics or a misunderstanding of what travel writing is supposed to be. That and the fact that the original writer of said phrase was someone who was actually making a lot of positive contributions to the site... --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 19:42, 19 July 2009 (EDT)

There is no need for discussion. There is no constrovercy. This is because these signs do not exist. Maybe they did. BUT THEY DO NOT NOW. Please do not revert back to previous content. If WIkitravel refuses to up-to-date contribution then it is a very low quality, inaccurate & useless. —The preceding comment was added by (WT-en) 219.141.183.162 (talk • contribs)

When there is disagreement, then there is need for discussion. That's just how a wiki works. The problem is that we get a lot of well-meaning edits from contributors seeking to remove (neuter) text that might be seen in anyway controversial. Instead of just removing the offending text, why not try replacing it with something just as lively. --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 16:00, 22 July 2009 (EDT)

On VirtualTourist, a couple of the reviews (from as far back as 2006) note that this is the exception to the rule among HCMC museums, in that it's clear of propaganda. The printed guidebooks I've skimmed also don't have any mention of it. I'd suggest we leave it out — other HCMC museums are so full of said distortions that the original contributor may have conflated the history museum with another. (WT-en) Gorilla Jones 18:33, 22 July 2009 (EDT)

Thank you Gorilla. I am amazed that other people who have not visited the museum consider they are in a position to comment on what is present. I understand Wikivoyage wants people to contribute, and surely those with first hand experience must be valued. Having been to the museum just under 3 weeks I ago there was nothing that could be described as risible, marxist or distortions. I will change the article now.

Yes, I think this is the definitely the right decision - I'd agree with the article at [6] that it is definitely one of the better museums in terms of content and guiding people through the history of the country, and it would be a shame to put visitors off completely.

Hair Salons

Under the list of things to Do are hair salons. There are a handful of "beauty salons" on or near Bui Thi Xuan St. in District 1 that appear like car show rooms filled with young women in tight dresses sitting around reading magazines, but not cutting hair. I inquired with a guide and also a cab driver and was told that one could get a hair cut at these establishments as an opening to something illegal. I'm wondering if this should be appended in the article to reflect this "confirmed" observation.

According to the Project:Sex tourism policy, it's not our job to list brothels, but I've added a note. (WT-en) Jpatokal 22:56, 2 September 2009 (EDT)

Shouldn't the "Happy Ending Massage" parlor be removed then? 220.255.7.235 11:07, 22 February 2010 (EST)

Saigon River

This listing was recently removed by an anon user, anyone know if it should? --(WT-en) Stefan (sertmann) ^talk 10:16, 27 May 2010 (EDT)

• The Saigon River. Believe it or not, the Saigon river is for swimming! Many a traveler rave to their friends and family about this opportunity to have fun with the locals. It is considered rude to done a traditional bathing suit; instead the custom is to wear jeans or slacks and a shirt or blouse - essentially you should look like you just finished work and really want to go for a swim. The park in front of the Renaissance Hotel offers nice views and access to the river. Make sure you know how to cross the road before attempting to get there. Expect to encounter some beggars in the park.

Apartments by the month were removed

I had added a section under "Sleep" for monthly apartments. I've lived in HCMC for 4 months and found searching for apartments to be difficult and the least available resource on the internet. I added the following apartment that I have stayed at which caters to travelers/foreign guests. It was deleted though, is there a reason for this? I would love more information like this to be available on wikivoyage personally.

Grace Apartment, 231/7A Le Van Sy St, Ward 14, Phu Nhuan Dist, HCMC, ☏ +(+84 8) 39918456, apartmentptt@gmail.com. $300-$700/mo. Great apartment catering to foreigners. About 10 minutes outside of Dist 1 (far side of Dist 3, easy to get to). They have a gym, rooftop garden, laundry. Great rooms. Prices as of late 2010: $300 for single room, $500 for 1 bdrm w/ kitchen (very nice rooms), and $700ish for larger rooms.

Airport Taxi

Actually there is no need to panic when taking a taxi from HCMC airport: if you do not mind paying USD 11 for a ride to the city center, select one of the taxi stands on the arrival side, between the customs and the exit. —The preceding comment was added by (WT-en) JeanLouisV (talk • contribs)

Yellow pages at it's best

I already did some cleanup on this page, but there is still a horrible amount of irrelevant small shops, food stores (sometimes even without address) and so on. So either this page should be split up in some district pages like for example Bangkok, or the lists should be cleaned from the less relevant or interesting options. E.g. entries for supermarkets or coffee chains are quite irrelevant imho. Some cleanup would be fast an painless, but splitting it would probably be better in the long run. —The preceding comment was added by ‎Ml31415 (talk • contribs)

I think both of your ideas are good and necessary! We should split HCMC into districts, while also removing a lot of the extraneous listings and garbage. It's unfortunate that a lot of our Asian city articles get clogged up with this sort of stuff. Are you a Ho Chi Minh local that may be able to help define the district borders? I just came back from visiting there a month ago, but didn't manage to formulate a thorough understanding of the city's neighbourhoods and divisions. JamesA ^>talk 07:53, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

No, I'm just a fellow traveller currently hanging around in Vietnam for a while. So I'd be fine to do the cleanup, but with separating the districts I'm afraid I can't help. But maybe it would already be enough to start with some additional "District 1" page, which would probably cover most of what had do be split in districts. Pages for other districts, or group of districts could follow, when someone familiar with HCMC enough finds some spare time.

Well it's great to have you onboard on this wiki! When splitting districts, we usually do them all at once and decide on all the districts together. So if we were to split off District 1, we'd have to split off the whole of HCMC. There's no reason we can't, though, as there's a lot of resources online, as well as the official divisions. JamesA ^>talk 12:42, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

When I see it right, there are 19 inner districts and 5 outer districts. So what you suggest would be, to split the current article in 24 town-template things. I'm not sure if this would be wise, as in that case the majority of the new articles would be empty or nearly empty, and anything that would have been put to one of these nearly empty things would be kind of lost and invisible, if everybody only clicks on district one, as there is the main action, but the one or two also relevant destinations in neighbouring districts won't be seen anymore, even if they would be just a footwalk away. So I think splitting it into a bunch of subpages (center, south, ...) would be great, but I think splitting it into 24 would only make it even less usable. Ml31415^✉ (talk) 20:19, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

Reliability of Taxis

I see Vinasun is listed as one of the two reliable companies, alongside Mai Linh.

About two weeks ago, a Vinasun driver turned a 2.8km ride into a 5km one for me. A Mai Linh driver made the same trip a few days later in the predicted 2.8km (Airport to Thien Vu hotel.)

I realize this is an isolated incident, but seeing Vinasun listed as a reliable company when they scammed me (Yes, I'm certain it was really Vinasun, not an impostor) feels misleading to me.

Lee Hostel Home For Backpackers

Should we delete the listing per Wikivoyage:Avoid negative reviews or leave the warning up as helpful to travelers? Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:50, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

Medical services

Moving the listings below off the article page as they appear to be more advertising business rather than health services for travellers. --Traveler100 (talk) 17:15, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

As the business listings remained on the talk page for over a year without anyone stepping forward to justify their inclusion in the article, and have become a target for touting, I've removed them. Talk pages are no more a place for touting than are articles. They remain in the history in the event anyone wants to argue for them to be restored to the article. Ground Zero (talk) 00:09, 6 August 2020 (UTC)

Air quality

As the local news rolled around this, the air quality here is a hot topic, especially the city is ranked 12th in the world with 157 US AQI in Airvisual here https://www.airvisual.com/vietnam/ho-chi-minh-city. Should we add this and where should we add this to? Thanks. Keranzy (talk) 02:36, 22 November 2019 (UTC)

"Stay safe", given the absence of a "Stay healthy" section (which some people think is not an option in Wikivoyage:Big city article template, anyway). Ikan Kekek (talk) 02:42, 22 November 2019 (UTC)

Banner

Perhaps it's time we should update the banner to be something more attractive. Perhaps we can use one of the old French colonial buildings like this one to make a new banner. What do people think?

This is an example of a building we could use, I think:

The dog2 (talk) 15:07, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

That's the People's Committe Hall, which is the building in the first article in the article. I think the current banner is not a good representation of HCMC today -- maybe some years ago, but not now. Ground Zero (talk) 15:28, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

Current banner

Some alternatives:

Banner 1

File:Ho Chi Minh City banner 2.jpg

Banner 2

Banner 3

Ground Zero (talk) 15:42, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, I'd prefer the latter two. Ho Chi Minh City is still a bustling city with lots of motorbikes, but I don't think that is a good banner for a travel article, since people don't generally visit a place just to see motorbikes buzzing around. The skyline picture is nice as it represents Ho Chi Minh City well as an up and coming global city that is developing rapidly, while the old South Vietnam presidential palace is one of the must visit attractions when you come. The dog2 (talk) 16:18, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

Great suggestions. My first choice is the fountain, followed by the skyline, but any of the three would be better than the current banner. (Caveat: I've never been to Ho Chi Minh City and don't know much about it.) The current banner is aesthetically pleasing, though – maybe we could use it in some other article, like in Working abroad as a more interesting depiction of commuting than the banner that's there now. —Granger (talk · contribs) 16:51, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

I haven't been to Vietnam, but my choices are #2 and then #1. I might prefer the existing banner to #3. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:33, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

The old South Vietnam presidential palace (Banner 3) is a really beautiful building, inside and out, if you like modernist architecture. It was a highlight for me of visiting HCMC, but it is hard to capture in a 7:1 photograph. I agree with The dog2 that HCMC is a modern and rapidly growing city, so the skyline might be the best representation of that. The government wants to demolish the old quarters and replace them with skyscrapers, so images of Old Saigon aren't representative. Ground Zero (talk) 21:02, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

2, 1 and 3 for me. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 21:45, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

So based on the comments here, I guess banner 2 will be the best compromise then? The dog2 (talk) 19:58, 9 October 2021 (UTC)

Probably SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 22:52, 9 October 2021 (UTC)

I think so. Ground Zero (talk) 00:01, 10 October 2021 (UTC)

Done replaced. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 05:03, 10 October 2021 (UTC)

Hi, guys. I'm sorry to tell you that the current banner was cropped from a copyvio file and will be deleted on Commons soon. 0x0a (talk) 12:03, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Replacement banner

@SHB2000, The dog2, Ikan Kekek, Mx. Granger: With #2 being deleted, what are our choices for a replacement? My choice is: #1, #3, current. Ground Zero (talk) 13:46, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Mine would be #3, #1, current. The dog2 (talk) 13:53, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

• 1, 3, current. Ikan Kekek (talk) 14:29, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
• 1 is my favorite of the three. —Granger (talk · contribs) 15:12, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
• 1, 0, 3. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 20:14, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Based on these votes from editors who participated in the last discussion, I've replaced the banner with #1. If other editors weigh in on behalf of #3, we can change it later. Ground Zero (talk) 21:12, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Article out-of-date

Swept in from the pub

I need to update Ho Chi Minh City article in the next days. I ask for somebody to check my edits there. Claude van der Grift (talk) 07:00, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

@Claude van der Grift: Sure. Will check your edits. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta.wikimedia) 07:08, 30 July 2022 (UTC)

dublicate sight

The "See" number 2 and 7 covers the same sight. Is somebody good in merging text? :) 80.187.74.187 22:00, 28 August 2022 (UTC)

Perhaps you? :-) Ikan Kekek (talk) 04:43, 29 August 2022 (UTC)

meh. I gave my best – unknown user (now, UTC)

I have to echo what Ikan Kekek mentioned. Why not just Wikivoyage:Plunge forward? If it doesn't seem idiomatic to me, I'll take a stab at copyediting it, but it doesn't hurt to try. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 07:58, 29 August 2022 (UTC)

Districts

HCMC is a huge city and the sheer amount of content is starting to demand we create districts for it here as well. Anybody care to take a stab at districts? Jpatokal (talk) 07:52, 9 April 2024 (UTC)