As well as sending remittances, many are returning to their homeland
Photograph: Hannah Reyes Morales/New York Times/Redux /Eyevine
May 22nd 2025|HO CHI MINH CITYShareListen to this story
Fifty years ago Thinh Nguyen left his homeland aboard an American navy ship. Some of his compatriots escaped in helicopters. Tens of thousands fled in makeshift boats. Many more, including Mr Nguyen’s father and brother, were left behind as troops from North Vietnam stormed into Saigon, then the capital of American-backed South Vietnam. The chaotic evacuation marked the end of the Vietnam war, badly damaged American credibility and left Vietnam in Communist hands. It also helped create one of the world’s biggest diasporas.
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Read this article in Vietnamese at Sài·gòn·eer.From the very first discussions in 1868 regarding a new marketplace for Saigon, it was not until 1914, that Bến Thành Market became a reality. The birth of the market was like a dream come true, one that came together after nearly five decades of debate in search of solutions for the city’s infrastructure woes.
The five-decade quest to seek a “worthy” marketplace
In her research conducted on the vendors of Bến Thành, anthropologist Ann Marie Leshkowich recounts the lengthy discussions of then Saigon’s colonial administration regarding the establishment of a new commercial center, one that, according to them, must become a place “worthy” of the metropolis they were helping to create.
In 1868, the French had only spent about one decade trying to install a colonial network in Vietnam. Members of the Municipal Council (Conseil Municipal) had the thought of building a new marketplace from metal, replacing traditional thatch markets. In 1869, a budget of 110.000 francs was greenlit, but by 1870, the estimated expenditure had ballooned threefold, causing them to reconsider the planned building methods and amount of materials.
More night entertainment activities, festivals, and large-scale shopping centres are planned to make HCM City “a city that never sleeps.” — VNA/VNS Photo An Hiếu
HCM CITY — New York, famously known as the “city that never sleeps,” will soon be joined by HCM City, which is aspiring to that status in an effort to step up its tourism game.
The city, formerly known as Sài Gòn and the “Pearl of the Orient” in the early twentieth century, receives an average of 400,000 foreign tourists each month, generating revenues of thousands of billions of đồng, but some experts say it lacks night attractions that meet the demands of tourists looking to explore the city’s night life.
Lã Quốc Khánh, deputy director of the National Department of Tourism, said his office has found a real need among tourists to stay up late and explore the local night life.
“Some 30-40 per cent of national and international tourists want to go out after midnight, as well as 60-70 per cent of local citizens,” he told the Tuổi Trẻ newspaper, adding that the majority of foreign tourists typically suffer jet lag due to time differences and can only fall asleep after 2-3am. Tiếp tục đọc “Sleepless in HCM City: a tourism initiative”→
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