Catch up on all the latest Vietnam news and travel info with Matt & Mel on The Bureau Asia Podcast straight out of Ho Chi Minh City!
In this episode we catch up on travel news to Vietnam, including the new visa extensions kicking off on August 15, which will hopefully make Vietnam an even more attractive destination to visit for your next holiday.
It’s been a long haul to this point, but it looks like Vietnam is ready to accept greater numbers of tourists as we blast towards the festive end of the year.
We also learn about the Taiwanese matchmaker of Singapore who’s been diligently hooking up lonely Singaporean men looking for long-time love with Vietnamese ladies.
But the question remains: Just how fine is the line between innocently hooking lonely hearts up across international borders and people trafficking?
We also dive into a story that surfaced recently that focuses on a female Vietnamese traveller who questions why popular tourist destinations in Vietnam can’t take the lead from other countries like France and Japan, and offer friendly, enthusiastic and “proper” services.
Have we found the root cause of Vietnam’s often-mentioned low-return-rate?
Fun turns to seriousness when we discuss an initiative in Hanoi that’s aiming to reduce the number of child drownings. It’s believed as many as 2,000 children drown in Vietnam each year, making it one of the highest ranking countries globally for drowning deaths.
A school in the neighbourhood of Ba Vi has joined forces with the local government and corporate sponsors to implement a program that’s so far making a huge difference.
Moving from up north to almost the farthest south you can go in Vietnam, archaeologists have discovered curry seeds from possibly as far back as 2,000 years ago during a dig near the town of Oc Eo in the Mekong Delta.
The discovery confirms that dishes like Vietnam’s own curry chicken may have been around a whole lot longer than we thought!
Then to wrap up the episode, our “cover story” reveals five locations in Saigon where some really dark things have taken place throughout the city’s history, including a couple of well and truly off the tourist trail places that you’d never find otherwise.
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