Jonas Koo - Life is the trips

Ho Chi Minh City, formerly named Saigon is the largest city in Vietnam today.
Under the name Saigon, it was the capital of the French colony of Cochin-china and later of the independent state of South Vietnam from 1955-75. In 1976, Saigon merged with the surrounding Gia Định Province and was officially renamed Hồ Chí Minh City (although the name Sài Gòn is still commonly used.)

The city center is situated on the banks of the Saigon River, 60 kilometers (37 mi) from the South China Seaand 1,724 km from Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam.

Located in the North of Vietnam’s East Sea, 165 km east from. Today’s Ho Chi Minh City is the bustling and vibrating economic center of the South and of Vietnam. Over the past few centuries, Saigon was called "The Pearl of the Far East or The Pearl of the Orient” and was an important trading center for the Chinese, Japanese and Western Merchants who traveled the Saigon River.

The metropolitan area, which consists of the Hồ Chí Minh City metropolitan area, Thủ Dầu Một, Dĩ An, Biên Hòa and surrounding towns, is populated by more than 9,000,000 people, making it the most populous metropolitan area in Vietnam and the countries of the former French Indochina. The Greater Hồ Chí Minh City Metropolitan Area, a metropolitan area covering most parts of Đông Nam Bộ plus Tiền Giang and Long An provinces under planning will have an area of 30,000 square kilometers with a population of 20 million inhabitants by 2020.

Saigon is a name so evocative that it conjures up a thousand jumbled images. Wander through timeless alleys to ancient pagodas or teeming markets, past ramshackle wooden shops selling silk, spices and baskets, before fast-forwarding into the future beneath sleek skyscrapers or at designer malls, gourmet restaurants and minimalist bars. The ghosts of the past live on in the churches, temples, former GI hotels and government buildings that one generation ago witnessed a city in turmoil, but the real beauty of Saigon’s urban collage is that these two worlds blend so seamlessly into one.

Some Saigon Landscape Photos