Is it Saigon or Ho Chi Minh City? My experience is that people who live there call it Saigon and those who don’t Ho Chi Minh. Myself I will call it Saigon because that name is more redolent of its history. One tip, how to cross the road in Saigon as you watch the endless wave of scooters and motor bikes the like of which I have never seen before, bearing down on you. At first you are stuck at the side of the road wondering how you will ever cross, but watch the Vietnamese and then you realise that the secret is just to step off the pavement into the massive flow of bikes. Then walk steadily, don’t stop and don’t change your pace and you will arrive at the other side as the bikes go round you. Its intimidating but amazing how it actually works.

In central Saigon is the Jade Emperor Pagoda, or Phuoc Hai Temple. This active Temple was built by the Chinese, being finished in 1909. It is also known as the Lucky Sea Temple. The Jade Emperor is a Supreme Taoist deity and the person who, according to legend, decides who goes to heaven and who to hell, so a significant figure!

The Temple also houses a turtle sanctuary, the turtle being a symbol of longevity and a symbol of good fortune and good luck. The temple is very active so as you look at it people for whom it is part of life worship there. One of the things that is striking in Vietnam is the generosity of the offerings of food that are presented at temples.

In the courtyard outside the temple is an incinerator in which people burn paper, often fake money on the basis that the smoke will reach to the ancestors and the deceased in heaven, the ancestors playing an important part of the spiritual life.

Some of the small sculptures that adorn the fringes of the building, round the roof, are beautiful depictions of religious scenes and life, done in a lifelike way and with amazing intricacy and a sense of reality. The Jade Emperor himself wears a large moustache typical of Cantonese culture, and reside in the room known as the Room of the 10 Hells.

The air in the Temple is rich with the smell of incense, the smoke of candles with its soft light illuminating the various statues which signify everything that the Temple celebrates, and it is alive with not just visitors but ordinary people doing their devotions. A beautiful place.