Saigon Skyscrapers 🇻🇳 Landmark 81 and Thủ Thiêm Ward

461-meter giant, the tallest building in Vietnam, Landmark 81. The second tallest in Southeast Asia. However, located away from downtown so, on June 26, 2024, I decided to set off to a bridge over the Saigon River to have a lovely vista of this skyscraper.

What a Sailor!

Meanwhile, on the way:

The whole walk was supposed to be a day without photographing people. Almost zero energy in my social battery, that was why. But when I saw two Vietnamese sailors, I couldn't miss the opportunity to photograph another angle of Saigon life... so I got excited (not without a caffeine overdose, of course) and walked directly to them. One of the young men agreed to pose for me.

It is weird but I couldn't help but think how proud of him his mom is.

Meanwhile, I was getting closer to the main attraction of the walk, Landmark 81 skyscraper:

A Break for a Nerd Stuff

By this fence, I found the great colonizer of Asia, and decided to take a couple of pix:

Muntingia, a South-American tree which is literally everywhere in Southeast Asia thanks to its edible fruits with the persimmon taste, shaped and textured like gooseberries. 🤓 Ideal for birds, and that's the way this tree has managed to spread everywhere - thorough birds' stomachs.

Underbridge Illegal Hotel??

I was ascending a bridge over Saigon River to reach a better point for shooting Landmark 81 and discovered this under the bridge:

No need for a hotel in Saigon if you are not afraid of being robbed. However. It might be there are people under this bridge who accept payments in exchange of guarding you from thieves. Because, when people park bikes on sidewalks, there are almost always security men accepting small notes. Here can be the same. 🤔

Another thing to consider: look, these guys, aren't homeless, they are people with some income, with new motorbikes and valuables in their pockets. Many of them are probably resting for a couple of hours under this bridge but some can stay at night too, perhaps. Vietnamese rest and sleep right on bikes, and these people have hammocks... Why? 🤔

And another piece: a man noticed me and angrily gestured for me to stop taking images. Vietnamese men never say "don't photograph" without a reason...

Saigon of Tomorrow

At last, I was on the bridge, and entering Thủ Thiêm ward (pronounce it as "two team"):

I can speculate about this and that, about wild capitalism in a (pseudo)socialist country but... that's a marvel that Vietnam has such constructions after decades of big troubles.

Landmark 81 at last:

Not bad, I would say, but hardly a masterpiece.

I had been near and around it in 2019. So this time, I decided just to enjoy a remote view.

Downtown

On the right side of the Saigon River, I had this:

Downtown, which coincides with the old colonial core of the city. That shot I took on this day too, just at the beginning of the walk in downtown:

Mangroves Become Concrete Jungle

On the opposite side of the river, there is a zone that was occupied by mangroves one day. It's easy to prove if you look at older maps. Even now Google.Maps satellites of Thủ Thiêm look quite mangrovian:

There are still charming nipa palms on the riverbank:

But that's not for a long time: they are turning this area into a concrete jungle.

So sad that they decided to destroy this green area instead of turning it into the a park. There is not a single park here that can be compared with the beauty of Bangkok parks... Saigon is behind Bangkok in so many things. Time to change it?

A sad landscape...

I wanted to visit those nipa palms to see if there were interesting birds but:

Restricted area, security guards asked me to leave, alas.

Entering the area, and finding a modern city there:

Streets are already too narrow, as you see, although the area looks underpopulated or, better to say, almost empty.

Probably, you need wider streets when you construct so many 30- or-so-floor houses.

It reminds me of residential multi-floor giants in Xian, China, I witnessed. They construct 30 floors and save money on elevators; as a result, there is always a crowd on the ground floor queuing for an elevator.

Live tomorrow" - truly, this place isn't about today: construction is still going on.

Glass high-rise buildings shine in the sun, waiting for investors. But outside the guarded area there are wastelands, garbage, stray dogs, and all that.

I wanted to continue walking towards the next bridge over Saigon River but a street I found on Google.Maps was blocked with a construction fence. So I had to return back to the downtown.

The same bridge but another side and the opposite direction:

The weather was turning grayer and that somehow fit the architecture:

Having walked along the river for a while, I eventually plopped myself down on the bench and thought: "Yep, getting older."