Ben Thanh Market

We stopped in on our last morning in Saigon at Ben Thanh Market, the large open-air market in downtown. Here each morning at 3am come loads of small trucks carrying produce, meat and seafood from the countryside. And as we headed over to one of the most delicious noodle shops in the area specializing in rice noodles with seafood - especially Scuppy's favorite "shrimp grilled on sugar cane" - I met up with the morning refrigerant resupply force. Here freshness happens the same way it has for over 100 years - in terms of huge blocks of ice.

We also received news from our neighbors in Riverside that our air compressor broke and our house is a little on the hot side while we are gone - 96 degrees. That ice looks good!