Final Moments by Sangam Munsiff

On our second weekend, we took a day trip to the Mekong Delta. A sprawling maze of rivers, canals and swamps in southern Vietnam, the Delta is famous for it’s floating markets, fruit gardens, and rice paddies. We thought it would be a nice contrast to the bustling city streets of Hi Chi Minh City. We booked bus tickets to Cần Thơ, the largest city in the Mekong Delta region, and booked a hotel room as well. The busses in Vietnam are sleeper busses, so we passed out real quick.

Once we got to Cần Thơ, we had to book a tour. To our surprise, the hotel did not have any tours so we started walking around to figure something out. We wandered past a couple booking agencies that had closed for the night and eventually found another hotel. We asked if we could book a tour through them and they were happy to help. We booked a guided tour through a couple floating markets, a fruit garden, a local restaurant, and a rice noodles factory. In order to go to the floating markets, the tour had to start at 5 am….We wrapped up the night with some Korean fried chicken at Don Chicken.

Saturday morning rolled around and with we rolled out of bed, a little drowsy but excited for the day. We met our tour guides, Phi and Phat, and our group split into two separate boats, each commanded by its own driver. The first floating market we drove to was huge and we learned it was the largest market in Vietnam. The entire market was produce that farmera brought from their farms. The market was a “wholesale” market—venders would buy goods from the floating market to sell at their shops on land.

A floating market on the Mekong Delta.

Next, we went to a smaller, local floating market; this one was not as busy and had no tourists. We ate jackfruit, rambutan, dragon fruit and bananas for breakfast and a couple people got noodles and balut and had them on the boat. Then, we got off the boat and walked through a village. We stopped by a farm and our tour guide asked if we could come see the farm. The farmers happily let us in—they seemed excited and proud to show off their hard work and delicious fruits. The fruit they were growing was local to the region and didn’t have an English name. It had a lychee-like texture and its flavor was a mix between lychee and lemon. They offered us a couple bunches of fruit and we happily accepted.

An example of some of the fruit we tried, this one is called Baccaurea!

After that we walked through a fruit garden and ate at a local restaurant there. We also bought fresh coconuts to hydrate for the boat ride back. Between the markets and the farms, it was clear that the Vietnamese people are very proud of the work they do and the goods they sell. Everywhere we went, we were treated with kindness and respect, even though it was clear that we were tourists. On our way back, we stopped at a rice noodle factory and saw their noodle making process. We started our journey back and relaxed as the waves rocked us to sleep.