Photo Essay: CET Vietnam

July 16, 2019

Photos by Vanessa Dinh (University of Michigan- Ann Arbor), Student Correspondent CET Vietnam Summer 2019

A view through the second floor window of a coffee shop called Là Việt Coffee Sài Gòn.

This is a Buddhist temple called Vĩnh Nghiêm pagoda in District 3.

A couple of CET students with our roommates in some green tea fields in Đà Lạt. We later drank tea from the leaves that were grown in this field!

View from Cafe Eon, just one floor above the Saigon Skydeck, on the facing the Saigon River. FYI: buying a cup of coffee from Cafe Eon was about half of the price as a ticket to the Skydeck, so this would be a good option if you want to see the amazing views without the expensive ticket prices!

This is hanging spiral incense called nhang. At the top of the nhang, there is a prayer written on a piece of paper. Once the incense burns to the end, the prayer is burned along with it, so that the prayer is sent to the gods.

Here is a section of the aó dài exhibit at the South-Vietnamese Women Museum in District 3.

We randomly stopped by this cultivated flower valley in Đà Lạt. The main attraction here were the hoa cẩm tú cầu, or the hydrangea flowers.

CET treated the students to Japanese-style pizzas at Pizza 4P’s, which is an environmentally conscious restaurant in Ho Chi Minh City.

If you ever go to Đà Lạt, you should go out to get cà phê chồn, which is weasel coffee. Apparently, when coffee beans are digested by weasels, it enhances the taste of the coffee. Not sure if this is true, but it tasted pretty good to me!

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Cover photo caption: Up-close shot of Landmark 81, the tallest building in Ho Chi Minh City. It’s located in the Bình Thạnh District near the Saigon River.