Brief notes from Saigon's semi-prohibition phase...

Restaurants in Saigon opened up for dine-in customers last night. Happy d̶a̶y̶s̶ nights? Well, let’s say much of the city probably has very mixed feelings about it. In all central districts, restaurants were not supposed to be serving alcohol, which tempered the celebratory mood of many no doubt.

Yesterday evening, your faithless correspondent took to the streets on his bicycle to soak up the sober scenes. Would no one really be (visibly) drinking at street-side venues?

There was some evidence they’d be wise not to – as I passed a craft brewery’s flagship restaurant in the Da Kao ward, the police were entering the courtyard. I guess we can call this little routine a ‘beverage’ inspection (**semi-prohibition phase tip for beer drinkers: put a load of empty ginger ale cans on the table. They’ll never suspect a thing!).

But in Saigon, well, there’s a lot of beer halls and lots of quan nhau (beer & grill joints). The local constabulary could only ever survey a slender selection on any given night. I pedalled on and, although many punters were sipping innocently on soft drinks, sinh tố and coconuts, sure enough, deep into D3 and Phu Nhuan, I heard the familiar sounds of ‘men who have been drinking for some period of time’. Not hidden in the back but right out front, as bold as bawdy pirates in an ungoverned port town.

Aside #1: Whenever I detoured, down hẻm and side streets, I continually passed clusters of men cracking into the cans with their tops off outside someone’s gaff. I mean, it’s not as if drinking alcohol has been banned…

Aside #2: In recent years, dozens of speakeasy **themed** bars have opened in Saigon, and now that their prohibition fantasy has come true, part of me wants to hear that behind shuttered windows, some folk are sipping on an intoxicating late-night libation, and in honour of Spats Colombo, the password is always:“I’ve come for grandma’s funeral…”

Anyway, as I meandered home, following the canal road, there was a wonderful bit of comic timing as a group of friends (middle class men and women in their late 20s, I’d say), sitting outside a quan, all cheers'd + clink'd with glasses brimming over with beer & ice RIGHT AT THE EXACT MOMENT when one of those little local ward police vans rolled by, very, very slowly... the punters arms all froze, glasses still held aloft, and their heads turned 45 degrees to see that it was… just two young dogsbody-drivers inside the van peering out the window. And so, the cheers’ing and clinking resumed…

But did they get away with it? Or did the drivers grass on them? Did the police eventually turn up and perform a beverage inspection? And what happens when that happens? Well, this cycling correspondent has no idea. He spent the rest of the evening outside the best and wholly legitimate strip of bars in town: Circle K - 7/11 - FamilyMart. Happy d̶a̶y̶s̶ nights.