If there’s some vestige of old-world French colonial architecture in Saigon (which nobody calls Ho Chi Minh City), I haven’t found it yet. I’m sure there are some appealing nooks in this big, noisy, sprawling burgh. I only arrived here last night so what do I know? But I can say without qualification that Saigon is an aggressively commercial city with Godzilla-sized super-towers on every other block (at least in the downtown area) and that there are piles of garbage floating near the banks of the Saigon River. Plus the iPhone receptivity has been just awful and the wifi at the Saigon Grand Hotel is the worst I’ve ever experienced in any big-league town in my life. Saigon clearly has an economically vital pulse, but it lacks that culturally refined je ne sais quoi that always defines a great city. People always want your money wherever you travel, but the good citizens of Saigon really want it — merchants and street hustlers have been hitting on me relentlessly. I love the tall trees and the big parks, but it’s just not my kind of town. I’m guessing it might be a little bit like Bangkok, which The Hangover Part II and Only God Forgives convinced me to never, ever visit. I guess I’m just more of a Hanoi type of guy.