Ben Thanh Market is Saigon's central market so you can probably guess what a bursting and bustling space it is. It's a great place to stock up on souvenirs, T shirts, bags, coffee and many other local products that sell at a much higher price in the city's more upmarket shops. But even if you're not on a shopping mission, Ben Thanh Market is a must see.
It's a great place to start your education in local cuisine - very local. It's all there for you to see and sample for next to nothing -
pho, bun - the full collection of tasty southern Vietnamese soups and much more. You could easily return to the market's food court more than once for good quality inexpensive local cuisine. By night, the street food just outside the market is also very tasty and excellent value.
Photo: Mark BowyerMrs Be has been selling her distinctive Vietnamese desserts from this market stall for decades. Nor far from the food stands is the wet market. The Vietnamese capacity to conjure culinary wonders from most of the organs of most of the creatures in the local animal kingdom is there for all to see - and smell. The nearby fruit markets also feature some outstanding tropical exotica from the Mekong Delta not to be passed over during a visit to Saigon.
Ben Thanh Market has been the focus of the city's commercial life since it was completed under French rule nearly a century ago. It has outgrown the main structure and now spills over into the adjacent streets.
Saigonese are so enamoured of their central market that some of the huge diaspora that fled communism to the US and Australia in the 1970s and 80s built replicas of Ben Thanh Market in Orange County and Melbourne that are still operating.
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