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T
on That Quynh Chau, 43, an
electricity engineer working at
AB Tower next to the five-star
New World Hotel Saigon in Ho
Chi Minh City’s District 1, gets a cof-
fee every morning for VND8,000 (40
cents) from a nearby sidewalk vendor
he has known for years. Asked whether
he would consider a cup from the Star-
bucks coffee store nearby he said: “It
never enters my mind; I have been
drinking black coffee from small side-
walk shops like this for 25 years.”
Saigon is full of coffee shops, both
cheap and expensive. This means a cup
is never more than a short walk away,
but for some even that is too far. Nguy-
en Hong Son, a busy reporter, prefers
not to leave his desk when he is under
pressure. “When I want a cup of coffee,
I just make a call and five minutes later
it is in my hand,” he says.
Sidewalk culture
Starbucks doesn’t appeal to the
thousands and thousands who still want
to sit on the sidewalk for a coffee. They
sit chatting on small plastic or wooden
stools in the intense afternoon heat,
or in the cool morning atmosphere.
They enjoy
cà phê đá
(black coffee with
ice) or
cà phê s
ữ
a đá
(iced coffee with
sweetened condensed milk) which have
distinctly Vietnamese flavours.
Signs of change
Saigon residents are getting busier
and the city has become nosier - two
factors which have led to the rise of air-
conditioned, up-market coffee shops.
Foreign owned coffee shops like Star-
bucks, Gloria Jean Coffees, The Coffee
In Ho Chi Minh City
coffee lovers now face
a bewildering variety of
options, from sidewalk
cafes to big name in-
ternational chains and
even mobile baristas.
Tuong Thuy
takes a
look at how the scene
has evolved.
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