Here are some tips from Eric if you plan to go to Vietnam for a holiday trip.

1) Direct flight on Vietnamese Airlines from Shanghai to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City). Stayed at the Indochine Hotel (about USD35/night; booked through booking.com, since that way changeable/cancellable)—small, nothing special, but fine/good for us (a big king bed, for all four of us), excellent location. One day, saw the War Remnants Museum and the Reunification Palace. In the evening, went bowling at the Diamond Mall (4th floor?), then caught a movie there (13th floor?). The next day, arranged through Vivu Tours for a driver to take us out to the Cu Chi Tunnels, stopping at the Cao Dai Temple (at Tay Ninh) on the way (~USD120 for all of us, all-inclusive for the day). If I were to do it again, I might prefer to do the Tunnels visit by boat, but I waited until too long to do that, and as a result the boats had no room for us. As far as I could tell, there are two kinds of boats—a plebian one and a more elite (and more expensive) one. The Tunnels have two locations and we went to the further-away one because apparently it’s less likely to have gobs of tourists (we were the only ones there!).