Saigon Goes to the Superbowl

[Peter_Donahoe@notes.rbs.org]

From: Peter Donahoe@RBS on 06/06/97 03:31 PM


  Saigon Goes to the Superbowl

  American-Style Mall Draws Young, Newly Affluent Vietnamese

  By Kevin Sullivan
  Washington Post Foreign Service
  Friday, June 6, 1997; Page A29
  The Washington Post

  HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam

  It was Saturday night and the Saigon Superbowl was buzzing. Pop
  music blared over the crashing of bowling pins. All 32 alleys were
  filled with cash-flush young Vietnamese in flashy clothes,
  drinking beer and rolling balls the color of creamsicles and
  gumdrops.

  Elsewhere in the two-story complex, the huge video arcade was full
  and there were lines at all eight tables in the billiards parlor.
  Families drank Coke and watched "Flintstones" cartoons on TV
  screens in the food court, which smelled of hamburgers and fries.

  Downstairs in the shopping mall, a life-size poster of Cindy
  Crawford hawked Revlon cosmetics; a toy store sold Legos, Fisher-
  Price baby bikes and Civil War Nurse Barbie; shoppers browsed
  through 20 other stores selling jewelry and squash rackets, Baskin-Robbins ice
  cream and Georgetown Hoyas baseball caps.
  Elderly people and giggling children rode the escalator over and
  over, amazed at the contraption.

  While much of Vietnam, including some noisy neighborhoods just
  outside the mall's doors, is still the land of dirt roads and
  flimsy shacks remembered by a generation of Americans, this year-
  old, $13.5 million complex is a symbol of one of Asia's fastest-
  growing economies.

  It is also a sign of Vietnam's demographics: More than 60 percent
  of the population is younger than 25, the vast majority  born
  after the Vietnam War ended in 1975. For most of the people
  browsing the American-style shopping mall and making their first
  awkward strides in candy-striped bowling shoes, the war and all
  its anti-American baggage are burdens that belong to a different generation.

  "The young people in Vietnam right now, we don't care if it's
  American or Chinese or anything else; if it's fun and it's new, we
  will pick it up," said Le Thuy Anh, 28, who works in Coca-Cola's corporate
  office here.

  "I don't want to think about the war anymore," Le said,  surveying
  the Superbowl scene. "It's in the past, and I just want  to go
  ahead with my life."

  Twenty-two years after the end of the war, which is called the
  American War here, Vietnam is booming. While its per-capita gross
  domestic product is still just $301, it is growing at a rate of
  more than 9 percent a year, second only to China among Asian
  economies. More than $10 billion in direct foreign investment in
  the past decade has fueled much of the growth.

  Ho Chi Minh City, still known to almost everyone here as Saigon,
  is the dynamic heart of that optimism, with the local economy
  growing at a stunning 15 percent a year. It has become one of
  Asia's hottest cities, drawing foreign corporate muscle that is
  betting billions on the future of a nation with a young  work
  force and 91 percent literacy.

  With a population of about 5 million, Ho Chi Minh still  has the
  feel of a small colonial city. Its broad boulevards are shaded by
  tall trees and lined with lovely white buildings built by French
  colonists. Landmarks such as the Rex Hotel, where American
  military officers relaxed during the war, and the ornate
  Continental Hotel watch over the city like European grandparents.
  Swarms of bicycles and motor scooters, which seem to outnumber
  cars 1,000 to 1, give the city streets a noisy, happy buzz.
  Visitors can still travel across the entire city reclining on a
  cyclo, a three-wheeled cycle pedaled by a driver, for less than
  $1.

  But Ho Chi Minh City's trendy younger generation has abandoned
  their parents' conical straw hats for Motorola cell phones,
  Spanish tapas and Corona beer. They mix with young foreign lawyers
  and investors at places like the ultra-hip Apocalypse Now
  nightclub, where the young Turks of business shoot pool and dance
  past dawn beneath ceiling fans painted to look like upside-down
  combat helicopters.

  They bowl. They ice-skate in steamy Saigon's new rink. They golf:
  15-foot-deep craters left by B-52 bombers dot the landscape
  outside the city; in some fields, they have become watering holes
  for cattle, but for those with the nation's new money, those
  craters have turned into hazards for weekend golfers who shank
  their drives on the local fairways.

  But despite the youth and increasing wealth here, Vietnam's
  transformation from communism to a style of communism that
  embraces capitalism has been slower and more frustrating than many
  had anticipated.

  Many analysts agree that investment in Vietnam has leveled off a
  bit since booming in 1994 and 1995, after the United States
  normalized trade relations. Many American companies arrived in
  Vietnam with high hopes, only to find their plans frustrated by a stubborn
  bureaucracy.

  Foreign companies doing business in Vietnam battle a disheartening
  array of official corruption and petty bribery, from laughably
  restrictive joint venture requirements to the traffic cop
  demanding $5 for imagined offenses. One American executive
  recently was stopped by traffic police three times in four days;
  each time, his Vietnamese driver settled the matter with a cash
  payment to the officer.

  Apparently recognizing the problem, the Vietnamese government has
  enacted new laws that call for the death penalty for the most
  extreme cases of corruption.

  Contracts are almost impossible to enforce in Vietnam's crude
  legal system, and the government changes regulations every day.
  The Communist government in Hanoi has conducted campaigns to limit
  foreign language on signs; logging on to the Internet here
  requires a government license.

  "It takes a great deal of patience to be here," said Michael J.
  Scown, an American attorney who advises foreign investors.

  Many Americans are still trying to shrug off their bad memories
  from the Vietnam War. But more than 150 American companies belong
  to the American Chamber of Commerce here, and upwards of 3,000
  Americans are doing business in Vietnam, said chamber chairman
  Frederick Burke.

  Joshua Jake Levine, editor of the Hanoi-based Vietnam Business
  Journal, said most American businessmen are still bullish on
  Vietnam, especially since the arrival of Washington's first
  postwar ambassador, Douglas "Pete" Peterson.

  American investors are saying, "We're here for fundamental
  reasons: our belief in Asia, our belief in Vietnam. We're not here
  because we think we can make money in one year and leave," Levine
  said.

  Signs of that optimism are everywhere: new Ramada, Hyatt and
  Marriott hotels are under construction, and McDonald's is coming
  next year. Plans for huge industrial parks are in the works, and
  investors from Asia, Europe and the United States are pumping
  millions into heavy industry, oil and gas projects, and telecommunications.

  But for any visitor, one of the first obvious signs of new wealth
  here is the huge mustard-yellow Saigon Superbowl complex rising on
  the road from the airport. The parking lot is always full, and the
  place attracts up to 10,000 people a day.

  Francis C.K. Lee, business manager of the Singapore-based company
  that built the complex with a Vietnamese partner, said it has been
  a success because of the "hidden wealth" of youth. Most young
  people live with their parents until they marry, and an increasing
  number of them work for foreign firms or Vietnamese companies
  cashing in on the influx of foreign money.

  Bowling at the Superbowl costs $2.60 a game on weekdays  and $3.60
  on nights, weekends and holidays. That's steep in  a land where
  many workers are lucky to make $30 a month. But it doesn't stop
  Nguyen Tan Trang and his buddies from coming here two or three
  times a week. "People come here because it  has a cool atmosphere,
  and it's new," said Nguyen, 26, who works in his family's plastics business.

  An hour's drive south in the Mekong Delta, a swampy expanse where
  several key battles were fought during the war, people still eat
  snake for lunch and transport pineapples to market in wooden
  canoes.

  But stepping inside the Superbowl is like stepping into  Tysons
  Corner. Here, they were drinking Cokes and munching cinnamon
  twists at the Magic Donut shop.

  "This is amazing," said Tranh Thi Tran, 45, whose three  daughters
  brought her to have a look at the Superbowl. "It's the first time
  in my life I've ever seen anything like this."