Shadowing Practice: Eating our way through Saigon 🇻🇳🍜 - Learn English Speaking with Video
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Spend a day eating through Saigon with me.
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We're in Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam and honestly
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if you only know Vietnamese food as pho and banh mi you are missing out.
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I've been living here for almost three years now
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so I'm totally not biased when I say the food scene here is so good.
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One of my favorite things about eating in Vietnam is that food is literally everywhere.
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You'll have proper restaurants, tiny family -run shops, street stores, markets, little plastic chairs on the side of the road
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and sometimes you genuinely can't tell if you're walking into someone's house
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or about to have the best meal of your life
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so today i'm taking you guys on a food tour we're filming a vietnam food tour today
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but zen doesn't know that i actually booked a scooter tour
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so there's going to be women riding us around ho chi
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minh city to go to different places to eat to sightsee the thing is Zen's been to Vietnam multiple times
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but she's never been on a scooter.
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I can't wait to see her face.
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Are you excited to eat?
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It's an episode full of eating.
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ExoTour has actually been around since 2010
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and they were the first all -female motorbike tour company in Vietnam
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which I thought was pretty cool and what I like about their foodie tour is
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that they specifically don't take you around to the typical touristy spots.
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The whole idea is to get you outside the typical tourist areas like D1
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and try more of the dishes that locals actually eat.
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We've reached the meeting point, we're just waiting for our ride.
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Our ride is here! Where?
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The bike!
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What?
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What are you doing to me?
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I'm giving you the true local experience.
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Oh my god.
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I knew if I told her earlier she would be like so nervous so now you know it's a bike tour.
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Like this heaven already.
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If you've never been on a motorbike before, don't stress like how
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Zen is here.
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Look how nervous she is.
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The tour guides will go through all the safety instructions like how to get on the bike, how to safely get off, all that fun jazz.
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Now, if you don't want to get super close and personal and hug your driver,
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you can grab onto the back of the bike and hold on for dear life.
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Or use your thigh muscles, clamp them together to stabilize.
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That's what true locals do.
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This tour is about four and a half hours and they're going to be taking us around five different districts.
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And apparently we're going to get to eat at least 10 to 12 different dishes.
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Lucky we've prepared accordingly.
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I basically starved all day for this.
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We're starting with a soupy noodle dish.
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And no, it's not pho.
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It's banh gan kho, which is a thick crab noodle soup.
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The noodles are thick, they're chewy, the broth is rich and almost gravy -like.
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And it's one of those dishes that probably make you realize how many Vietnamese noodle soups there actually are.
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Actually, maybe we should do a video on that.
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Just noodle soups alone.
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This restaurant is pretty big.
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It has three floors.
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And most importantly, there was air con.
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First stop is a banh ganh phu place.
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A crab noodle soup.
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We survived.
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Mok Hai Ba Yo!
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This is the secret sauce, guys.
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Chili kumquat lime.
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It's sugary, salty, spicy.
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I feel like everyone knows pho but not everyone knows manganku.
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It's like a thick crabby noodle with tapioca noodles which is kind of like chewy.
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It's like a udon.
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It's like a thick udon.
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Yeah, so there's like prawns, crab cake, there's crab meat.
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The noodles are chewy.
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It's got this like bounce.
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The soup is a little bit on the thicker side.
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Mmm, it's got like a little bit of sweetness in the crab meat.
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We're gonna try to do that jujitsu food trend thing.
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Wait, what's the count then?
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So we'll be like one, two, three.
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Okay.
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Someone put the bowl in!
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Try again.
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I want a bit more.
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I hope it works.
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The sauce is like slightly tangy, lemony, zesty, sweet.
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Am I invading your personal space?
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You have to do everything so close together.
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The broth is actually really good.
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It's not like fishy or like too seafood -y like other places like when we've ordered on Grab.
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Sometimes it doesn't taste like super fresh.
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You know what I mean?
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Like this, it's got a subtle sort of like, it's like sweet.
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Yeah, it's like a sweet soup.
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A little bit salty, a little bit sweet.
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Tastes clean, you know what I mean?
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Like, when you get like, prawn noodles and stuff, it kind of tastes like prawn meat.
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And the chunks of crab, they're legit.
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It's not like fake crab.
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Okay, this place definitely deserves to be in my food guide.
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If you guys are coming to Saigon and you want like, beauty, fashion, cafes, food, activities to do, check out my guide.
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Link is below, shameless plug.
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Oh and this tour, the XL tour is on there as well and they have a special promo.
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First stop was an absolute hit but we still have plenty of room left in our bellies.
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I'm ready for the next stop!
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Next up we're gonna check out a market.
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We're gonna walk through the market and see what's there.
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And then grab dessert.
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Problem is it looks like it might rain.
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Nooooo!
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It's more fun.
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It's more fun when it rains.
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Lots of chickens here.
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Lots of seafood.
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This is like I guess the produce area.
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Oh there's fresh seafood.
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Okay guys so this is the local market.
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You can just see people stop on their bikes, grab a couple of things and then ride to the next store.
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So this is the local market between
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District 5 and 6 which used to be like the Chinese
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or Cantonese area the tour guide was saying this is a really popular place for tourists
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because it's a place that a lot of the locals come for wholesale
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so a lot of the trading happens here they don't really sell like single pieces
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when it comes to the stores but I mean the markets are local markets so feel free to come and visit,
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get some fresh fruit check it out,
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it is hustling and bustling like it's busy Vietnamese avocados are like long and odd shaped compared to the husk avocados.
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Ooh, they got durian!
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Durian!
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We ended up getting some tropical fruits as a little palate cleanser.
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I don't know what this is called in English, but in Vietnamese it's called bong bong, which is such a fun thing to say.
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Bong bong.
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It's sweet.
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It's kind of like tangy.
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Ooh, I like it.
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It's like jelly -ish.
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How's the Chinese seed?
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Grandmutan Grandmutan Chom chom
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Actually the previous one had like a little bit of a funkier taste
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It was like sweet
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Really sweet If you look at the bottom of the fruit
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The petals represent how many I don't know pieces are inside
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Oh I didn't know that
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Do we have a good one?
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Yeah Oh me me me
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The queen of fruits with the queen of chaos.
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It's good.
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It's good.
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It's starting to rain and everyone's rushing.
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Everyone's rushing to cover up their goods and bringing it in now.
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The rain began to pour and within minutes, everyone had their stores wrapped up and undercover.
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Clearly, they're experienced in this.
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Yours is coming.
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We will be blue penguins together.
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They came prepared we've got matching penguin suits.
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Thankfully it doesn't usually rain for that long in Saigon.
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We usually get spurts of rains and then it clears up so fingers crossed I've got my fingers crossed.
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Okay it started to rain again and now rain jackets are back on.
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This might be the uniform for the rest of today.
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We're at the next location.
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Where are we Zen?
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We are at an outdoor barbecue place.
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Yeah, barbecue!
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When in Saigon you have to try a Saigon beer.
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I got water.
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I don't know if you guys have ever heard Vina music
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but there's this beat like it's like a dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun
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I hope we don't get copyrighted for this.
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This is the only club we'll go to.
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This is the mathematics move, it's like plus.
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Mathematics.
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Mathematics.
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Minus.
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Divide, divide, divide.
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Divide, divide.
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And then multiply.
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Multiply.
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It's like a how to dance like a true Vietnamese tutorial.
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First dish is water spinach with garlic.
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A staple in Vietnamese cuisine.
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It's got like a nice crunch to it.
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Refreshing and obviously wet garlic girlies.
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Spicy, it's got a bit of a kick to it, very garlicky.
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Oh, so this is gonna be barbecued right here.
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We didn't even have to barbecue it ourselves.
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This is amazing.
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Next is the beef cooked by none other than our Michelin star chef tour guide tea.
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You gotta grab a piece and then you dip it with like a lemon pepper, salt and pepper with chili.
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Get that zinginess.
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Cheers! That hit the spot.
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That's good.
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The music is just sending me like...
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Juicy lemongrass pork belly.
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Dip it in this...
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Sweet sauce Wow That's good the pork has like the perfect amount of fat to like lean meat
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And then the lemongrass very fragrant the sauce is kind of like a spicy sweet chili
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Oh, this is good.
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Haimayo!
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Special dish wrapped in foil.
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They're unboxing it.
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Oooh!
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It's like mixed veggies.
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Melt in your mouth.
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Egg tofu.
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Okay.
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Mixed veggies, tofu.
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Oooh!
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I feel like it's kind of buttery, melting your mouth.
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It's sweet.
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I thought it was salted egg, but it's just like tofu egg.
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It's got like a skin around it.
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We're looking quite dewy.
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Local restaurants like this are usually where locals hang out with their friends after work.
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They eat, they drink, and sometimes they even play games.
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Our guide taught us one.
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This is a game that tests your chopstick and teamwork skills.
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We split up into two groups and first group to pick up 10 peanuts and pop it in the bottle wins.
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It sounds easy but it's a lot harder than it looks because the other team can sabotage you.
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Can you guys guess who won?
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Let's just say it wasn't me.
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But I'm totally not mad.
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Then we enjoyed the rest of the fruit from the market.
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Nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom.
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The sun went down and we took a little cruise around the narrow streets of D4.
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The streets here are very tight, but oh so lively.
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Like there's restaurants, shops and little street stalls all along the side.
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It was a vibe.
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This is our last food spot for the night.
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Located in District 4, which used to be known as the Gangster District of Ho Chi Minh City
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But since then it's cleaned up and people like coming here for their seafood
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and night vibes I think it's like rated in Time Out magazine as one of the top 10 or top 11 neighbourhoods
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And we got cream
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This is very new to me because I'm usually in bed by this time
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But I'm out like
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It's like peanutty, you've got the spring onions, you've got the fish sauce
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Adds that like sweetness spiciness.
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There's nothing better than freshly grilled seafood
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Crab already peeled.
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Yes, bit of lemon pepper chili.
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Okay, cheers It's sweet guys
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It's got that sweet juice crumb meat and it's so much better when someone else pulls it for you.
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We're spoiled for today today.
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Not only do they serve seafood they also serve like a stir -fried rice cake with eggs
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and you dip it in a special soy sauce.
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It looks like a Singaporean dish right?
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It looks like carrot cake.
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Carrot cake.
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It kind of does it looks like carrot cake.
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There's like papaya shreds and then the thick soy sauce.
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Cheers.
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it's got a nice like crunch to it on the outside it's got okay it's a simple dish
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but it's a yummy one we finished the night off with two desserts a sweet
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and savory coconut sticky rice had a very interesting taste
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and then a rich creamy cheese yogurt which is very popular in vietnam
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and that was our last stop of the night honestly this is one of my favorite ways to experience saigon you
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You get on the back of a bike, weave through parts of the city you probably wouldn't find on your own,
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you eat way too much food, and somehow still make room for two desserts.
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So I'd say today was a success.
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We're full, slightly sweaty, and borderline food -combed.
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That's it for this video.
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Thanks for tuning in to your Kitchen Queens of Chaos.
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We're out the kitchen this time.
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We're out of the kitchen, but it's still chaotic.
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But it's Vietnam.
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If you guys want to check out more of our videos, click the video on screen and subscribe if you're here.
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We'll speak to you guys next time.
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Bye!
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Bye!
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Don't forget to thumb this video.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This speaking lesson is built on the video “Eating our way through Saigon 🇻🇳🍜”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: sweet, tour, noodle, nom. This video has 261 sentences and 2214 words to shadow. The speech runs for 14:28. The speaker talks at a natural 153 words per minute, close to everyday conversation. Only 78% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is demanding.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| dish noun | /dɪʃ/ | A vessel such as a plate for holding or serving food, often flat with a depressed region in the middle. |
| crab noun | /kɹæb/ | Any crustacean of the infraorder Brachyura, having five pairs of legs, the foremost of which are in the form of claws, and a carapace. |
| thick adjective | /θɪk/ | Relatively great in extent from one surface to the opposite in its smallest solid dimension. |
| soup noun | /sup/ | Any of various dishes commonly made by combining liquids, such as water or stock, with other ingredients, such as meat and vegetables, that contribute the food… |
| seafood noun | /ˈsiːfuːd/ | Food from the sea, including that derived from fish, shellfish, crustaceans, cephalopods, seaweed, algae, marine mammals, and other marine organisms. |
| divide verb | /dɪˈvaɪd/ | To split or separate (something) into two or more parts. |
| chili noun | /ˈt͡ʃɪli/ | The pungent, spicy fresh or dried fruit of any of several cultivated varieties of capsicum peppers, used in cooking. |
| mathematics noun | /mæθ(.ə)ˈmæt.ɪks/ | An abstract representational system studying numbers, shapes, structures, quantitative change and relationships between them. |
| pepper noun | /ˈpɛp.ə/ | A plant of the family Piperaceae. |
| cheers | /t͡ʃɪəz/ | A common toast used when drinking in company. |
| dessert noun | /dɪˈzɝt/ | The last course of a meal, consisting of fruit, sweet confections etc. |
| spicy adjective | /ˈspaɪsi/ | Of, pertaining to, or containing spice. |
| carrot noun | /ˈkæɹət/ | A vegetable with a nutritious, juicy, sweet root that is often orange in colour, Daucus carota, family Apiaceae, especially the subspecies sativus. |
| rush verb | /ɹʌʃ/ | To hurry; to perform a task with great haste, often not properly or without thinking carefully. |
| chaos noun | /ˈkeɪˌɑs/ | The unordered state of matter in classical accounts of cosmogony. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| check out verb | To record the departure or withdrawal of someone or something (such as guests, employees, books, etc.). | |
| clean up verb | To make an area or a thing clean; to pick up a mess; to tidy. | |
| clear up verb | /klɪəˈɹʌp/ | To clarify, to correct a misconception. |
| close together adjective | Near each other in time or space. | |
| cover up verb | To conceal or disguise. | |
| end up verb | To bring to a conclusion. | |
| get off verb | To move from being on top of (something) to not being on top of it. | |
| go down verb | To descend; to move from a higher place to a lower one. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- Are you excited to eat?
- What are you doing to me?
- Am I invading your personal space?
- You know what I mean?
- Tastes clean, you know what I mean?
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| “Used to” used to + verb — a past habit or state that is no longer true | used to be |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | Zen's been · she's never been · has actually been |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | is called · be barbecued · was salted |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | kho, which is · noodles which is · bong, which is |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 65 contractions and reduced forms, such as we're, don't, I'm. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: thick /θɪk/, mathematics /mæθ(.ə)ˈmæt.ɪks/, thumb /ˈθʌm/, thigh /θaɪ/, broth /bɹɔθ/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: dish /dɪʃ/, rush /ɹʌʃ/, chef /ʃɛf/, instruction /ɪnˈstɹʌkʃən/, refresh /ɹɪˈfɹɛʃ/
- Long words — get the stress right: mathematics /mæθ(.ə)ˈmæt.ɪks/, genuinely /ˈd͡ʒɛn.ju.ɪn.li/, importantly /ɪmˈpɔɹ.tənt.li/, accordingly /əˈkɔɹ.dɪŋ.li/, undercover /ˌʌndə(ɹ)ˈkʌvə(ɹ)/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like dish, crab, thick.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.