Made up of 19 urban districts, Ho Chi Minh City was built along Saigon River and renamed from its old name Saigon after the Vietnamese Communist Party chairman, in 1976 after the reunification.

The city has in recent years seen a surge in foreign investments in its real estate sector, including those from Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore and Malaysia.

Many young Malaysians and businesses sought opportunities abroad during the regional financial crisis in 2008. Vietnam, a latecomer in development, was a land of opportunities for them.

Central Ho Chi Minh City is teeming with colonial buildings in the likes of Notre Dame Cathedral, Reunification Palace, Central Post Office, the People's Committee of Ho Chi Minh City and Ben Thanh Market, among others. Further afield, the city boasts newly developed townships, broad leafy boulevards and modern apartment blocks.

Land of opportunities

Developed by Malaysia's Gamuda Land, Celadon City in Tan Phu district is a guarded estate with lush greenery, a pristine lakeside park and clubhouse, with an Aeon Mall in its vicinity, not unlike any typical modern township in Malaysia.

Gamuda Land (HCMC) deputy general director Angus Liew was the marketing director of a Saudi company in Hanoi before joining Gamuda Land.

He left Kuala Lumpur for Vietnam on 2008 Merdeka Day at the height of the financial crisis.

"I started work in 2000, and came to a bottleneck in 2008. I thought it was better for me to venture out of the box."

A Singaporean friend of him was then looking for someone to take over his place in Vietnam, and Liew, still single at 30, thought he should give it a try as Vietnam was culturally and geographically quite close to Malaysia while his family was supportive.

Hailing from Johor Bahru, Lim Chin Keong jointly started TW-Asia Consultants Pte Ltd with some friends in Singapore before venturing into Vietnam.

Lim worked in Singapore upon his graduation from university. In 2005, he was tasked with the responsibility of expanding TW-Asia's business to Thailand. After the 

coup d'état the following year, Lim subsequently turned his attention to Vietnam in 2009. He and his partner saw vast potentials in relatively underdeveloped this country.

Adapting to new life abroad

"During my first few days in Vietnam, I remember I totally couldn't read the restaurant menus and had to settle with instant noodle back in the room. So I made up my mind to learn some Vietnamese."

Liew spent his first three years in Vietnam working in Hanoi, where people hardly spoke English. He was forced to learn Vietnamese from the drivers during the 1-hour taxi rides between work and home.

As for Lim, he did not quite like this country when he first arrived here — dishonest taxi drivers, ubiquitous traffic jam, blaring car honks , and rough-talking locals — but now this place has become his second home!

It wasn't that difficult for him to get used to life and food, but as Vietnam's economy now moves into the slow lane as a result of the global slowdown, he sees both risks and opportunities.

"It was wrong timing. As soon as I arrived, the Vietnamese market collapsed. We went through really tough time!" But soon, Liew took that as a buffer period for him to learn more about Vietnam's culture and market operations. He needed to build up a good foundation and prepare for the sunny days ahead. The market picked up again in 2015.

Lim shared the same feelings. His arrival coincided with the economic crisis in Vietnam. A listed company director told him to get his team ready, do some R&D, develop new technologies and boost operational efficiency.

The period between 2011 and 2013 was the heyday for his company, which received lots of OEM contracts from Singapore companies.

Setting up a new family

Both Liew and Lim later set up their families in Vietnam.

Lim met his architect wife Pham Nguyen My Dung while they worked together in a project. The couple married in 2012 and had their first son in 2014. 

Lim would bring his wife and son back to his parents' home in Kulai, Johor every month.

"My parents could not accept a foreign son-in-law at the beginning," admitted Pham, "but they were very fond of him after the meeting."

To her, Lim is a very polite, gentle and responsible man who insists to give all his weekend time for family despite very busy work days.

As for Lim, he finds that family cohesion is very strong among Vietnamese, and like the Chinese, they also celebrate Lunar New Year, dumpling festival and mid-autumn festival.

Liew and his wife Vo Thi Minh are colleagues. They are married with a girl and a boy, Michelle and Anson. Like Lim, Liew speaks Mandarin with his children, his wife speaks Vietnamese with the kids while the kids speak English at international school. Liew also taught the kids some simple Malay.

He always reminds his children that they are Malaysians, and will prepare Malay costumes for them at the school's cultural festival. He also takes them back to Malaysia on a regular basis to see their grandparents.

Vo's parents, like Pham's, were initially against her marrying a foreigner, and Liew invited her parents to Malaysia to get to know more about his family background.

Although Liew and Vo are in the same age bracket, they have very different family backgrounds.

Vo's parents put a lot of emphasis on the children's education, believing that this is the only way to change their life.

"She is a very thrifty woman and is very particular about the details. For example, I must turn off the light after leaving the room.

"She was very much like my father when she was young. They reared pigs at home and often starved of food. I had color photos when I was born, but she didn't have those things. I always ate out when I was young, much like our kids now."

He went on to say that Vietnam's leaders today are all very young, between 40 and 50 in age. They belong to the post-war generation and are very enthusiastic to take the country out of poverty.

He believes the next generation of Vietnamese will have very affluent lives.