Ca Phe Do Phu (Palace) located in Duong Dang Dung, D3 is a place with a history. This is evident the moment you enter the place, although it is likely that you already knew that before seeking out its obscure location. During the war the café served as the ‘red address’ of the Saigon Special Forces. Besides acting as a place for cadres to rendezvous for clandestine meetings and mail drops, its cellars were also used to store arms in the lead up to the Tet Offensive – two tons of materiel being in place by 1968.
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​Nowadays the café provides a historical wraparound as you sit amongst assorted old household paraphernalia from a time quite recently gone by. Round the corner in Tran Quang Khai is the Gia Dinh Special Forces Museum, a small venue with exhibits on two floors.

All the text accompanying displays was in Vietnamese, necessitating a quick Wikipedia search at each stop to be sure of the detail. One suspects that this small museum is off the foreigner beaten track.