Cafe Nhac Tre 173 is a coffee shop in Ho Chi Minh City staffed by attractive ladies in revealing clothing. But although the women walk around in clothes that leave little to the imagination no sexual services are offered at the place. It is more or less just a coffee shop. Cafe Nhac Tre really proves the point that in Vietnam what you see isn’t always, or even usually, what you get.
Cafe Nhac Tre is rather large. There are around twenty tables and chairs out on the front patio and more than fifty seats inside. The interior is separated from the outside by glass doors and windows that are slightly tinted.
I don’t know how many women actually work at Cafe Nhac Tre but there must be more than a dozen. On any given day there are usually nine or ten walking around in their high heels and low cut tops. The gals are uniformly good looking with most appearing to be in their early twenties.
While the shop is for the most part frequented by local Vietnamese guys foreigners do also wander in from time to time. Most of the women on staff can only speak Vietnamese but there are some working the cafe who can speak other tongues like English or Korean to some degree. These women are usually eager to try out their foreign language skills.
Ca Phe Om
Cafe Nhac Tre is not exactly a caphe om. In other words it is not a place customers can hug or do more with the women on staff. It is essentially a coffee shop. That doesn’t mean that customers just order coffee and sit down alone however.
It’s not uncommon to see one of the women on staff sitting with a customer or even sitting on a customer though other than that things are more or less limited. There are rumors of women meeting regular customers outside of the shop but obviously that is not any kind of official company policy.
Since the shop is oriented toward locals the prices are quite reasonable. A customer can spend an hour at Cafe Nhac Tre enjoying a Vietnamese iced coffee and a complimentary ice water while chatting up attractive women and leaving a tip and still get away with spending less than the equivalent of $5 US Dollars. Compare that to the recently reviewed and not totally dissimilar Gira Gira Girls in Tokyo where spending an hour can cost a guy hundreds.
Perhaps most interesting or annoying depending on your outlook are the special events held at Cafe Nhac Tre with regularity. For the most part these are club style parties featuring guest DJs that spin records, or perhaps more accurately these days push buttons, while bouncing up and down on the small stage inside.
Sexy Vietnamese DJs
Ordinarily that might not sound like much but since the DJs are uniformly attractive women who sometimes wear even less than the waitresses you can understand why these special days are quite popular with local customers.
Even while such events are going on prices remain the same. There are always some disinterested customers who continue to enjoy their drinks outside even when such rambunctious parties occur steps away inside the doors too. For them the screen of a smart phone is apparently preferable to the sight of bouncing jugs in a cafe cum discotheque.
Cafe Nhac Tre is one of many cafes of its type in Ho Chi Minh City. When people muse that the city is filled with coffee shops I often wonder if they recognize the diversity in the venues. After all there are all sorts of coffee shops in Ho Chi Minh City including some like the previously reviewed Tro Lai that don’t even sell coffee at all!
There are street sellers, mom and pop shops, local chains, international chains, and caphe om. There are also coffee shops staffed by attractive women in short skirts that have DJs come in to play dance music like Cafe Nhac Tre 173. Two stars. 
Cafe Nhac Tre 173. 173 Su Van Hanh, Ward 3, District 10, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Click here for a map. Open every day from 10:00 AM until 11:00 PM.
