Calamity in visa land

Well, let me start this story by saying I am a bit embarrassed by our actions and I do take full responsibility for my part in it. However, there is a lot of misinformation and "regulations" seem to be up to the person you deal with at times. However, let our folly be your word to the wise.

We landed in Saigon with a great plan. Enjoy a long weekend of taking in the sights and then on Monday pick up a 60 day visa from the Thai Embassy and on Tuesday zip off for a month+ to Phuket and the South of Thailand. On Monday morning after reading many travel reviews saying getting a visa was super easy, we woke up early and planned on being the first ones at the embassy office so that we could get our visa processed and be on our way to enjoy one last day in Vietnam, getting massages, eating Pho and taking in the sights. 

Upon arrival, the lady noted that we had to prove we had tickets out of the country, we asked if bus tickets would be okay and she said yes but they had to have a printed copy as evidence. We had read so many posts about border runs in Phuket we had assumed we could just take care of staying slightly over the 30 days once we were in the country. Especially for a 60 day visa, it is really hard to book a ticket that far in advance when you are trying to live life on the wild side (you know sans itinerary).  After hours of running different scenarios and price checking each option to find the cheapest most effective way to leave the country. We decided to fly from Surat Thani Thailand to Bangkok then take a bus to Cambodia. 

Armed with the necessary documents we got another Uber back to the embassy. Filled out the documents with ferocity knowing we were nearing the end of the day, only to be informed that we couldn't get the Visa in time before our flight. 5 Ubers later and our last day wasted in Vietnam we discovered a few frustrating truths that could have saved us a lot of time and money if we knew them earlier:

1) Visas take at least two days! We should have gone in on Friday so we could have picked them up on Monday. Plan ahead for unforeseen bumps in the road and take care of business first! Usually, our M.O If you know us, then you know how shocking it is we dropped the ball like this.

2) Ask more questions. People tend to be short with you when there are language barriers but take the time to make sure you fully understand the situation. When we went in that morning to get the Visa, we should have made sure, if we did indeed get the printed proof of tickets out of the country, could we get the visa done in time?

3) Don't trust everything you read. We read so many reviews and blogs, that said it was very easy to get a Visa and that they did not have to show proof of an exit ticket. That pared with the advertisements of border runs we figured it would be easy. When in doubt be over prepared, especially when it comes to something as important as a visa.

4) Laugh at yourself, learn from the mistake and move on. Traveling with a companion it can be easy to get mad at each other of take the frustration of the situation out on each other. However, after spending so much time and money on a completely moot point we left the embassy and just had a good long laugh. 

At the end of this exhausting/stressful day. We remembered a vegetarian restaurant we passed in one of our Uber rides and decided to go look for it and at least take the opportunity to eat in a new part of town. Retracing our steps we were quite proud of ourselves. High fiving each other and reveling in our awesome internal GPS systems. Until... we landed right back at the embassy. We did a huge circle, didn't eat all day (our last day to enjoy the amazing foods of Saigon no less), and it started to rain. Late, tried and slightly depressed, we splurged to get yet another round of Ubers to our favorite Bingsu place (amazing Korean dessert). Two heaping portions of shaved ice, fresh fruit and condensed milk later, the world was looking a little brighter.

Thinking back to all the things we could have done differently could literally make you go crazy. Coulda, woulda, shoulda all you want. However, the only thing to do is to learn from the mistake, share your story with others so you may save them the hassle, treat yo self and move on.      

Vegitarian delights

A lot of our foodie friends were shocked and appalled when we told them we were going to do our best to maintain our vegetarian diet throughout our gap year. However, Vietnam in particular is 70% Buddhist so even though we have seen every type of meat under the sun cooking here. We have actually been able to truly enjoy the foods of Vietnam. Some of our favorite items: mango sticky rice, White Rose (rice flour raviolis), Mi Quang noodles (rice noodles), Spring rolls, eggplant, morning glory greens and all the dragonfruit and passionfruit we want. We even took a cooking class and they were kind enough to modify some items with tofu so we could join the rest of the class.

We frequently search for "Mon Chay" on the menu which means vegetarian. There is even whole restaurants that are Mon Chay. Our favorite is Thien Nghia Quan, a little old lady runs this small café that feels more like dining in her home. After we placed an order with her the children running around the restaurant took turns coming up to us with little pads of paper pretending to take our order again. They were in fits of giggles each time we told them we already ordered. During our meals here we noticed how many locals constantly stop off at this little spot and get food to go or get off their motorbikes and enjoy a relaxed meal. We love going where the locals eat, no one is speaking English, the food is amazing and you feel as though you are getting a bite of real Vietnam. If you have the good future of coming to this spot make sure you try her stir fried Mi Quang noodles, served piping hot and loaded with vegetables this savory dish will only set you back around $1.50 US and will fill you up with noodly goodness.

Relaxed in Hoi An

Our first blog post, talk about pressure... Our goal was to start this blog on the first on January when we started our "gap year" off celebrating new years in Hanoi, Vietnam. Sounds perfect right? A New Years celebration to commence the trip of a life time. Well, that's what we thought at least, until the reality of being 28 set in and we realized we are no spring chicken anymore that can handle 30 hours of traveling and going though a 16 hour time difference without some downtime. I regrettably must inform you that even with our best intentions of starting off 2017 with a bang, we hit the snooze button one too many times and slept though the festivities.

However, I am getting ahead of myself. As we do have a lot of catching up to do, does sleeping through NYE2017 excuse us from not writing? No, no it does not. Our lack of blogging has not been due to neglect but rather an issue with Google locking us out of our accounts. We had to use a "Proxy" in order to out smart the system and get back into the swing of things. I will be the first to admit we are not the most tech savvy girls but we can be resourceful when necessary and have a great support system of smart friends and family back home (you know who you are and we thank you). So cheers from the beautiful ancient city of Hoian and the numerous mistakes and lessons that have led us here. We can't wait to share more with you as we continue our trip of a lifetime that we literally sacrificed blood, sweat and tears for. Oh ya, and that great support system we mentioned from back home, thank you for helping us get here! Vietnam is absolutely beautiful, crazy, loud, delicious and unforgettable.