It was 36 hours until our scheduled flight to Hanoi, and my visa application still hadn't been processed.
I don't know what had gone wrong. I've applied for a Vietnamese e-visa before - most recently just a few months ago, in fact - and the application had always been processed quickly. Mom didn't have any trouble with hers either.
Unsure about what to do, I contacted a sketchy visa agency online who assured me that they could secure me a visa by the next afternoon "95% guaranteed"... for five times the standard price of a visa. Hesitantly, I agreed. I transferred the money, hoping I wasn't making a huge mistake.
I was desperate. I knew that if I couldn't get my visa my upcoming trip with my mom would have to be called off, ruining the amazing adventures we had planned for her birthday.
I don't know what they did. I don't know who they bribed. To be honest, I don't need to know. All I know is that the next evening, about 12 hours before our flight was due to depart, I had received an e-visa confirmation letter in my inbox. Sketchy though they may be, they pulled through, and I'll probably trust them again to help save me the headache of future Vietnamese visas.
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| sunrise in Bangkok |
I picked Mom up at 5am the next morning, ready for our early flight to Hanoi. It wasn't until we were in the lobby and Mom was already halfway through checking out that we realized that the flight was in the early afternoon... oops...
Our adventure was off to an inauspicious start, but after a leisurely breakfast at the hotel buffet, we finally made our way to the airport. The trip would be happening after all.
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| Even the guardians mask up at Suvarnabhumi Airport! |
It looked to be a beautiful day as our VietJet flight left Thai airspace, flew over southern Laos, and crossed the border into Vietnam.
The rice fields of eastern Thailand gave way to the rugged mountains of Vietnam, and an hour and a half after departing from Bangkok, we were touching down at Noi Bai International Airport in Hanoi, the capital city of Vietnam.
We checked in and went in search for an ATM where we could withdraw some Vietnamese dong. Like most of the rest of Asia, Vietnam is still very much a cash-based society, but we hadn't had time to exchange our baht at the airport.
On the way, we took a walk around Hoan Kiem Lake (more on that later) and had a look at the legendary Turtle Tower (also more on that later, so stay tuned for a future post!).
Mom's first impressions of Hanoi were chaotic... but whose aren't? She really couldn't get over the traffic, the motorbikes, and how the driving laws are, in the words of Captain Barbossa, "more like guidelines".
Hanoi is a learning curve.
It's a crazy city, but one that I'm totally crazy about. Hanoi is everything that I had imagined Bangkok to be before I arrived to find a modern and highly developed metropolis. Hanoi feels alive. It's also more unpredictable and wilder than you can imagine until you've experienced it yourself. It's exhausting yet exhilarating.
We dined atop our hotel - a narrow "tube house" of 14 floors in the heart of the Old Quarter. Dinner started with two bottles of the classic Hanoi Beer and a view of the tropical sun setting over the beautiful old city.
It had been quite a time getting there, but I was so glad we had finally arrived.
Mom's first meal in Vietnam was phở (noodle soup), one of the most popular Vietnamese dishes in the world.
Here's something you might not know: after English and Spanish, the third most-spoken language in my home state of Texas is Vietnamese! There's a huge Vietnamese-American population in Texas, which means that we have a ton of amazing Vietnamese restaurants throughout the state. Mom was excited to compare local northern Vietnamese cuisine to that back home.
I was so excited to be back in Hanoi! It was my third time visiting Hanoi, but Mom's very first, and I couldn't wait to introduce her to all the sights and experiences that the thousand-year-old "Dragon City" had to offer.
I know that Mom was excited to be there as well...
*In 2018 my wife (then girlfriend) and I spent three months backpacking across Vietnam. We spent a month in Hanoi, a month in the central region around Da Nang, and a month in the south in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon). If you're interested, you can read all about our wonderful adventures in Vietnam right here on my blog starting with this post: A New Start in Old Hanoi
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