So after months of research and planning, we are booked for our travel extravaganza in Asia! Tomo and I are both approved for 2 months of leave from work, the itinerary is set, the flights are booked, the major tours are booked, and we’re off to see Taiwan, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Indonesia, and Japan.
Extra cause for excitement: Emily has been on board to join us for the Indonesia portion since the earlier stages of planning, and now, Ailee has decided to come too. Hurrah!
That is not to say that there haven’t been some concerns along the way.
From what I understand, visas to Vietnam have to be booked beforehand for citizens of most countries, or you will be denied entry, but obtaining a Landing Visa was not really what I expected. It was hard to tell whether or not the Vietnam Embassy in Ottawa’s website was authentic (helloooo, sketchy grammar), and after I paid my US$70, I got a confirmation page, but no identifying number or anything that I could use as a reference to prove I had completed an application. After a longer-than specified wait time, however, (apparently, the embassy was closed for New Year) I did get the necessary paperwork, and we are good to go to Vietnam!
There have been similar incidences where I’ve had to ignore my uncertainty, and send money to sources I couldn’t verify to book tours. This is on one website:
No identifiers for my payment or anything.
Or I was told “please send money to my PayPal account”. Um, okay, sure why not? Eek. But these companies I’ve been emailing have good ratings on TripAdvisor, have been good about responding to my emails, and haven’t disappeared after they had my deposit, so I’m going to have some faith that I haven’t just been duped.
My last major concern is the spat of airline crashes that have been occurring in the last few months. Most of our inter-Asia flights are with Air Asia, which, as you know, was in the news recently when one of their flights from Surabaya, Indonesia, crashed into the ocean during a tropical storm. We’re also flying with Trigana Air, an Indonesian airline that ranks even lower in safety according to the criteria on airlineratings.com. But I reason that airplane crashes are still fairly uncommon. Besides, a once-in-a-lifetime 3-day jungle trip in Borneo calls. Calculated risk in the name of adventure!
Tomo is concerned about language barriers, and needing more rest days in our itinerary. Uh oh, rest days? …..I guess we’ll just have to see.
Sixty Days in Asia 