Air travel is a funny thing.
When selecting my flights from PE to Hanoi, I had a few options (as one usually does, especially with multi-step travel). One I found amusing is that I could leave at 7am and arrive at 1230 or something, or I could leave at...8am and arrive at 1230. Turned out there was just an hour later flight for the first leg, from the Port Elizabeth Airport to Johannesburg, but the next flights were exactly the same. I wonder if it was a commuter flight or similar. Whatever the case, as often, I didn't fit in the first plane. Indeed, I barely fit in the other two, but I didn't photograph them. They were slightly less egregious, but for an 8 hour and a 6 hour flight, almost nothing is going to be *comfortable* - just less uncomfortable. When I took my flight from China back to the US, it wound up being a 13-hour flight from LA to Beijing. I upgraded to premium economy for that, which resulted in having enough leg room to almost stretch out. It was glorious, and for that kind of trip, worth the $600 or whatever extra that I paid.
Anyway. Given the friends I'd made and the easier time I'd had with life overall, leaving PE was a bit sad. It's part of the lifestyle, of course, and there's a reason I'm planning to return next year. But still. After a lunch of champions at the Johannesburg airport, it was off to Doha (which I repeatedly mistitled Hoda in previous posts, I think). Because I took several pictures of it in a previous post, I'll just say that, yes, it's still excessive, it's still a shopping mall with airplane gates, and it still advertises itself more aggressively than I can possibly find reason for. From Doha to Hanoi offered some lovely views in the morning.
Landing in Hanoi, the immigration process was almost effortless. This stood in stark contrast to my entry to Saigon some 6 years ago while I was living in China, where I handed over my documents and sat for a good hour, hour and a half before getting the visa applied. This was almost as quick as anywhere else - hand the passport over, get it scanned for validity and whatever else, stamped, and done. Almost anticlimactic. Applying for a tourist visa in Vietnam, as in a growing number of countries, requires an e-Visa, an application online to provide details about you, your stay, and so on. It did back in 2019 as well, so I'm not sure what about the process changed. Maybe it just got modernized to the point that the e-Visa is displayed for the passport agents at the gate and no further checking needs be done. Maybe coming from China lead to some increased suspicion or security. Who knows.
I was offered a taxi by no fewer than 5 people in the literal one minute it took me to get from the arrivals door to the passenger pickup area. I was trying to order a ride on the local Uber equivalent, Grab. Someone saw me with the app open, approached me with theirs to imply that they worked for Grab, and then just called a normal taxi anyway. Which was annoying because I didn't have any cash yet and they didn't accept cards, so they stood by my luggage once they dropped me off while I ran across the street to an ATM and got some. Another tourist tax, like Georgia - just arrange your ride and ignore people pushing to "help" you.
Whatever the case, I got there eventually...only to be told by the management that there was a problem with my room, some kind of power issue or water heater break (I'm still not sure). They put me up in a motel for the night, which was kind of the least they could do, and it was...fine, I guess. Definitely smaller than the apartment, but that's to be expected. As usual, I'm very tall. I spent the night there, and got word in the morning that the apartment was ready.
Honestly, I'm pretty happy with my temporary new home in Vietnam. It's a tad more spacious than my place in PE, with a smaller and less-equipped kitchen admittedly. But I'm back to having a large bed instead of the single or twin or whatever I had before.
There's an amusing quirk of it though. My assumption is that this building was expanded before any of the ones around it. So those windows all originally were...well, windows. But then, later, the buildings nearby expanded as well. So now, despite being on the third floor, my windows look into just the wall of the next building. And I don't mean they're looking across a way - I mean the wall is built against the window itself, and the windows don't even open. There's even a balcony in this unit, but it just buts up against a wall. It's kind of funny to me. There is one window that actually sees outside...to a degree, at least.
For those of you who haven't been to many Asian countries, a note on the bathrooms. You might have noticed that in the first one, there was just a little glass divider between the toilet and the shower. In the apartment, there's no divider at all. I later learned that this is a design called "wet room," and while it's seen some presence in the West, the space efficiency means it's pretty much ubiquitous in the East. The whole room just has a single drain, in this case hidden under the sink. And really, why not? Aside from cases where one part of a couple might use the toilet while the other showers, it's rare to have more than one person using the room for anything. May as well save the space.
And yes, I'm still tall, but fortunately the shower here is a bit more accommodating.
I took a walk the next day to explore the nearby lake. As often, I won't link every picture I took, but rather just provide the full album link. Most of it is the lake, along with a few pictures of the walk there and of some kind of temple. I was particularly amused that I'm apparently supposed to boogie when using a crosswalk.
The day after that, it was past time to get my desk and chair sorted. So I went on a grand quest. And I say grand quest because this was a whole freaking thing. I went to one place, they were closed (despite being a pretty reasonable time of day). Went to a second place, they were just a consultancy and not an actual shop (I think, I never actually talked to anyone there, but it was an office building). Finally the third place, sort of an alternate-universe IKEA chain called JYSK, had what I was looking for. It was a familiar brand, as one that I'd used back in Georgia, so when I saw it on Google Maps I knew it'd be a reliable choice. And since Google Maps had failed me twice already, I just needed *something* to go right.
Treated myself to a simple, low-interaction McDonald's after all that. Sometimes you just need ice cream. Particularly when the candy you're familiar with is so expensive (for reference, that's about $4 US).
I'm settling in, slowly but surely. Learning what food places nearby are accessible, figuring out what I like, navigating the grocery stores, and missing some of the all-in-one type places that the West is known for anymore. They may still exist and I just haven't gone to the effort of finding them, but for day to day stuff, you don't need much more than just a food shop.
I also got laughed at for a mispronunciation of a word today. I think it was good-natured, and even if it wasn't, I'm adept at laughing at myself. It's a crucial skill in life.
