How My Family Got Stuck in Siem Reap

I had just finished wiping the dust off my feet in the Siem Reap Airport when all hell broke loose. There, at the Vietnam Airlines counter I was issued a boarding pass at five minutes earlier, stood Claire, my parents and four close relatives, all clustered around a ticket agent and speaking at once. Voices had anger in them. Faces concern.

"They're not letting your family on the plane," Claire said when she heard me approach. My flip flops, which had gone over and around the temples of Angkor all day, were now squeaky clean. "We've got to get on the Internet and figure this out right away!"

In December, Claire and I tried to go to Australia for Christmas. On our first attempt, we failed -- we hadn't obtained visas. We drowned our sorrows in Tiger Beer and tandoori chicken at Ashoka on Le Thanh Ton Street, went home, got online, discovered all we needed was "Electronic Travel Authority" clearance ($20/person, payable via the web, good for one year, active immediately) and problem solved. We were on a Thai Airways flight to Sydney, only 24 hours later than originally scheduled. Fair dinkum.

Cambodia is different. Especially when you're trying to go to Vietnam ... and you're not from Vietnam ... and you've got the wrong visa for Vietnam. No website in the world can help with that.

But travel agents can. If one of their employees has a good motorbike.

Let me explain. First thing the next morning, I called my buddy George, general manager of one of the biggest tour operating companies in this part of the world. Within an hour, he had someone at a Vietnamese official's office in Saigon, waiting for a signature from the only person authorized to approve the re-entry of six foreigners with single-entry visas. By 2 o'clock, the paperwork was good to go. It just needed to be faxed over to the ticket counter at Siem Reap Airport, and it was.

Only one problem: That ticket counter's fax machine had run out of paper. Seriously.

My uncle Christopher calls me from the ticket counter. I call George in Saigon. George calls dude in Siem Reap. Dude prints out the documents, then hops on his motorbike, weaves his way through rush-hour traffic on congested National Road, and 15 minutes later my family is passing through security, destination Ho Chi Minh City.

Just another day in third-world Asia. Claire's gotten used to it. Here she is kickin' it with a bunch of cyclo riders:

Comments

Miranda at Marz Haus said…
Whew, that was close. Love the pic of Claire & friends.
March 5, 2008 at 8:05 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Shop Signs in Ho Chi Minh & Hookah in Hong Kong

Image
One great thing about living in Saigon is that if you ever get bored there's a simple remedy: An early-morning taxi ride from District 2 to the airport. The 45-minute journey is about as dull as a Robin Williams interview. Today, it was some language that got me. First, a shop sign that read, "Specializing in creativity and copying." Classic. Not five minutes later, I saw a woman wearing a shirt that said, "Necessary if mailed in the Koogi." Not even kidding. You can't make this stuff up. Of late, I haven't been witness to Saigon's goofiness. In the past five weeks, I've either been in Phan Thiet, Hanoi, Hong Kong or Dalat. Stops in the coming three weeks include Hanoi (again), Hue, Halong Bay, Hoi An and Bali. When my "winter" travels are complete, I expect to look back and say, "I enjoyed Bali most" -- I've yet to hear a negative comment about the surfer's paradise. Until then, Hong Kong holds the top spot. Claire an...
Read more

Why My Dad's Getting Pink for Christmas

Image
If I'd have thought to bring my camera, the picture I'd have taken would've been one for the ages. There, just around the corner from what's now my local supermarket, was my dad, sitting on the back of a moped, wearing not just a helmet, but a pink one. And several sizes too small, at that. "No way !" my brother exclaimed before doubling over. It took him about 20 seconds to stop laughing. "Did you steal that from a baby?" There was also the kid driving the bike, a Vietnamese dude of about American drinking age who seemed to have skipped puberty -- not only was he all of about 5 feet tall, but he was thinner than bamboo. My dad, on the other hand ... well, perhaps he said it best a couple days later, when, being led up the sand dunes of Mui Ne by a pack of 10-year-olds who had talked us both into trying their homemade sleds, his belly was poked. "Yeah, too much rice," he said. "I eat too much rice." The result was a bike that look...
Read more

Where Dragons Dance in Salt Lake City

Image
Three years ago last week, when Claire and I were living in Saigon, we flew north to Hue , Vietnam's imperial capital, and spent about five days there with my colleague Jim and his family -- wife Thuy, son Cullen and daughter Vivian. I remember it being cold and rainy in the same way my native Seattle is around this time of year. I also remember how fun it was to be in Hue that week, mainly because it was Tet, the Vietnamese Lunar New Year. The streets and markets were crowded with shoppers of all ages on the prowl for things like flowers and cakes and decorations and gifts. Despite the gray skies, there was color -- reds and golds and yellows and greens, everywhere you looked. We roamed places like the Citadel and Thu Duc's Thomb. We drank cafe sua during the day, and in true locals style, warm beer at night. We munched on Hue specialties, in the homes of Thuy's relatives. We cruised around the wet city on a rented motorbike. We played pool in the lobby of La Residence Ho...
Read more