The Waiting Game

Visas are an important part of any trip and luckily we have been able to get most of our visas at border crossings and airports. We have had to get a few in advance, India in San Francisco and Vietnam in Cambodia, and knew we would need to spend a few days in a major town collecting our final 2 ‘advance’ visas, Brazil and China. Brazil is an odd visa, you have to get it within 90 days of your arrival in their country, but you are required to obtain it in your home country. Basically, this means if you are 8 months into an around the world trip, you are going to have some troubles, and that is exactly what happened to us when we arrived back in Singapore.

We were going back and forth on which visa to get in Singapore and which to get in Hong Kong. Hong Kong is said to be the easiest place in the world to get a China visa, so we opted to attempt Brazil in Singapore. We arrived at the Brazil consulate early on a Monday morning, with applications and all supporting documents that they might need. As soon as we opened our mouths we were shot down. We were not permanent residents of Singapore so we could not get a visa there we were told. The consulate worker went as far as to tell us to “thank Bush” for our problem. Clearly that did not go over well with us but we bit our tongues and asked him to reconsider. I even threw in a few tears hoping they would help the situation. Eventually the worker told us he would send a telegram(do people still use these??) to Brazil asking for special permission. At this point we even questioned wanting to go to Brazil, but our around the world ticket had us landing in Sao Paulo and we had no other options for flights. We were told to come back the next day. No updates the following day and it seemed they were just stringing us along. Frustrations mounted at this point and we decided to hit up a local microbrewery to let off some steam. We had only had one drink, bought at a corner market, in the previous three weeks of travel in Malaysia so we figured this was as good of time as any for a cold one. We were happily informed on arrival that Canadian brewer had just released his ‘Oktoberfest’ beer and we had an afternoon fest of our own while discussing our options for moving forward with the visas.

On the third day we headed back to the consulate, hoping to get some answers. By this time we had already spent a total of 6 nights in Singapore and we were becoming impatient. We had planned to head up to Malaysia to a tiny little island off the coast for the week, but the visa was more important, so we had to cancel our reservations. After being given no update and sitting in the waiting room for over an hour, they finally decided to give us visas. Victory! Did we mention the visa few for Americans is $142? Reciprocity fee.

We had four nights remaining before our flight to Hong Kong and we knew we needed a break from Singapore. The easiest option was an hour ferry ride off the coast to the small Indonesian island of Bintan. We had not expected to visit Indonesia on the trip but the opportunity presented itself and we hopped on the ferry with no reservations or real knowledge of the place we were heading. Unaware to us, while on the ferry a large earthquake hit Indonesia. The news was broadcast worldwide and we had no idea anything had happened. We were on the ferry and felt nothing and the island sustained no damage. We had no email connection during our four day stay and unfortunately this lead to a storm of worried emails from friends and family. The island turned out to be relaxing and rather quiet. Our resort was rural and rather simple but had an authentic feel and was run by local townspeople. We stayed in a wood bungalow, perched on stilts over the water and spent the days and nights reading, playing cards, and enjoying some great local beer.

Our flight to Hong Kong was uneventful. For once we were not questioned at check-in as we had converted our paper tickets to electronic tickets at the American Airlines office in Singapore. Due to high accommodation costs in HK we spend our first night in the YWCA before transferring to one of our nicer hotels of the trip. We had caught a web special for multi-night stays and we were actually upgraded at check-in. Once again, bright and early we found ourselves waiting in a massive line outside the Chinese consulate. We were extremely worried about this visa. We had a flight 5 days later and Chad already had a cancelled Chinese visa in his passport from his trip to Tibet 5 years ago. We waited patiently in line and when we finally made it upstairs handed our application in with no issues. They didn’t even want any of the supporting documents that we had spent a few hours putting together the night before. They told us to come back on Thursday and off we went. No drama or problems, what a difference from Brazil. We now had another 4 days stretching ahead of us while we waited to pick up our passports.

Hong Kong is a pretty amazing city. High-rises control the skyline and fancy malls line the streets. All this working on passports in already expensive cities was starting to take a beating on our wallets, so we spent hours wandering around the city. We found free internet at the local library, browsed some high end malls, rode the historic tram to the peak overlooking the city, hopped the low cost ferry and subway system around town, and put together meals from the local supermarket. On our third night in town we met up with a friend from college, Brian, and his wife Elodie for drinks. The couple had moved to HK on a 2 year commitment with work and were now entering their second year in the city. They really had enjoyed their time in the city, had started a family and were actually looking into extending their stay. They played great hosts to us treating us to a night at a local brewery, inviting us to the historic horse tracks the following evening and allowing us to crash at their apartment our final night in town. Once again, friends on the other side of the world have shown us such great hospitality and we are truly grateful.