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Philadelphia → San Francisco → Seoul → Hanoi
Day 1
Up at 2:00 AM to get ready. Uber to PHL airport at 3:50 AM. Arrived PHL airport at 4:30 AM and encountered 30 minute TSA security line.
Boarded UA2002 PHL to SFO for 5:45 duration flight. Arrived SFO D concourse for a flight departing G concourse.
Boarded UA893 SFO – Seoul flight planned for 12 hours 1 minute and 5778 miles. Joined daughter, Lauren, on this flight. Uneventful but long.
Boarded Vietnam Airlines flight VN415 from Seoul to Hanoi for planned 4 hour 40 minute flight. This flight was crowded and seat legroom dimensions seemed shorter than other airlines. This airplane was packed and miserable is the kindest description. The cabin lights remained on for the entire flight. There were very few Westerners onboard.
Arrived Hanoi airport 27 hours and 40 minutes after getting on the airliner in Philadelphia. Beautiful airport. No issues with immigration or baggage. The visas we had applied and paid for via the internet were were in order and passports were stamped.
Meet Captain Kidd
Airport transfer was arranged in advance through the hotel as we had been warned of taxi scams of unsuspecting travelers. The local rideshare app called Grab is fantastic, but we did yet have Vietnamese sim cards for our mobile phones, so arranging through the hotel was the smart choice.
Our driver met us just outside immigration and customs. He was a happy fellow who did not speak much English. Dead tired, we were dragging while he enthusiastically bounded to the car in a nearby parking lot.
Unbeknownst to us and him at the time, our driver gave us an illuminating lesson as to what was in store for our Vietnam experience. In my mind, I nickhamed him Captain Kidd.
The parking lot was a congested mess with cars parked in entry and exit lanes and multiple cars going the wrong direction according to lane markings. Our jovial driver hopped up on the bumpers of cars and started shouting friendly but authoritative orders at other drivers. Somehow they listened and made moves that allowed an opening to escape. Our driver jumped in the driver’s seat, laughed like I imagine a successfully plundering pirate might laugh, and … we were off.
It was full nighttime with wet streets.
Captain Kidd was clearly a master navigator in a land where traffic lanes and rules were more of a suggestion rather than law as the Code is described in Pirates of the Caribbean.
It was smooth sailing … until Kidd hit a motorcycle knocking a couple off and onto the street. He jumped out of the car and began yelling and waving his arms at the young couple as they gathered themselves, apparently not seriously hurt, onto their feet. Kidd handed the broken taillight to the young man and wheeled back around to our car.
Kidd jumped in, turned to us and said “F*^$ing motorcycles” in reasonable English, hit the gas, and we were on our way.
Lauren and I just looked at each other, wide-eyed. Knowing we would be on motorcycles soon, I remember thinking, ‘holy sh&#, what have I gotten us into’.
The rest of the ride was uneventful and we sat in silence. We arrived at 11:30 PM local time at the wonderful Hanoi Exclusive Hotel, 31 hours and 40 minutes after I got up in Devon, Pennsylvania. Although the hotel had hired the driver, I gave him a few dollars worth of Vietnamese Dong for which I had exchanged for some dollars at the Hanoi airport. He laughed and took off, disappearing into the night.
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