Wow!!

WOW!!  Really, that about sums it up, wow! 

We've already been here for a month!  The time has simply flown by.  It's been an amazing experience thus far! 

Getting Here!
The actually getting here part was a bit more complicated than we had anticipated.  I thought getting Dexter on the plane would be one of the most difficult parts of our journey - as it turns out, getting Dexter to Vietnam was the easy part.  (Albeit, all of the preparations for it were a bit of a nightmare.)  Getting us to Vietnam proved to be much more difficult!  To make a  long story short, we were coming into the country on a tourist Visa through the school because the government won't issue a work permit until you're present in the country.  All of our arrangements had been carefully planned in detail, verified, and we had gone over the process several times so everything was set for smooth sailing.  No problems, right?  Ha!  We had every paper we were supposed to have - agreements, contracts, work authorizations, tickets purchased by the school, all kinds of stuff, but they wouldn't let us board, basically because we didn't have a return flight within three months.  (That's the longest you can stay on a tourist Visa.)  Try explaining the situation and all of the documentation so that not only Korean Airlines can understand, but so that they can also relay and verify everything with Vietnam.  Yeah, no language or translation obstacles there.  So the six hours that we arrived early were dwindling and time was ticking away with no luck.  One lady kept telling us she was trying to, and I quote, "call Vietnam."  I think Johnny's visualization describes it best - this lady is just going to pick up a phone and call a country?  So....what, she dials on her end, and in the middle of a park somewhere in Vietnam is a payphone, and the country itself just answers and says, "yeah, send them over!"  Really lady?  Plus with the 13hour time difference the odds of getting anyone at the embassy at that hour were slim to none.  Well, missing our flight and having to take another one once it was all figured out wouldn't be the biggest problem in the world, would it?  Oh wait.....Dexter was still on board!  So then we were trying to at least get our dog back, but cargo was locked down three hours prior to the flight.  Oh joy.  We basically kept being told we couldn't get on the flight because we'd face deportation, they'd get in trouble, blah, blah, blah.  After all the planning nightmares to get Dexter on our plane, I was suddenly wondering how on earth I was going to get him off since we couldn't seem to get on!  Well, we were already three people high in supervisors and I figured with less than an hour to take off it was now or never, so I went for it and engaged in a (rather well-played on my part if I do say so myself,) game of semantics.  It basically all boiled down to that fact that the written rules the supervisor had stated we "may" face deportation, which does not necessarily mean that we will, and we had sufficient documentation to prove that we wouldn't (which I argued removed any liability of wrong doing on their part.)  She didn't like it, but she was having difficulty arguing with me, so she said she has to go and check on something and excused herself.  A minute or two later she sent back the lady that was "calling Vietnam" and she told us she reached everyone she needed to and that we are allowed to board the aircraft.  Yippie!!  We were getting onboard and Dexter was still onboard.  Woo-hoo!!  They even sent us through a separate security line so we could make it in time.  We got to the terminal and found out they had not even boarded yet - what a relief.  Of course, I decided to press my luck and try to go grab one last bagel.  The line was long, and other things would have been quicker, but I wanted the bagel.  Greedy, greedy me.  Shame on me.  I didn't get through the line in time and had to board the aircraft hungry.  :(  Oh well, at least we got on!

While Korean Air may be tough cookies about actually allowing you on their planes, I have to admit, it was a nice plane.  We found our seats, finally found overhead storage (we were the last ones on the plane because of greedy little bagel-loving me) and we got situated.  The seats were pretty cramped, especially for such a long international flight, but we figured we'd just sleep through most of it.  After all, I had literally been up the entire day and night before (yes, we were still finishing up getting ready - hey, making a move of this magnitude on such short notice was tough!) so I thought I would for sure pass out before we even took off.  Wrong again Jenni, wrong again!  Eye-yhie-yhie!  For some reason I was so exhausted and excited I couldn't even sleep.  We each had our own little tablet/tv with games and movies so I fiddled around with that for a while, and they took pretty good care of you on the flights so there were little snacks and warm towels to break up the monotony.  One thing was kind of crazy was that we were in daylight for all of the flights, I hadn't even though of that before then!  Of course they try to control the cabin to some extent by dimming the lights and everything, and I tried - I tried so hard to be a good little passenger and just go to sleep, but it just wasn't happening.  Well, no big deal, I was still just happy that our whole little family was on the plane.  It started getting warm though, very warm, and most people that know Johnny know he doesn't do too well once it starts getting too warm and he's in a cramped place.  Well, I find it kind of funny now, it wasn't at the time (and I'm not sure if he finds it amusing yet,) but now I find it kind of amusing....You see, after one of the meals that they woke everyone for, Johnny was very warm and started not feeling so well.  I asked them to turn down the heat a little (I suspect they were heating everyone up so we'd sleep) and they turned it down for a few minutes.  But then the heat started blowing again, so I ask again and explain that he wasn't feeling well.  The guy next to me saw poor Johnny and gave me his newspaper so I could fan him.  I was fanning him and it started warming up yet again, so for a third time I called the flight attendant.  She came over, took one look at Johnny (who was looking rather green at this point in time,) gasped and ran off, returning a moment later with the most enormous barf bag you could possibly imagine.  It was ridiculously big for a barf bag, it was about the size of one of those huge plastic Macy's bags with the thick double black handles.  It took me a minute to figure out that she thought he'd need an adequate size bag to get airsick in - granted they had fed us two meals, but I guess she really thought Americans eat a lot!  Anyways, I asked her for some water and she came back with a giant bottle, an ice pack and cool cloths.  She was very sweet - very funny though!  She saw that I was still fanning him and all of a sudden the cool air clicked on.  Johnny started feeling better and he never lost his lunch.  I did notice though, that she started bringing extra blankets to people around us before she finally turned off the air (we were even a bit chilly by then.)

Anyhow, we finally touched down in Seoul.  Slightly embarrassed, we thanked the crew extensively.  They really were great.  We were all kind of chuckling and saying goodbye when they started asking us about connections and they helped us figure out exactly where to go to catch our next flight.  Feeling good we set off for the rest of the journey.  We were polite and let people in front of us that seemed to be in a rush (we had two hours until our connection.)  Well, that was before we realized that maybe we should be in a rush too!  In Korea you have to go through security again no matter what, even for transfers from the States.  (It really kind of makes sense when you think about it.)  Nonetheless, we were stressing again, not knowing if we did something wrong, but it all wound up working out and we made it with time to spare.  Of course, once we were in the terminal one of my Asian fears started coming true - there were very few things I could read.  It was so strange!  (It still is!  But environmental print is a whole other thing!)  We had our first encounter with trying to get food in a foreign, primarily non-English speaking country.  We wound up getting a couple of subway sandwiches and were really appreciative of gestures and body language.  So we ate and it was time to board again - we were almost there!  The flight was similar - again very nice service.  We asked the flight attendant to please just remind the pilot that there was a live dog in cargo so to adjust the temperature and pressure accordingly.  She went and reminded him, checked on Dex, came back smiling and told us "I see your dog.  He look very good.  He in cage."  I think you had to be there to really appreciate it, but with the language barrier and everything it really was pretty funny.  So that flight was very similar, except for exhaustion really started hitting me and I wound up being the one not feeling well on this leg of the journey!  Johnny took great care of me though and I quickly felt better.  I even dozed off for a little bit!

We finally landed in Vietnam!!  We were taking in so very, very much!  But we stayed focused and with, in my opinion, relatively few errors we figured out where to go, how to get through customs, and how to get our bags.  Customs took a while, and we were worried about Dex, but we finally got through.  (We had to wait twice as long because our boss forgot to tell us to bring an extra passport photo so they had to make us one.)  Nonetheless, we quickly found our bags, which had all been pulled off the conveyor and neatly stacked for us - which made us realize just how long it took us in customs! 

Now all we had to do was get Dexter.  We knew he had made the transfer and that he'd be coming out of the freight cargo section of the plane.  We asked and were directed to the area where the cargo is deplaned.  We waited and started getting nervous because he hadn't come out yet.  We knew we were in customs for awhile so we figured he should have been off the plane by then.  We were worried about if they could have forgotten he was on the plane and the plane would depart again with him still on it - all kind of things were worrying us.  It was very stressful because we couldn't read anything and it was very hard for people to understand us.  We kept asking, several people, for freight cargo, (constantly saying the word cargo,) and then we finally showed our shipping receipt to this one guy that spoke somewhat descent broken English.  He looked at it, looked at us, and repeated, "cargo?" and we excitedly said "yes! CARGO!"  He turned and spoke in Vietnamese to several of the other people that had been "helping" us and then amidst the Vietnamese we heard the word "cargo."  You could see the others all having this little epiphany, as they all made a long sound of astonishment and said "....cargo!"  Well, as it turns out the Vietnamese word for cargo is - get this - CARGO!  They just thought we kept repeating some random English word (in the airport) that sounded like their word for cargo.  They didn't have a clue.  It was rather frustrating.  But we finally figured out where the actual freight cargo area was and headed that direction.  We briefly found and met our new boss, who had a hard time recognizing us since I'm not a blonde anymore, and we pretty much dropped our bags with him and took off to find our beloved Dexter.

The guy that actually helped us told us to hurry because they close in just a few minutes and it was a little bit of a walk, so to walk fast.  Well, we went for our first run in Vietnam the first night we were here.  We took off running and found the freight cargo section, but it was late it looked like they were closed.  The first guard station that we found had a guard that we tried to talk to - he just shook his head and pointed us down further.  We kept running and repeated this for several guard stations.  Finally I saw what looked like an open garage door to a warehouse.  We saw a nearby guard, flagged him down and tried to talk to him.  I had my little translation book and we were still having a hard time understanding one another.  Finally, Johnny acting out "big dog", barking and all, got him to understand what we were looking for.  The guard looked rather perplexed.  I kept pointing to the warehouse and motioning to ask for permission for us to go inside.  He was little uncertain, but he motioned and let us in.  We saw another guard even closer in, so smiling, we again motioned and asked the first guard if we could go talk to the other guard.  He seemed pleased with the idea of getting rid of us, after all - he kept speaking in Vietnamese and we kept speaking in English and we weren't really getting anywhere - and we certainly weren't going away (persistent little devils we were,) so he smiled, nodded and let us go.  We found the next guard, who did not take much of an interest in us, and certainly didn't understand us, so he pretty much just walked off, leaving us standing there all alone.  Well, the door was open, so we went in and saw that it was indeed the freight cargo bay! We started making Dexter's calling noise, hoping to get him barking so we could find him.  Being a couple of foreigners walking around the inside of the cargo bay at an international airport does apparently get some people to take an interest in you though.  Suddenly several people just start appearing.  They finally figured out who were (the dog people - apparently bringing in a large dog through freight cargo does not happen everyday in Vietnam,) and they got the man that had been trying to contact us all day.  This poor guy only had our work information (we didn't have phones or even our address when I made the arrangements,) so he had been calling the school all day long, which was closed for Christmas holiday.  Nonetheless, it seemed like we were finally in the right spot to finish getting everything we needed....or so we though!


WOW-SHERS!  It's no wonder I'm behind on this whole blogging thing!  If I keep writing so much about every little thing then I'll never keep everyone up to date!  Okay, here's to keeping it a bit shorter.  Not to worry though, I'm sure it's rather likely there will be some long random tangents.  Look!  There's a conical hat ;)


"Cargo Customs"
Okay, so for those of you just now joining us, or that had to take a short nap after the last segment, here's where we were at:  Johnny, Dexter and I all had landed in Vietnam - we just hadn't gotten Dexter into our possession yet....

Cargo customs was an entire saga all it's own.  Basically, we found out from this guy that had been trying to reach us that we had a bit of a problem because customs had already closed for the night, so we couldn't do a declaration for Dexter.  This guy really did show us an example of the personal responsibility people take for their work here and the ethic that drives them.  This guy was supposed to leave hours ago, but he was in charge of getting the dog and getting him to us, so since the job wasn't done, he hadn't left.  (Our boss explained it to us that he was charged with this certain task, and that often in this culture, if someone doesn't complete their task, they themselves have failed.)  Even though customs was closed this guy tried like heck for us to be able to get to take Dexter home that night.  He called other people back to work, at 2300 hours (and they actually came back!) to try to help.  He made it through several steps of the process but finally a guy in a suit (who refused to make eye contact with my almost crying puppy-eyes,) seemed to say it was a no go.  He would not make an exception and we would just have to wait until customs opened the next day. 

Johnny and I were watching as everything happened, and we already knew what the decision was that had been made, we could tell from the conversations and the body language.  We could tell the guy that had been helping us had really gone to bat for us.  He didn't even want to tell us it was a no-go, he was so disappointed you'd of thought it was him trying to get his puppy out of customs.  I fought back tears and we stayed a few minutes longer asking questions while the prick in the suit left.  The guy that had been helping us, Nghi, explained that he was leaving for Saigon in the morning, so he was going to walk us through everything we needed to do the next day.  Nghi literally walked Johnny all over customs, showed him exactly where to go and explained everything we needed to do in the morning.  I was still a little hung up on whether or not Dexter was actually okay.  Then this random forklift comes out and sets down a pallet on the other side of the cargo bay.  Then it picks up the pallet and turns it.  Dexter's dark gray crate had never looked so shimmery and wonderful!!  Instinct took over and I ran for my puppy, as Johnny describes, wilding flailing my arms in the air and screaming "Dexter!!"  Nghi jumps in front of me with both of his arms extended to stop me, frantically and worriedly looking at Johnny, and says "No, you must calm down!"  I regained control and heard my puppy beating his tail against his crate with excitement.  I knew then that he was okay.  I apologized and promised the guy I wouldn't go crazy, and we calmly power-walked over to see him.  We couldn't take him out, not even to go potty, but he did let us feed him through the crate.  We felt much better after spending a few minutes with him.  Nghi gave us his cell phone number too and told us he'd be here at the airport in the morning before he left for Saigon, so just to call him if we needed any help and he would try to help us before his flight.  As we started to leave our poor puppy kept crying and yelping, it was so sad.  (I was secretly hoping they wouldn't want to hear it all night and would let us take him, but no such luck.)  It was only another six hours or so until they opened again so it didn't seem all that bad. 

Feeling much better, and knowing my dog was actually there and alive, we set off to find our boss that we had ditched a descent while earlier with our bags.  Bear in mind, we had no phone, no internet connection for email or anything, so we couldn't even call to keep him updated - we were hoping he and our stuff were still there.  And he was, yay Stan!!  Johnny opened by asking "So, do we still have jobs?"  He seemed puzzled, until he realized it was joke, and then things were off to a great start.  We told him about the freight cargo fiasco as we headed off for our new home.  We had to take two taxis to fit everything comfortably.  I rode with Stan and we had a pleasant ride.  I was very tired though, and taking in the driving culture of Vietnam for the first time, so much like the actual ride, the conversation was a little jumpy every now and then.  At one point I thought I was so tired that I was seeing things, but as it turns out, traffic here really is that insane!  Stan was talking to me about something when I saw someone cross into oncoming traffic on the highway.  This maniac on a motorcycle was weaving in and out of head-on traffic of vans, cars, motorbikes with absurd amounts of bails of hay strapped to them, mixed with bicycles and pedestrians pushing these wooden wheeled carts that looked like they were straight out of the middle ages.  Everyone was honking and this guy barely makes his exit on the opposite side of the highway - he was within inches of head-on collision with a city bus.  Just then Stan, who was still casually talking, asked me a question, I imagine pertaining to whatever he had been talking about while I was entirely distracted with the chaos on the road.  Startled, I responded honestly with something to the effect of "I'm sorry, I don't think I heard a word you just said, I was distracted by that....by, all of this!"  However I played it off, it came out pretty funny and my new boss got a good laugh out of it.  I will say that I don't think any amount of reading can prepare you for experiencing the driving culture of Vietnam.  After we exited the highway, thankfully on the correct side of the road, it was pretty dark for the rest of the ride, but Vietnam looked very interesting to say the least. 

"Home, Sweet Home"
We arrived at Ciputra.  The community and our building felt reassuring after the crazy cab rides we had just experienced.  Stan was going to show us to our new home.  We loaded up the elevator and Johnny stayed with our other bags as I rolled the first set into our apartment.  I was expecting those ugly red couches and was surprised when I saw beige couches.  I paused in the doorway, looked around and commented, "huh, no ugly red couches."  We went back downstairs, loaded up the rest, and the guys moved them in while I held the elevator.  I heard Johnny ask as he walked in, "where are the ugly red couches?"  We both knew this wasn't the apartment we had been sent pictures of, but at that moment we really didn't care that much - it was clearly where we would be sleeping that night. 

We sat down at the kitchen table with Stan, trying to go over some paperwork but we were all exhausted.  (I was working on close to day three without any substantial amount of sleep and Johnny only had a couple of hours on my sleep time.)  We were all a bit delirious and we broke into the pretzels and banana bread that Stan had gotten for us.  I was looking at the clock and trying to figure out what time it was and Stan jokingly asked "why, are you planning on going anywhere anytime soon?"  Johnny and I both stared blankly at each other for a brief moment, then practically in unison said that we had to be back at customs in a few hours.  Stan laughed.  Then he realized we were serious.  He asked how we're going to get there, I shrugged and said in a taxi I suppose.  He stared at us for a moment, I would like to think with some amount of awe at our determination, but it very well could have just been because he thought we were crazy, he shook his head and said "you'll need some help."  We were surprised, but we weren't about to decline.  We discussed the time and Stan bid us goodnight, promising to return at 6a.m. 

We spent about an hour getting settled in enough to be able to get ready quickly in the morning, and then crashed on a rock hard bed.  When the alarm went off a few hours later it was painful to get up.  We soon discovered we hadn't gotten so far as figuring out hot water yet, but I needed a shower.  Begrudgingly, I took a frightfully frigid and plain-old painfully cold shower.  No one can say I'm not serious about needing my showers.  Seriously, I expect no more guff from anyone about me being dramatic about needing a shower.  I proved it that day, period.  Anyhow, as promised Stan returned at around 6 that morning, and we headed back to the airport.  We were early so we stopped and grabbed our first taste of Vietnamese food - a hotdog of sorts on a stick - not exactly great, but it was edible.  Then it was back to freight cargo customs.  While we were waiting Johnny tried his first Vietnamese coffee - it was probably triple the strength of espresso and about three times the thickness as well, and that was after he had it watered down a little.  Don't worry, I was a sweet wife and shared my Coke Light.

"Stamps"
At 8:00 no one was at the customs counter so we waited until about 8:10/8:15 to start to worry.  It was New Year's Eve and we were a little worried they might be closed (even though we had been assured they wouldn't be,) but nonetheless we were worried so we called Nghi.  Johnny got him on the phone but couldn't quite understand what he said.  He hung up and told us he thought he said he was going to call someone or that he'd be right there or something.  Sure enough, about two minutes later Nghi waltzes up the stairs with his bags in hand and got started on our problem.  He talked to some people and found out that the customs agents were just late today but that they'd be there soon.  He went and got the process started for us a different way and then came back with two helpers.  He explained everything to them and told us that they'd be with us until we had our dog.  He headed off for Saigon and we got started on the customs process.   

Alight, I know I haven't been that great yet about keeping it short, so with that in mind, here's what happened next.  We spent hours with these people, running all over the place, getting a ridiculous amount of stamps on numerous forms.  Stan kept telling us that nothing gets done in Vietnam without a stamp, and boy was he right that day!  It was easier for the Vietnamese people to actually go to all these different places and get papers stamped and then come back and have us sign some things.  Then they started needing my signature at the window so I tagged along.  It appeared that having me there made it more difficult to get the clearances needed, so eventually I was just standing back off to the side, literally blocked by their bodies; then, when my passport and John Hancock was needed, the girl would step to the side, I'd poke my head through, smile, sign and say thank-you.  Off to the next station to get the next stamp and seal.  It was crazy.  Every now and again I'd check back in to let Johnny and Stan know I was okay.  Once we had about a dozen stamps we found out we needed some grand master stamp if you will.  So off I went again, except this time I had to leave the huge customs office.  Bear in mind, I hadn't been in Vietnam for but a few hours, and I hadn't even seen the place in daylight, so I was a little skeptical of having to actually leave the airport to get this particular stamp.  Equipped with Johnny's iPhone for an emergency, I followed the two people we'd been with all morning.  We went down the road and turned on this dirt road alley that was full of old buildings. There were roadside stands with food (quite delicious smelling to my hungry little body,) stray animals - dogs and rooster alike - just strutting around.  The vegetation was unlike anything I'd seen before, lush greens growing out of nowhere, trees with trunks of thickly wound roots that must have been hundreds of years old, and random gorgeous colorful flowers.  It all seemed very out of place with the rundown buildings and random uniformed officers of some sort.  I digress, back to the story, it took a little while but we found the office and got the stamps we needed.  I signed a few documents that were much longer than anything else I'd been given, so it seemed as though we were making progress!  The guy even told me we were almost done!  We headed back to the initial customs building at the airport and found my poor worried hubby, sitting with our new boss that was playing the harmonica.  Stan told me he had assured Johnny everything seemed legit, that these things just take a long time here and that I was fine, but Johnny had gone looking for me anyway.  Apparently when he came back Stan asked if he had found me.  Johnny said, "No wife.  No dog.  No good.  I guess I'll wait here patiently and hope they come back."  And that was when Stan reached into his back pocket, pulled out his harmonica, and started playing the blues. 

So you'd think I would have returned with Dexter by this point in time right?  Nope, not yet, the helpers ran off to try to get him and even they were frustrated when they were told they needed more stamps.  We had stamps galore!  We were getting the same exact people to sign and stamp again.  The only progress was that Dexter had been brought out into the bay area.  A few more stamps later he was brought near us.  At this point in time Johnny and I went and stood next to his crate.  We stood there for a loooong time.  Johnny said they'd get tired of us standing there and eventually let us have our dog.  Soon lunch time was rolling around and Johnny had called it, they didn't want us still standing there when they got back from lunch, so alas a bit more progress!  The helpers came back with a few more stamps and an official import clearance form that was given to me, but we were told we couldn't take him yet, apparently we needed to wait just a little bit longer.  At this point in time Johnny playfully said Dexter's new nickname should be "Stamps."  I loved it, it was too perfect, so we officially gave Dexter a middle name, Dexter Stamps Marotto.  A few minutes later, after a few more people in uniforms came by to 'oooh and ahhhh' over Dexter, we were told we could take him.  Nothing changed with the paperwork, nothing at all, but they finally said we could take him so we didn't hesitate for a moment.  Within about two minutes Dexter got to go potty, leave the cargo terminal and was loaded in a taxi headed home.  Our whole family had finally made it to our new home.  Victory!!

"Life in Vietnam"
Okay, this entry is yet to come.  I will try to update much more, much more concisely, much more quickly.  I guess the whole journey here was simply too much to be able to summarize in a few short sentences just yet.  I mean after all, we haven't been here that long.  In some ways it feels like we have been though.  There has been so very much going on and hopefully we'll be telling you guys all about it in short, sweet little anecdotes.  Oh, and we have finally started taking a few pictures!  Yes, we were so busy even I, the picture-nut hailing from my Auntie Susan, didn't have time to snap a few shots for a little while!  Not worry though, that has been remedied and I'll be posting some soon.  But like I said, "Wow!" really about sums it up.  Goodnight!