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[abulinhthi]

Anybody know what's "special" about these?

My wife and I recently visited HaLong Bay with her brother and his family. We stayed at a 4-star hotel. My wife and I forgot to bring our passports. Everybody else had their ID's, and we were all obviously one big family, but...............rules are rules, and the reception was very hesitant to let us stay without our passports.

Eventually the wife of my brother-in-law took out her ID. She's a journalist for ......."Vietnam Economic Times", I think. Her card was such a big deal that 4 people from behind the receptionist's desk gathered around to see it. When they saw it, they LITERALLY, VISABLY were taken aback. Within seconds, the answer was, "No problem. Welcome to our hotel." We never had to show our passports, or any ID.

I caught only the briefest of glimpes of her card: bigger than a normal VN ID, green-bluish color, not red. I asked her about it, but she doesn't really speak much English. The rest of the family either didn't know, or didn't want to say why it was so easy to check in, basically under the ID of the wife of my brother-in-law.

Anybody know anything about this?? Ever seen one?? Ever met a VN journalist??

[Magic8ball]

[abulinhthi]

Dear Magic8ball,

"A "journalist" in VN is connected."

In what way? How do you know this????

"Possible a party member...."
Whoa! My understanding is that it's nearly impossible to join the Party nowadays. They do background checks for 3 generations, and several people I've known who've wanted to join, basically just give up 'cause it's too cumbersome. What I've learned is, it REALLY, REALLY doesn't matter.

We're not talking "political indoctrination" here. Those days are over, and have been for at least 20 years, when membership into the Party started to become difficult. We're talking about economic indications of certain sectors in the economy, professionally and thoroughly researched, checked, argued over, differing analyses offered.............in sum, "just business." It really has nothing at all to do with "Party membership."

Nowadays, people learn to get "connected" in a myriad of other ways, and this connection is a central part of life in VN.

"That trump card is worth playing again....."

Yeah, we have, and we will, but it's very interesting what I've learned: What we do, if you want to call it, "using the trump card....." is really never anything "illegal", and in fact could not be done anyway, even if you weren't "connected". There IS a way to do almost anything in VN. "Being connected" doesn't really smooth the way nearly as much as "being nice" does. My brother-in-law's wife is charming, beautiful, young and smart. From an educated, loving, warm, traditional family. Also modest, a lovely Vietnamese trait.

Just wondering: How long have you been here? No attitude, just a request for information.