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[Jbhughes]

Bugger me it's cold! I've got about 4 layers on, even inside!

I'll try not to make this post too self-indulgent, rather attempt share any useful information I've come across in coming home for a short holiday, share some of my experiences and try to garner some more about my return.

1. Changing money.

VCB (of which I'm a customer) allowed me to transfer cash to a relative's bank account with the following supporting documents:

-Work Permit
-Tax documents (Tax withholding certificates that I described in this post: http://forums.eslcafe.com/job/viewtopic.php?p=973640&highlight=#973640 )
-Labour Contract (mine isn't a green or blue one that I've heard about on this site, but it has been submitted to the provincial labour department in relation to my work permit extension)

Initially they said I couldn't do it because my pay isn't transferred directly into my account from the company I work for, then I showed them my w.p. and tax documents to prove that I'm working here legally and that my pay is also legal.

VCB HCM allowed me to purchase �GBR with the following supporting documents:

-Work Permit
-Labour Contract
-Flight ticket (despite being a return)
-Pay slips

I found the last item weird, the slips are just the ones the company gives me when they pay me and are hardly legally binding (the phieu chi ones, or is it phieu thu?). I showed them that I had the tax documents, but they really didn't care. This leads me to believe that, as other posters have said, they just want some kind of paper trail for the cash.

I don't think that my work permit was particularly necessary, although my labour contract definitely was and also my flight ticket was only a print out from the VN airlines office. Perhaps they made a call to verify the ticket number, but I doubt it. While I'm not suggesting or condoning fraud, to me it doesn't seem particularly hard to simply buy yourself a phieu chi book, type up a made up contract and flight ticket and go into the bank and just give it a go. Oh, I needed my passport too for both transactions.

Now, I had one more rather annoying task with the VCB HCM branch. As I was changing my currency in the official above board way, I wanted them to produce a currency certificate for me ,to allow me to cross the border without any hassles. In the morning they said 'yes' and lo and behold in the afternoon (when they gave me the cash) they said 'no.' Their reasoning was that I was carrying less than the $5k cut-off and therefore didn't require certificatation. This was all fine and well, little did they know about the couple of thousand US$ I had been collecting from the gold shops over the past year or so. Of course, I didn't want to tell them about that, so I tried to persuade them that I needed the certificate for the authorities in the UK, anyway, they didn't agree, but I swear it was simply because the manager couldn't be bothered to write it up, rather than any official policy or anything. This forced me to leave my $ with a friend for safe-keeping, rather than risk what happened to that 'poor' Chinaman the other day.

2. The UK / the West?

After 3 years away, it really has taken some adjusting.

One thing is the cold. I thought Da Lat was cold in the teens, hell no, cold is around the -5 to 5 range. How do you Canadians survive with your minuses?

Another is conversation, I have little in common with people and I find it difficult to keep up. Often I miss what people say.

Things are so much more organised and regimented and boxed into categories here. I love the seeming transparency, but it is a little lifeless. Transport is a great example. I had to take a coach (a novel word I'd forgotten about) and a train to my destination.

The coach ticket was booked and paid for on the internet prior to my arrival, they printed it out for me on the spot and I was able to change the ticket (for a fee). Christ, the last time I got a bus ticket in VN, I had a row over a telephone number with the world's most stupid woman, who wanted to ignore me and speak in VNese to my non-speaking VNese companion! The bus arrived and left on time, the drivers didn't act like they owned the bus (oh and didn't actually own the bus either) and that I was very lucky to be on it. The bus didn't play loud awful crooning music from some endless variety show and (unfortunately) didn't have the comedy skits on either. The bus wasn't full to bursting and I wasn't moved from my seat, my ticket didn't have an allocated ticket number that was swapped with someone who wanted to sit in my seat and the person next to me (ok, there wasn't a person next to me) didn't move somewhere else in the bus as not to be sitting next to the foreigner. I didn't hear the driver use his horn once, or any other drivers for that matter and the motorway outside was just a tedious hum of cars and lorries, not a motorbike, 3 wheeled converted contraption, bicycle, accident or anything particularly interesting in sight. Oh and the road was smooth. Lovely and smooooth. The bus arrived on time and one of the drivers got my stuff out of the hold and didn't throw it on the floor or in the dust. A million people didn't try to grab my stuff and pester me insatiably to find out 'where you go'. In fact, it took me a minute to spot the taxis, the drivers of which sat inside reading the paper, waiting for their turn in the taxi rank. I did walk though, because it cost more than was worth not walking.
The train was equally sedate, punctual, EXPENSIVE (�8 for a 25min journey) and hassle-free.

People are so much more polite. I almost fainted when the custom's officer gave back my passport with a 'thank you Sir' and a smile! Are VN custom officials trained to look so stern and to be such arseholes? There was even someone marshalling everyone into the right channels at the airport with smiles and 'madam's and 'sir's and answering people's questions politely and HELPFULLY! His badge said 'security team leader'. Unbelievable.

About the more expensive thing. It is and it isn't. Petrol is 46,000 a litre. Beer is 50,000 for bottles on offer in the off-licence. Milk is 30,000 a litre. If you buy bigger cartons, it goes down quite quickly, about 20,000 a litre. You can get things from the bakery, like sausage rolls etc for 20,000 or so. If you get a really good sale, you can get warm clothing for upwards of 200,000.

Maybe the post was a bit self-indulgent, I just thought I'd confirm some info on the money front and share a little of the experience on being here compared to lovely warm Vietnam.

I've got a question, too:

I am looking to renew my passport here as it's cheaper and mine is getting full. I located the required information to do it here in about 5 minutes on the internet, but alas I still can't seem to work out about the status of my temporary residence card.

Can I change my passport, yet retain the usage of my temporary residence card (which has the old passport number written on it)?

I'd imagine it's ok, but I would like to know from others what they have experienced and also if anyone can find an official document that says something about it, it would be great.

Thanks for any replies, and any questions about Blighty, let me know.[/url]