A Vietnam Podcast: Stories of Vietnam

How We Ended Up In A Vietnamese Government Quarantine Camp | S3 E1

March 28, 2020 Niall Mackay Season 3 Episode 1
A Vietnam Podcast: Stories of Vietnam
How We Ended Up In A Vietnamese Government Quarantine Camp | S3 E1
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Show Notes Transcript

This is a special episode, maybe mini-season, of Seven Million Bikes direct from quarantine in Saigon. This was recorded on a phone recorder and I don't have a laptop for edits so it's a live interview with my wife, Adrie Mackay.

Adrie and I left Vietnam on March 9th for what was meant to be three weddings in three weeks on three continents; going to New Zealand, then the USA then back to Vietnam for the final wedding. 

Weighing up the risks of the coronavirus we decided to start out trip, but almost immediately those plans changed as things developed rapidly in the world. And continued to change daily, then hourly, then almost by the minute as we tried to get back to Vietnam as soon as we could before the borders closed and we were stranded in New Zealand. In hindsight we should have listened to those red flags and stayed in Vietnam.

Adrie tells the story of how we got back into Vietnam, barely, and why we are in quarantine after the most anxiety inducing and stressful period of our lives together. 

We feel ridiculously lucky that we made it into Vietnam at literally the 11th hour before the border effectively shut at midnight to foreigners.

******
Adrie and the presenter of Seven Million Bikes, Niall have been married for nearly 7 years, living in Vietnam for 4 of those, calling this country home. They have a beautiful French Bulldog called Biscuit who is waiting for them to get out of quarantine at her best friends house. 
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Theme music composed by Lewis Wright.
Main Cover Art designed by Niall Mackay and Le Nguyen.
Episode art designed by Niall Mackay.

Ian Paynton was one of the first students in our course and now has a podcast, You Don't Know Vietnam, that is in the top 10% of podcasts worldwide and already bringing him business!

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spk_0:   0:01
Welcome to another episode of seven million Bakes a Saigon podcast. My name's New Mukai. I'm your host. There's always on. This is an extra special episode for regular listeners. You've noticed that has not been an episode in a while being really busy doing lots of Comedy night, among other things. And then, obviously, as everyone knows, then the Corona virus struck on DH. It's kinda put a stop to a lot of things right now, not just in Vietnam and around the world. So this is an extra special episode because and it may turn into a special season. We'll see how we go. But this episode is being recorded from Quarantine s o my wife right now, currently in quarantine. We have bean for eight days now. We have six days left. We have no complaints about that. We expected to be here. The food's awesome. We get fed three times. They were isolated in a room. We stay away from each other. Oh hell with you. We've had a test so far. We're waiting to find out if that's negative. Much fingers crossed. It will be. But I thought for this episode I'm going to introduce and I'm gonna interview, um, my wife. So here I have a J with me, and she's going, Teo, tell us basically about this storey. And I'm sure I'll chip in as well off how we ended up in quarantine because it was quite dramatic living through it, wasn't it?

spk_1:   1:26
Hello? Uh, yeah, it was pretty anxiety inducing.

spk_0:   1:34
Yeah. So what we're gonna gonna go to share with ism? Not really. A little bit About what it's like in quarantine, probably. Well, actually, but more so we're going to just show the kind of like what happened 10 days or so before we go into quarantine was maybe the most stressful of a life, partly because of the changing situation that was happening every single day around the world and in Vietnam. Um, when they ended up landing us in quarantine to let's go back, try to tell me what was ill fate. E plan originally.

spk_1:   2:09
Okay, so if we go back before this whole pandemic started, um original plan short storey version wass. We had three weddings in three different countries, actually, on three different continents in three weeks, Three Saturdays in a row. So we've known about two of the three weddings for nearly up to close to a year now. And our plan wass to go to New Zealand for two weeks. Um, attend wedding number one. Your cousin's wedding. Um, my cousin in law, I guess, uh, fly on Monday. The 23rd too. The U. S. Spend a couple days in l. A Go to Texas. Attend my cousin's wedding on the 28th which, coincidentally, is today on DH. Then, after a week in El Paso, were planning to fly back to Saigon to attend wedding number three are friends, which is going to be on April 4th. And those were our grand plan plans, and unfortunately, they did not go to plan.

spk_0:   3:15
So we'll go back to We were planning to leave on March 9th months, 10th March name on Monday night. I know, you know. So we posted a storey on Reddit on. We've had lots of support on there, but we've also had some criticism from people off of radio is well, seeing. Why did we go basically calling his idiotic thing that we was selfish and stupid for going. So if you're listening to this and you're thinking why the hell did they go? Well, just provide a little bit of a context as to what was happening around the name's intense of March. Just to kind of explain why we still go on that on that trip. Do you want to explain a little bit about that?

spk_1:   3:59
Yeah. I mean, I guess the first thing I would say is if we had our flights originally booked for the 10th or the 11th even if march like, we absolutely probably wouldn't have gone, Um, obviously days and weeks leading up to our departure, I had been following the news really closely just as everyone else hod schools here had clearly been closed and being almost taking it quite seriously. But I don't know in hindsight, if if the way the seriousness Vietnam was assessing the pandemic or at that time it wasn't a pandemic gave us maybe a false sense of security to travel because we felt like we were coming from a relatively unaffected place transiting through Australia, which at the time on March 9th had very few cases and our final destination at the time, Wass Zealand, which only had five cases as well. And so I mean as most people would maybe agree with a lot of the government response to hand it to the start to the outbreak affects how it's dealt with in the country. And from our personal perspective, it seemed like the three countries that we would be travelling within were relatively, um, attacking the outbreak in a smart way. I guess the governments were, I think when we left we were pretty much fifth. Maybe when we left, where 60 40 gonna continue on to us, and pretty much when we touched down in New Zealand, maybe within a day or two it was that percent to do. Going to the U. S was rapidly shrinking and in within maybe three days after arriving New Zealand, it was pretty much 100%. We're going to cancel the second leg of our journey, so that was very clear. Pretty early on, I think

spk_0:   5:51
we were given warnings before we left The ball does could be closing. We're won't buy it some close family that I was a possibility. We saw that there were red flags. That was a few things that we were like, Are we doing the right thing by going can you mention we had this trip planned? Like a year in the making? It was we hadn't been back to the US for three years to see Avery's family. So that was obviously a big thing where you actually lived in New Zealand. And that's kind of our home country. So we will tickle back and see friends here to see my cousin get married. So around that time, people will still travelling, You know what I mean? For the wedding in New Zealand, there was people still flying, and after us, nothing was shut down on the other. But as edgy said, things changed pretty rapidly and then just changed every single day after that too. That was given the situation at the time. Now, this is where the drama started before we even left. You only talk about my drama just trying to get over the country.

spk_1:   6:55
Yeah. I mean, we had a few red flags that in hindsight, the universe is probably telling us Don't go. Don't go. Don't go. Unfortunately, we decided to go. Um, But before we even left, we actually had quite a long layover in Sydney, Australia. And when we booked our tickets a couple of months back. Um, I knew at the time that we probably needed to get a visa because our layover was longer than eight hours. But I kind of forgot about it because we're simply transiting through the country until a few days before, like literally two days before I was like, Oh, no, we haven't gotten a visa. So I quickly went online and just checked. And I knew in from previous experience me personally. I've gotten visas for Australia that have come through pretty quickly, like almost instantaneously. So, um, I followed the guidelines on immigration website. It basically pointed me to a transit visa, which ended up being a really complicated application process, to say the least. I freaked out a bit, sent it to Neil, asked him to fill it out as well. We both submitted the application and it came back saying 8 to 14 days processing time. We're like, What have we done? And it's Australia. You're not getting in that visa. So we thought we might as well just apply for the electronic visa, which would be basically for like, a holiday or a tourist visa. Essentially, I applied on DH Sure enough, instantaneously that came back approved. This is on Saturday. Neil applied. And because he has a different passport to me or because you have a good support to me, it wasn't instantaneous and, you know, holding our breaths from Saturday night Sunday into Monday when he was finally able to call the immigration office in Australia. And they said that actually, it's public holiday in Australia, and most of the offices around this around the country are closed. So

spk_0:   9:00
a ll the days when I needed my visa to be processed as fast as possible code up immigration. And she's like, uh, it's a public holiday in four out of 60 in the studio. It's probably going to get done today. And our flight was that night, too.

spk_1:   9:16
So it was highly unlikely that Neil's visa was gonna be approved at the same

spk_0:   9:21
time. I don't get it, soldier that day.

spk_1:   9:24
Yeah, Okay. Okay. We're talking about that now.

spk_0:   9:27
I'm just saying I was like the added stress that the pressure was like a dog. Also needed to have surgery and have, like, a wart removed. It was just, like, so stressful. Time to figure all that out.

spk_1:   9:37
I got hit by a motorbike on Friday. I could barely walk the Friday before he left. Oh, I

spk_0:   9:44
forgot all about that. So you can talk about that and we will The way

spk_1:   9:50
we're doing errands around the city on Friday getting ready to go because I work on the weekends and, um, we're walking. It's walking, driving down day Tom and I was sitting on the back of his bike and one of those drivers that you curse that when you see them driving past you came too close and clipped the my foot and I thought my toe was broken or half of my foot was broken turned. That was just soft tissue damage, but that through a total spanner in the works, he had to go to the emergency room. Basically Columbia Medical.

spk_0:   10:24
I forgot. I got to

spk_1:   10:27
write a wheelchair for the first time.

spk_0:   10:28
You got a driving down the street like an absolute maniac. No helmet, of course. Daniel in our street part of town, on the wrong side of the road. And then clips a dri. I I saw it happening and you didn't because she was looking at the way I was driving, I don't know. And I thought I was going to see a leg just ripped off during the legs. So thankful to Tony you hadn't seen, but he managed to kind of almost ripped up too often the process. So that was just afraid you, before we left Saturday was the Visa drama. Then I don't need surgery. Two. Sorry. So then we go to the airport?

spk_1:   11:01
Yes. On Monday Way basically were like, Well, let's just Monday was really stressful because we I could not figure out a way around the visa issue apart from booking two completely new flights which obviously would have been quite costly and then also because we're aware of the, you know, epidemic and border restricts not border six in so much at that point. But we knew that we didn't want to transit. We couldn't transit anywhere in Asia like just anywhere in Asia. So looking at the flights was quite restricted, were somehow still trying to get through Australia because you really wanted to limit where we're travelling at that time. And so anyway, we went to the airport. We tried to cheque in. I checked in because I was like. Well, might as well go anyway. If one of us is gonna have to book tickets, one is better than two. And they wouldn't let Neal cheque in because he didn't have a visa and expecting which we expected. Yeah, because you absolutely need one. If you're transiting Australia more than eight hours, Take note. We have a lot of play over in the distant future. After the epidemic is over,

spk_0:   12:13
we thought they may have, like, a magic number that they could call and somehow again, instantaneous visa. But it did not. Teo. Go on.

spk_1:   12:22
Yeah. So luckily, we had an onward ticket from Sydney to Wellington, and I gave the woman at the cheque in counter my ticket so she could so she could see that I was continuing on and not staying in Australia. And she checked me and she gave me my boarding pass. And then my bag tag came back and she said, Your bag has checked all the way through dwelling tonight, and I was like, Oh, so I don't actually need to go pick up my bags and recheck them in and go through customs. And she said, No, you don't have to it's cheque. That's fine. Okay, So light bulb went off in my head and I realised Neil could still get on the flight, but we just needed to get him out of Sydney in under eight hours because he didn't have a flight. Sorry, a visa. So we ran quickly, sat down, had no phone credit, had to use this body, airport WiFi. And it was just frantic pleas, Flight searching for unaffordable, realistically affordable. Less than what we had previous expected to pay. Like for a cheaper flight, basically just to get him out so he wouldn't need that. And sure enough, we able to find one that transited through Auckland instead to Sydney to Auckland, Auckland. Wellington called up in New Zealand a little bit of time on the phone who were able to re book him on that flight.

spk_0:   13:50
Yeah, so this was an hour and I was able to get on the same flight is easy to get a upside gone, so we haven't even left the country yet. We were already having so much drama. There's not. One point of this was relaxing, and as I mentioned before, a dog people who follow us on Facebook. I'll see any pictures or you know, that Biscuit has appealed on previous episodes. When she's only snoring in the background, she's just like everything to us. So the fact that we had to leave with her amazing dog, sit up Daniel, who were very comfortable leaving her way. I was just the added pressure as well. So But we finally managed to get a get it to work. I got out of the country. We go on the flight. Turns out that my flight, because I had a short of transit, the needy. I got Tio Wellington, four rebels before

spk_1:   14:36
I was still sitting at the terminal, the gate at Sydney Airport when Neal was already having a beer with our friends

spk_0:   14:45
playing fever. So noise way got to Wellington. Fine. So stable of friends. Nor in car. Right? Unbelievable. Um And then from then on that so that would be the night of the 10th.

spk_1:   15:01
On the night of the names. We arrived in New Zealand on the 10th. Yeah, the evening of the 10th.

spk_0:   15:08
And then we're moving. We're all going there for my cousin's waiting. So she's obviously Scottish, like me. No husband. There's a kiwi and they live in Australia. So people flying from mysterious people find over Scotland people coming from the US all coming to New Zealand for their wedding on the 17th. So what happens was

spk_1:   15:30
17 21st

spk_0:   15:32
20 post. Oh, yes. Sorry. 20 dates don't mean anything to me anymore on the 21st. So what, then? How did things are unravelling once we arrived in New Zealand?

spk_1:   15:44
Um well, I've been like hyper, maybe over high bird active, actively reading the news for the last few months. And, um, that didn't change when we got to New Zealand, in large part because things were escalating in the wrap around the world massively on the 10th 11th 12 I think the 10th possibly in the US, which would have come back, it would have come through quite, I think must have come through on the 11th of New Zealand because the time difference. But I think the 10th was the day when, like March madness shut down sports around the world around the country were being cancelled us like it was really escalating. You're in the US Obviously Europe had already started to escalate. Um, not as much maybe in the UK, but like for me from looking at it from faraway perspective, like shit was getting really I think the 10th or the 11th was the day that it was not. I was declared epidemic around the world, which was like crap and then quickly thereafter. Like Tom Hanks is like the first celebrity to be tested positive for covert. And he was in Australia and the time and I was like, Well, that's really close. I didn't even realise is much of an issue in Australia and then yeah, sure having in our first couple days were a little bit blissful because we're still quite isolated in New Zealand. Still felt safe and normal, uncomfortable like things hadn't gotten there. But

spk_0:   17:10
in terms of people in New Zealand, is rebel Italian like it really wasn't like the difference between when we continues. Even when we left, obviously not other countries as well. Speaking of the countries and locked down when we were there on the 11th and 12th which Jesus, how goes out? It's like two weeks ago, life in New Zealand was completely normal. No one was really talking much about social distancing.

spk_1:   17:32
People didn't know the reaction, like obviously Kobe was kind of a new topic of conversation in New Zealand when we were there and when we told people what we've been through Vietnam in terms of like, schools have been shut for two months or, well, six weeks, rather. And just how it had already affected a lot of people's livelihood in Vietnam and businesses and Children, teachers, people were had no idea. They were just completely, like surprised that we've been dealing with coded for two months already since the end of Ted. And But that quickly, very bearing quickly changed, like probably in the first couple days were there. It was still kind of like a joke the way it is most places around the world before it really hits. Like come from now, huh? Like still kind of funny And then that literally every single day, That kind of changed.

spk_0:   18:28
Yeah. I mean, I think I said this a few times. Just when Corona virus can. I first started here in the started shutting schools. I mean, I was making jokes about being over reaction. Remember asking the whole audience of 23 people and does everyone think it's an overreaction and was like, Yeah, yeah, it's an overreaction by making jokes about it. No, absolutely regret that I don't regret it, but I was Obviously I know I don't think it was an overreaction, but so I think the point is that you're making we've been living with this. We've gone through that period of denial like this isn't that serious in Vietnam. And we've come through normally, right? Okay, this is something to be taken seriously with thinking. Definitely New Zealand, Dina Street. We will talk a bit more of even a couple of weeks later, this there were taken to use way. Can't assaulted too few really, really awkward in New Zealand because I think any G was one to most of the reading Facebook groups news up today with everything that things started to really open for us, right?

spk_1:   19:27
Yeah, I'm not entirely sure what you're referring to

spk_0:   19:30
just the slightest,

spk_1:   19:33
because we'd been dealing with it maybe longer than some other people had in Australia, New Zealand, it seemed like, and we are to the point where we taking it very seriously, even like the way we travelled was different to people who travelled on safe from like Sydney two Wellington The difference in passengers from not to Sydney where, like, really different. But, um yeah, I mean, I think that the kind of nonchalance, blase nous of it in New Zealand, which I can completely understand because, I mean, the sixth case occurred when we were there on like this. The 15th of March was 1/6 confirmed case. So, like people didn't think it was a thing, really. And then obviously that quickly escalated. But yeah, I think because we've been exposed to the news and I have been quite close and just in it for so long, the nonchalant attitude of a lot of people that we came in contact with was a little bit unnerving and it kind of uncomfortable sometimes when people were just like I don't think we were social distancing, distancing at that point. But I was very hyper aware of like cleaning my hands, sanitising not sharing drinks, not touching other people's stuff. And people in New Zealand weren't doing that. Yes,

spk_0:   20:55
they're sharing food stuff. Well, so this is this is how quickly escalated, right? So my sister flew in from Australia for the waiting in queues of great need On the 16th. You're

spk_1:   21:10
No Friday the 13th

spk_0:   21:11
right. It felt she flew in afraid of the team. I don't see what she does, but she's quite high up in Australia in health community. So she she's very aware of what's going on. She sits and high level meetings. There's no travel restrictions at that point. She is still flowing over for the wedding. She was looking forward to it. She was a whale, you know that they were there with things went right in the world and that there was a looming problem. But at that point, frankly tell teens she was still flying over from Australia, fully intending to be in New Zealand until after the wedding, which was gonna be on the 24th. This is a quickly escalated on the 14th. They had the hands quality on the Saturday on. My sister got a phone call that night saying that she had to come back to a stream. We have mixed the So she spent about faulty. I was in New Zealand before she was to she had to come back again because he's high up in the health community. They needed us back. But that's so sure. That's how quickly escalated that she was comfortable getting on a plane on the fraidy and by the Sunday she wasn't having to fly back to Australia on that same Sunday. We had relatives flew in from the U. S. C just before the restrictions came into place Within New Zealand. Putin restrictions that anyone given after the four teams have to self isolate for 14 days after the 15th and then a couple of days after that, the prime minister of New Zealand recommended anyone that's coming after the march, I should say vice elite, but it wasn't enforced. I'm getting a doubtful look right

spk_1:   22:43
now. I I'm not sure about that.

spk_0:   22:45
But it's true that the point things were changing quickly. So my sister went back way. Had another break made, flew in. She came in on this Saturday on the 14th on again because the situation was time to change rapidly. She decided to fly back on the 16th so she spent less than 40 hours and shield him all

spk_1:   23:03
the way from the UK,

spk_0:   23:04
come all the way from Scotland and flew all the way back to Scotland. I think it was that second week with things in New Zealand really starting to to ramp up at this point, Egypt was pretty much like no sleeping, almost.

spk_1:   23:21
I was sleeping, but it was really difficult. I would say that like the only response I got from following the news and thinking about like, What should we do next? Are we doing the right thing? Should we stay? Should I go like should we do this? That the other thing, Yeah, The only response I got was like when I put my phone down and forced myself to try to go to sleep. But even that, like I would wake up in the middle of the night, checked my phone because we're dealing with so many different time zones. Obviously we're in New Zealand, which is six hours ahead of Vietnam on DH, then Obviously the US is like like like 18 hours or something. But it just meant and it just meant that at any point of the day, new news was coming out. So, like, because we're six hours ahead in Wellington, the morning was quite quiet for us. But then, as Vietnam started to wake up and policy started to change and meeting started to happen and things that work started to happen. And, you know, rumours started to swirl. We'd get like, a whole bunch of messages starting from maybe like in New Zealand. And that would carry on like through the evening. So, yes, I would wake up in the morning. It would be like, let me read all the news that happened overnight and then midnight midday all the stuff would come through from Vietnam and then obviously was trying to keep track of us. We, as I mentioned before, like we pretty much knew very quickly that we weren't going to go to the U. S. I was trying to keep that information a little bit at they because I was just so overwhelmed with the amount of information that I was trying to process and trying to decide what to do with, um, I mean, rightly or wrongly, like we had emotions from both sides and family ties on both sides and, like we just had so much stuff. Tio kind of mentally assess, like if we're doing the right thing or not, it was yes, So I would say like it was, honestly, that week in New Zealand was apartment. Maybe like the first and second day. We're there maybe three days. It was, like the most anxiety inducing meant physically, eventually exhausting and emotionally wrenching days I've had in a very, very, very long time, like a distant memory. And it got to the point where it was actually, like, physically exhausting. The day before we left New Zealand on the 19th I mean, both you and I started to have, like, R. Okay. What do you say

spk_0:   25:55
that? Well, I mean, at that point, I would wake up after should be on the phone, and literally every morning I was weak and up till like, Oh, my God. You thank you. I would wake up to bad news every day because you have been reading old. I mean, that was even, like we have the back the hen's party with bachelor party on the 14th. Well, come in the morning. The 15 times with all the guys contact Edie. She's like, you need to contact your system. He only had to go home. So that was pretty much the norm. Was like, every morning we can up like a new reality or a new new rules were coming into, please. So that was the 16th Monday, the 16th. That's when we changed the flight, right?

spk_1:   26:45
Yeah, I'm going to be honest, I think we would have changed it sooner, But things were just we had the were separated on Saturday. You had to go to here things super, super early on Saturday. So old. And then, of course, the the dude stag do rules were, like, cannot communicate with female. So barely was communicating all of Saturday Sunday. Obviously, we woke up to the news that Neil's sister had to leave, so we're kind of doing that all day and just making sure she was able to, like, connect family for at least a little bit. Um,

spk_0:   27:17
because, I mean, it was just meant to be a relaxing time, right? And suddenly I'm gonna drive across Wellington, which is like 1/2 an hour drive to get from where I was to then take my uncle to meet my sister, and I'm going to have, like, a last minute lunch and trying Kat job. Then I haven't seen my sister and more like two bells since Mark Hansen. My sister. Only two years I got this year for maybe a grand tour off Western.

spk_1:   27:40
More than that, we hung out with Freddy.

spk_0:   27:42
Yeah, but anybody help from? Not for long. So, um

spk_1:   27:47
yeah, so then on Monday was the first kind of, like, free day that we had to really like, Try to think clearly, process all the information, decide what what we're gonna do and how we're gonna do it. So that's when we decided to go to a travel agent to just get, like, an outside perspective opinion which may be, I don't know, was necessary the right thing to do because they were completely oblivious to what was happening in Vietnam. Um, but it was just too much for, like, the two of us to deal with. So we knew. First inform us we already cancelled our flights from New Zealand to us. We actually, we tried to change them, too. I'm not existing airline to change. It rerouted back to Vietnam, and we had maintained the date of the 23rd because that was the day we were gonna go to the US and we thought, Well, Newzealand is still quite safe. Vietnam is still quite safe. Things are escalating around the world, but it seems to be okay. And these three countries, So we'll change our flights to go back after the wedding. Um, that united with the airline you're on doesn't really find Asia. What we're able to do that. So we decided to go to the travel agent to see what they could pull up on their systems in terms of basically transiting only through the places we knew were safe to get into Vietnam. Obviously, a lot of Asian places have been Asian countries, and transit places have been I kind of already omitted. So ultimately we decided on a flight that transited. I was really hoping to transit only through Australia. But we ended up getting on Singapore Airlines, which transited through Australia and Singapore. Wait, book that on Monday.

spk_0:   29:29
That's right. Not at that point, the ruse. So there's rules about what? Like obviously you couldn't come from Italy on changing Korea. Japan? Yeah, but so that when we booked this place going through Singapore, map is on the money, so just highly rapidly things were changing. And that was finding on Monday we booked that for the next the waiting was on the Saturday Well, I will do the waiting which plan for a year, and then we'll get out of here on Monday morning. We'll get back to me now, and I'm not at that point. That was fun.

spk_1:   30:01
It was. But I do remember explicitly asking the woman at the agency. I said, if we if the airline cancels the flights on us, will they put us on another flight? The answer is yes. What are the change? Fees and restrictions to the airfare that we're booking because we know that this everything is changing rapidly. So even though we booked for the 23rd we knew at that point that there was a possibility that we wouldn't be flying on that date on that flight, whether it was gonna be after before, we weren't sure. But, like I was well aware of the fact that, like, we're kind of just booking a ticket as a placeholder, So we had to get out of the country. At least we're on a flight out of the country. And we knew that that was subject to change because everything was changing so quickly. Um and had we not had a wedding to attend, family members waiting to attend, we probably would have gotten out of there pretty good. Clean, I'm not.

spk_0:   30:57
So that brings us to Tuesday. I remember Tuesday night we caught up with some friends, and by this point it was time to be taken more seriously. Uh, choose their sympathies, Dave and its embodies. That goes off in Wellington like that's a big deal. I know as a river is but one Monday, though, even though maybe all this is Patrick's day, celebrations around the world are being cancelled. This is how far removed wasn't Wellington on Monday. Everything was still go. All our friends were going out. Everyone was making plans to meet up literally by Tuesday. Like people like, you know, I'm not going anymore like people were meant to be. Meeting more Texan say no. But everyone staying home now like this is just again like the speed of which everything changed. So we did go and meet with some friends on. We did do an elbow bump. I remember instead of Huggins in one of our friends for four years and gave them a noble bomb. So we started to become more a whale way. We're getting quite worried at that point. We will, like they said. But I still regret Yeah, Looking back, in hindsight, I wish just going over there. But, um, we did go up, which I regret now as well. But thankfully, I don't think we have. We spread the disease, it doesn't look like but that was starting to become a concern is well, especially read more and more about how people could be asymptomatic and then spread the disease. That was time to become more of a concern. I remember we went to an Irish bar, Of course, on met our friend we were staying with. I remember going to the bathroom and just everything went to bathroom just religiously washing my hands and then just watching all these guys is coming, do the business. And we even just being like, you know, this is no a good situation like people are getting it. You will not suit your distance in the very least, bloody wash your hands. Probably. So it was a Tuesday night.

spk_1:   32:49
I think social distancing at that point in time was still really, really knew there.

spk_0:   32:53
I don't think

spk_1:   32:54
I really like that day were made the day before that. It was kind of like People are starting to feel like OK, yeah, we should keep our distance from each other. And I mean, I can't really remember. Now everything has changed. My brain has turned to mush. But, um, I don't think we really knew the whole asymptomatic thing. It wasn't his wife widely known until

spk_0:   33:17
Yeah, because it was always like, Have you got a fever? Have you got fever?

spk_1:   33:19
Yeah. Yeah, so much was like unless you have symptoms blah, blah. I think that asymptomatic thing has come out relatively recently in the last few weeks because I just more sort of more soup, but also like because it's been spread around here when there's a lot more like Western countries and English beacon news about the actual symptoms and how it happens in the spread of the disease and stuff. I just don't think it was his wife know then, because

spk_0:   33:50
well, even today, 28 come out right now just reading Boris Johnson's got a Corona virus. They're not testing people who have come into contact with this in the Guardian newspaper, and the reason is because they don't have symptoms yet. And I'm like, Wait, hold on a minute. Well, lately, more and more that especially in Vietnam, most of the new cases you're reading on people with symptoms of asymptomatic. So I have

spk_1:   34:12
any Titus.

spk_0:   34:14
I have no idea why they would not be tasting people. That Boris Johnson has come into contact with being having symptoms is no like,

spk_1:   34:22
well, again. I think maybe that's still quite a new thing like new ish thing in the Western world, because I think before it was like, This is the incubation period. But I think all the light they were saying, like probably at some point you will show symptoms, whether it's two days of 12 days. But now I think what they're saying is people are getting it with either no symptoms at all, ever or very, very, very few symptoms. And that's the scary thing. And I don't think that was his wife known 2.5 weeks ago when we were necessarily deciding to travel, which, obviously, as it started to come out, probably when we were New Zealand, it was terrifying to think. Yeah, you could You could be just a care here and completely terrified,

spk_0:   35:06
like just spreading this around everywhere. So that was Tuesday, 17th on then. This is where things really started to ramp up and take a massive, dramatic tonsil Wake up Wednesday morning.

spk_1:   35:18
No, I told you on Tuesday night. Okay. I remember Neil was playing with our friend, and I was locked in the room frantically reading the news. Of course, Uh, like, quite late on Tuesday evening. And then I came in the room and I was like, meal. I have to tell you this now and then. He was like, Right, OK, because I'm going to bed. Um, when I said, we have to wake up. So we're just gonna wind tour with their friends and family? Well, with our family, the wedding party on Wednesday, we'd really been looking forward to that. And I said, We cannot go on the line to it. They're picking us up at, like, 89 in the morning. And I said, We can't go tomorrow. We have to get out of here now. So I looked at flights. I thought we could maybe try to go on a flight on Wednesday. This 18 in the afternoon um, but yes, we woke up the next, so I told him that I was There was nothing we could do now beyond midnight or something. So we woke up the next morning. We went basically what street to the travel agent spent.

spk_0:   36:24
The way you walk up and tell the waiting part, everyone coming and again, I just don't think people realise this, I think, go the feeling people didn't really understand why we will be leaving. What was on Wednesday morning. At that point, our flight was on the Monday after the wedding, but at this point in a journey had been with me the form decision and obviously told me and I read you like we need Teo. So at this point, we're like, Okay, we're just gonna miss the wedding we're gonna eat because to the flight, if we have to think this is too dangerous now because because what was happening with the news from Vietnam was changing like every day. So now, at this point, the eliminated Asian countries you couldn't transit through easy and countries

spk_1:   37:04
which we have been travelling using apart,

spk_0:   37:06
which at that point we were going through Singapore so that eliminated a lot of options to get back. We could only go through Australia, and even then it was just everyday Was tightening and timing and tightening the conditions that you could get back to beat Now So anyone that doesn't know is we've lived here for four years. We have work permits. Life is in Vietnam. So at that point, we were still allowed back into Vietnam. But

spk_1:   37:30
it was a little bit uncertain because by the time we're gonna fly, I think probably that day that week. Anyway, I know they're like, um there were just rumours and stuff and people who had So the thing that was scariest for us at that time wass seeing the rumours on Facebook or like people, United States rumours, actual people's experiences. I was following a lot of groups and comments on Facebook which yeah, you could say like fake news or whatever and I don't trust anything you see on Facebook, but actually, the people that we're having real experiences coming into Vietnam from different places were probably the most helpful and illuminating for us in terms of decision making, because Neil neither clearly are different passports. Me being from the US and him being from the UK And so I was actually really scared that his British passport wouldn't allow him into the country. Because we had heard rumours and seeing comments about some people with UK passports who had not been to the UK or been to Europe were being denied injury simply on the account of the fact that they had a passport from affected country. And that was quite terrifying, obviously is the cases in the U. S. Kept going up. I thought that my passport could be in that situation as well. And so we really had no idea what we're going to deal with coming into trying to come into immigration. And then it started to get worse. Like, Are we gonna be allowed on the plane? Are they gonna last cheque us in? To make matters worse, I don't have it. TRC At the moment I have just a work visa and then Neal has a t r a c. So we also didn't know if our work that TRC situation was gonna be looked at differently or the same or like what? If we got there and they allowed one of us on and not the other one. Or what if we got here and they allowed one of us to go home and one of us into quarantine? So we had so many different factors we were dealing with.

spk_0:   39:20
TLC is a temporary resident card, which wait, I seven movie banks, listeners all over the world trying TOC This, uh I'm not really sure. What? What difference? You're TLC and work with you. I called in my possible. This is I'm a temporary resident agent.

spk_1:   39:41
I had a TRC, but it expired. And then there really was just so I don't

spk_0:   39:49
weigh well. Got Wednesday morning. Went to the flight centre in Wellington 9 a.m. Seeing girl. We spoke to Emlen, which have toe She's never gonna get this, but everyone was amazing. And sadly, we have never found out she's lost. The job is part of many people round the world losing a job because we sent an email to C. Thank you for all the help. Just just a couple of days are going to go on email vaccine. She no longer works here, but she do wanna hire back it said in a couple of months. Once once this blows over so she could get a job back as well. Esso and Ling was amazing. It was Rosie's place and they were amazing. They give us some options. We have to go with you over a walk because we were just head was like so just for gay. With so much information, ages read so much and all the all the travel agents follow this Web site that we were also following called I 80 flight Centre I Travel Centre E. But the thing was that so that's meant to be kind of like the gold standard of information. It gets updated for every country in the world as their restrictions or what? Not forgetting. But this was where was getting really muddy because the information that was on this website, which was upon the record standard, was different information from what was coming off a Vietnam while we were reading on Facebook like reality because we were reading people's real storeys about getting through immigration and their storeys didn't match up with rules and Bob Lasso. So we ruled that by this point things were getting pretty horrible for us. Way took us from 19 GMT 12 PM to finally re book our flights. We just cancel the ones that we had on Monday that will. I couldn't go through Singapore. We get credit for them, but the money could be lost. You don't know what way have flaked rate. It's all over the world right now. Wary. Booked our flights for the fraidy, so we couldn't get on that flight that afternoon on the Wednesday.

spk_1:   41:42
The other thing is it was like two or three airlines that fly direct from Australia to Vietnam without transiting, either through Singapore or Hong Kong or whatever it's being on airlines. And I think Jet star like Qantas Jet star, whatever So and most of those, I don't know if this is always or just at this time, but most of those flights only fly like every other day. And, of course, they fly on the same day. So Wednesday, when we got there, we weren't able to get on either Vietnam Airlines or Jet Star flight, so we had to wait until the Friday because there were no flights that were flying on Thursday. So, despite like wanting to leave, then there now we had to the only thing we could book that wasn't transiting through potential. Others like problem country. I was on the Friday

spk_0:   42:34
with 60 and I was 24 hours before the wedding. So obviously that the wedding kind of became, unfortunately, less of a priority in the biggest priority Came became coming back home, but still, though pretty cutting Teo the money, to be honest, like when we're not rich but money, that was probably the least factor in it. It was still, like pretty crap have spent so much money. We, you know, like any waiting I've got suit needed. You got a beautiful dress. Well, being together with ties and stuff like this, you know, we were ready for a waiting on weddings on cheap. Right on. Also again, Forget about the money. We've been planning for this for a year to see my cousin get married. Our families, my family's there. We'll know ages family. She knows them all. Well, there's gonna be in this beautiful place and New Zealand. And so the fact that we got so close to the waiting but just had to say we couldn't go was obviously really upset as well. So subs a wait and see, um, Wednesday afternoon, we can't Oh, we ended up meeting up with family after they've done the wing tour, and again, he just didn't seem to get it. We like, Oh, I'm going back to Vietnam and they're like, Okay, like this didn't really seem to understand. Nobody understood the seriousness of the situation sizes that some family members have just flown in on the full teens from USC. It was full plans going ahead for the wedding. There's no talk of that then, about like New Zealand is never locked down. But it was The end ofthe world was talking like nothing. Our weddings are cancelled in New Zealand, right?

spk_1:   44:09
Have e. I think at that point they were starting Teo cancel and advise against events of 505 100 only about 60 people going to the wedding. And I don't think it might have been like either just before or just after a right around the same time where they started to say, like events no bigger than 50 people. So the wedding was never really that in danger of like officially being told it couldn't occured. Um, and he Yeah.

spk_0:   44:42
So that was then What did we do on Thursday? All right, so healthy. We start packing, I guess it's

spk_1:   44:51
okay. Yes. Thursday. Okay, so we just backtrack a little bit. So part of the reason is well, that we, like decided we needed to immediately get back was because when they announced that you couldn't transit through an Asian country, they also said, If you do transit through amazing Country as he's a hold a work visa holder or a resident or a citizen or whatever, you must go into mandatory 14 day government quarantine. So I thought, if there's any chance that we won't get put into quarantine, let's go and try to try to make, like, get because obviously, like you're planning to side house silent self isolate regardless when we came home. But if we thought if we could self isolate in an apartment with our dog for two weeks, guys way more preferable to being in a dorm room without our dog for two weeks like 20 kilometres up the road from our apartment. So that was part of the like impetus to, like, get out of there as soon as you could. Um, so then when we booked the flight for Friday. Thursday, We're like, Okay, so here's what's gonna happen we're gonna get And obviously I'm still reading the news. Things are still changing. There's still all these different accounts of what's happening where people are going global to this point. Australia, New Zealand. Still nowhere on Vietnam's radar in terms of like quarantine or anything like that. So which is why we're planning to just self isolate. Um, But Thursday we're like, Okay, realistically, the things that are gonna happen Wait. And so we're talking through what could possibly happen? One best case scenario, we fly. No problems. They welcome us back. We go home, we self isolated for two weeks. Next scenario we fly. We get there, they put us into government quarantine. Next scenario we get to the airport, they don't let us on the plane for whatever reason, because the rules have changed and they've been posted by a website. Next scenario we fly to Australia somehow in transit borders shut and we get stuck in Australia. Next scenario, uh, we cancel our flight, we just stay here. He'll be here being Zeeland until this all blows over, which was a realistic possibility because things were changing so quickly and we didn't know. So Thursday we were just talking through all these possible scenarios and what we would do if we got put in any one of the situations.

spk_0:   47:29
It was the most worst case scenario was that somehow we got turned away at the old or because we have different passports, we would be sent back toa foreign countries, which I have no lives that need to queue for 15 years longer. My family's there, Adrian. I lived in the U. S. Felipe News nine years. So, like I don't believe we're married, We're going to be apart. So that was, like, literally going through going through every one of these scenarios. Like what if we get sent back to other countries, then the boulders shutdown. We're separated for 456 months like that was the That was the worst of the worst case and are used to Yeah, we woke up on Thursday morning, our cousin's house. Just remember Wednesday night we have a family. We stayed with them. We woke up Thursday morning and again this once in every morning we woke up and something had changed. So we woke up Thursday morning, and suddenly the new rules Well, that to get back into it, you need a negative Corbett test. Well, just like what? Like you got to be kidding me on. So this was the new rules that just being posted. So I called up the Vietnamese Embassy. Wellington. I spoke to the guy there. Super quick tour is finally picked up the phone right away. But I said to your super and informed Well, there was super uninformed. I told him we're flying on you. What? Passport said UK. But not a tango. That's not the rooms. Don't can't get in because I want you keep passports. No, Can't get like, I've been to the UK used Well, he called and said my wife's on a U. S. Passport. No, no, she can't get any of that. I was like, All right, this is no the rules I'm reading. Can you double cheque? He's like, Okay, call me back in 15 minutes. Is how could you call back in 15 minutes? As for talking directly Kiki Sorry. Sorry. Go that wrong? You can get in, but you need a cool bit test. Okay, so then we get dropped off at the travel doctor and Wellington, where we went four years ago to get all of our vaccinations when we started travelling. Still other records on file Got to see a doctor. Really? Now you cannot get a cruel test in Australia or New Zealand. I don't know about the rest of the world most most of the Western world, right? Unless you have symptoms, they will not give you a call. That test. So we went to the doctor. She gave it an examination, obviously tested on temperature. Looked at our throats, every thing. And she gave us a clean bill of health thing. I almost verbatim these patients are This vision is asymptomatic. Therefore, I cannot give him a Corvette test, but he seems to be silly. She's saying that we made sure she stamped it cause anyone listening who lives in Vietnam was being now in love, the stamps. So we made sure we have an official stamp on it. That was that was the best thing we could get. So again, this is just how everything's changing. We wake up Thursday morning suddenly needed called test. Suddenly we need to take two hours to go and and get this more expenditure.

spk_1:   50:26
The other thing is, if we did get a covert test, waited for the two days to get a result, we wouldn't have come back, but we couldn't get back. We just wouldn't have been able to come back. But we knew that things were changing so quickly. If we were like, we'll just get the covert test. If we could wait for two days and then we'll fly on Sunday like we literally wouldn't have been allowed back in the country because by that point they close the borders toe all foreigners, so we couldn't take the risk of not trying to get on our flight on the Friday

spk_0:   50:56
on. The other thing was, they said that you need a cool test that had been approved by the relevant authorities. But no one could tell you what what that men like approved by the relevant authorities. So we then took a letter of clear bill of health to be actually walked because Wellington anyone knows Wellington is so small, weak to a 15 minute walk and got to the Vietnamese Embassy, and Wellington just walked right and rang. The doorbell were like. Can you translate this for us? Can you stand this? Can you do something again? So helpful, but could actually help, but they're really No, there's nothing we can do. So that was Does the by this point now, Ellie. Afternoon. All flights at 6 a.m. We couldn't really do much more at this point. All right, We're just gonna have to just get on the flight. So we went for a walk. Anyone knows Wellington is just the most stunning, please, On ants on a good day took a bit of a walk in the heroes. We enjoy the scenery we managed to breathe. But I mean again, just the whole time. Just anxious anxiety the whole time we know what's coming. Yeah. You want to see something?

spk_1:   51:58
Well, yeah. I mean, I think we were just at a loss for what to do, but I knew what 11 of the things I really wanted to do and prioritise on our trip away from Vietnam before this old massively changed was just take advantage of the ability to walk out and go for a hike. Go in nature like fresh air, hills, greenery, etcetera, um, and So I thought, Well, let's just say our last opportunity. We might be stuck in a room for two weeks when we get back. And also Vietnam's not, You know, there's a hotel in city. There's not that many places to walk anyway. So we went for a walk. Um, really? We'll go for a walk and then we'll go to the grocery store because we want to pick up some, like, last minute New Zealand treats and things we missed t bring back. Um and yes. So as we were going to the grocery store, I had a stroke of genius. Not really like I should message because I knew we knew someone in quarantine here been following her storey of storeys on Instagram. She'd been in quarantine for a couple days. So the message her and say like, if you knew you were going to be sent to quarantine, what would you bring? Because we're gonna go the grocery store. And I thought, Well, if we might go to quarantine, at least let's be prepared and literally I was about to send that message. Or maybe I did press end when

spk_0:   53:18
that's why I've been in communication with my work with the HR director. I mean, we don't get tension wrong for one of about what is the immigration managers who he deals with all these others everything to do with all the expats working a company. Andi. So he was messaging with, like, a group chat, and there were given advance on what to do to get back in the work that they can't reiterating the fact that you need this covert test and weigh cannot get the call the test like we just can't. So they will do the best they could. It was frantic on their end and again waiting on time difference. So, like Vina didn't wake up till about like one, Well, that people are coming to work in about one or two in the afternoon in New Zealand time. So we're having a way all morning for people to wake up here to communicate. So we'll chat, chat and then he drops a bombshell that he's just being told that, um, at midnight on that day, the borders were closing to everyone but Vietnamese nationals so that I

spk_1:   54:22
didn't get on the 20th and we're flying 20.

spk_0:   54:26
No, no, Like the stroke of

spk_1:   54:27
midday on. It

spk_0:   54:30
was a bit confusing, but, you know, with midnight, you get confused on as the clock struck midnight on the morning of the 20th or the night of the 19 Boulder would close to everyone but Vietnamese nationals and citizens, so that, like, Oh, world just at that point after everything with being too rude, Well, where would then just turned upside down even more? Because we are like, What does that mean? And he's like, the borders are gonna reel for least 30 days. Well, like what? So that, like, we're gonna be here in New Zealand for fair days at least. And now that that was the situation at about four o'clock one that does that. Four o'clock?

spk_1:   55:08
Yeah. Three. Because we're about to go. Yeah, was likely afternoon. And to be fair, like I mean, if we're gonna get stuck and you right in the world, New Zealand would be the place because we're both residents there and we have friends there, and it's comfortable and safe, and we know Wellington, and it's one of my favourite places in the world. But being told that you can't come home, it was just like a punch in the chest or the stomach. It was It was horrible. It was just absolutely horrible. So our grocery store trip was pretty crap

spk_0:   55:41
way. Just being bald to things and left way with my stuff according to, because we were fully expecting to be quarantines were like, Right, What gets improving balls? Let's get some snags, you know, because we followed to the best and we were talking to with Francis, Who's the blogger? You may have checked out a Glock, so the adventure begins. Go cheque. If you haven't, she's also she's actually mean heart of recorded an effort suit before the pandemic before we left. And she's going to be the first episode of the Fox the next. He's enough seven million bait so we won't be talking about this, but maybe we'll do a follow up of you to find out how the experience. But we've been talking to hope. It started getting supplies, and then all of a sudden it was like you're staying in New Zealand. Not that that was We thought that was The door was closed at that point, right?

spk_1:   56:27
Yeah, we're just waiting for an imminent government release, but then obviously having experience with, like the school closure, government releases and all of different releases, like when you hear kind of rumours of what's gonna happen. Actually, sometimes it can take a bit longer. So we just kind of we're waiting for waiting for waiting for waiting for and it just never was coming through. So we thought, Well, obviously those scenarios that I played out before we're still all possible still all relevant, some at this point more than others. To make matters more interesting, I've been checking all of our documentation and getting all of our boarding passes and proof that we've been in Zeeland, just a cable assets, immigration, blah, blah. And I looked at the print out from Flight Centre from where we've gotten our tickets is well and they completely for gotten my double barrelled last name. And they've for gotten the Makai part of my last name on my official ticket. So we called flights in her up and they said, basically a long storey short After calling them back in, They said, you have two options. We can cancel your ticket altogether. Uh, faces like you're not going or we can We're gonna have to re book you in because they had to call quantities to change it. And they were on hold for, like, three hours. Thank God we didn't have to, but they're like we can't change the name. We have to either cancel your ticket and re book you a new one at Flight Center's expense or just basically cancel your ticket. So something that we never would have even considered basically like cancelling or to get all together was now on the table Because we're like, What if we're stuck here? Should we just cancel it money? Should we not even go? Should we even bother? And I was like, this never would have been a consideration if Flight Centre had put my name into the system correctly. Um, so that was a whole another consideration. We had luckily, at the end of the day, literally at like seven. PM they're calling us back, like, closed already. What are you doing tomorrow? And I was like, just keep the ticket, book the ticket, we're going.

spk_0:   58:26
But this just just try and explain. This is how stressful the situation was. It was gone from D by day, hour by this point. It was minute by minute. It was literally like our friends have come home from work. We explain the situation to them. The two of us are a mess. A Jew is having like a panic attack. We were both pretty much in Thiel's because we thought we were going to stay for three days. We don't have jobs in YouTube. Then we can work there. But we don't have jobs. You don't have a home with people we can stay with. But, you know, we don't want to be a building on people. But at this point, we explain to our friends. Nor in Qarabagh told him a 1,000,000 times. Abel. Just unbelievable. Delhi, Look, if you need to, you can stay that you got home here trying to stress to do what you need to do. And so we're just weighing up everything in like ages. And then we got a place in our e mailing and calling me, like, you know, including what we do with this ticket. And I'm speaking to run, therefore would be like, just just give me five more minutes, five more minutes and I'll put food done and me in a gaol like What are we doing? Are we cancelling this plate? Are we getting on it

spk_1:   59:26
like one? One other thing that was added Teo, you've mentioned this yet so backtracked to the scenarios that I said before one of the scenarios wass we get on the flight to Australia. We had a long layover in Australia, so we knew that, like, a lot could change in that time. If they weren't gonna let us on the plane in Australia to Vietnam, you'd have to turn around and come back to New Zealand, which at that point was still a possibility. Even the lost. Sorry. Even though new feelings had already closed its borders because we're residents, we could actually still come back to New Zealand to thank God. That was a possible option. However, by this point they'd already implemented the 14 day mandatory self isolation for anyone travelling from overseas. So we had to way up the realistic possibility of getting on a flight to Australia, possibly turning back around to cabin to Zeeland and then going into self isolation in a country where we don't have residents like we are residents. But we don't have a resident residents. So, um, that was scary, because at this point, like where we have been staying, we knew like, they have a nice, lovely house, but they only have one bathroom No enough for four people when two people need to be in isolation. So you're gonna have to find another place to stay. And at this point, like you don't want to ask someone like we might have to self isolate in case we've picked something up travelling to Australia, Can we stay in your house? So that was like something we had to consider. Like, do we even get on the plane at the risk that we are sent back? And then we have to self isolate in New Zealand because, I

spk_0:   1:1:05
mean, Norrin Conrad were amazing and they were just super honest able like, If you get sent back and you have to self isolate, you can't stay here because they have jobs. And then we'd be putting them at risk and things like that. So, again, thankfully, a friend, Avorn, who just met a few days before to catch up she again Coroner has been Andrew just unbelievable it from the beginning, they were like if you need somewhere to feel like you can come here. So I get to misuse them and be like, this is this scenario. If we get sent back, can we come and stay with you for 14 days and self isolate? And again, people just so unbelievable. She was like, Yeah, we got a big host. That's fine. Don't worry doing to do so. That was a bit of a piece of Maine that if we were sent back to New Zealand, we had someone to go. But it's still not a nice feeling to know that you are basically being a building on someone, right? So So this was many of my Bennett. No, Get up to think about seven o'clock on those. The still no announcement from Vietnamese government that the borders were shutting it midnight that night. So wait, just kind of wind rain. Let's just call it the airport. But then we made the decision. Right. Let's go to the airport tomorrow morning for a M. P A. M flight. Was it six? We'll ask them what we need to do if they see you. It's the boulders of clothes that they're gonna close more than right. Fine. We come back, we're gonna be in New Zealand for at least the ideas will do with it, right? Somewhere we can stay. We'll just have to figure out. The next scenario is we get on the flight from Wellington to Sydney. Then the boulders close. Once we arrived in Sydney and something, we have to go back to museums. All those scenarios in come back into play to get to the airport. Everyone had the same idea to get Ellie. I think everyone was a whole bunch of people there before any staff for them, the staff come out working, terrified that they have to come out till you deal with this again. There probably are gonna lose their job. So absolute, like sympathy for what they have to do with the show. They're, like, got to do with this shit, and I'm gonna get lose much over the next year. But they really were clueless. Like that was the most disappointing thing. Like we knew mould in the airport staff. And, like, I gather they're probably grumpy away because they're losing the job. When we asked him, we've been like, what's happening? She was like I don't know. Do you know what's happening?

spk_1:   1:3:18
I mean, the worst thing was just that because way, obviously not Vietnamese. And we told her that our final destination in Vietnam it was immediate judgement on her face. And she was like, Well, that's what you get if you choose to travel right now. And we had to say, like, look like we're trying to get home like our home is in Vietnam. Like, obviously we didn't tell her life Storey, but she immediately change Your expression changed as soon as she knew that we were not just, like trying to go on a backpacking trip to Vietnam at this point in time. But I mean, yeah, it wasn't it wasn't fun. And it was confronting and obviously just travelling at that point in time because things had changed so quickly was just not I'm not comfortable at

spk_0:   1:4:00
all. And so this is This is this now is when there was a stark difference between the Australian and New Zealand attitude in the rest of the room to import New Zealand that morning, nobody wearing masks, nobody looked like anything different was happening at all. The world seemed normal, so he knows the chicken. It was a few red flags festival there. Well, checking any possible anyone and who didn't have an Australian passport? Hold on. Someone's at the door. Here in quarantine was just gonna take a break for a quick sec. That's probably a temperature cheque. All right, I'm going back. Just delivering some water. We'll talk more later about how amazing that the staff and everyone here quarantine right now. Focus on the storey. So the first red flag was it, roomie checking in Australian passports. So that wasn't worried. Then when we asked the cheque her bag all the way to Saigon, they said no, we couldn't cheque it to Sydney. So that was again a water because we were worried that we're gonna get stranded in Sydney. But we got on the plane. That was really really worrying because nobody took your temperature. Nobody asked us to fill in any health declaration for nobody asked us about anything. Nobody said anything about visas. They're literally just bowled. It is on the flight as if nothing was different. Then we go to Sydney. Something new health cheques, no declaration forms, no temperature cheques.

spk_1:   1:5:19
Even the announcement on the aeroplane like for the people that were landing and Sydney over, like so normal. Relax. They were like, according to the Australian government, if you're landing in Australia, you need to self isolate for 14 days. Have a great time in Sydney. E was just so conflicting and it just didn't sound serious. Like which you can kind of understand if you just got off the plane. Why? I mean, yeah, they hand out information, I think, but announces on the aeroplane. We're just like life is laughable.

spk_0:   1:5:51
So we go to sit name. The first thing we did was we bought gloves we found on campus. We bought gloves. We already had masks that we brought with us. So we were in Sydney Airport. We're about the only people with masks and gloves on, and I took a selfie or a picture and centre toe can remember a couple of family members, a couple of friends and one of them noticed able like why are you the only people in masks and gloves like and they could see in the background that everyone no one else wass by this point, he was super partner. We was super worried that we had the disease, that we were asymptomatic, super worried that we were spreading. It

spk_1:   1:6:24
could pick it up any

spk_0:   1:6:25
more you could pick up. We were absolutely terrified to the pit of the stomach. Then we could have the disease and then spread it like it was horrible, horrible feeling that we could pick up anyway because it seemed like a lot of cases coming from the airport. So what we ended up doing was Teo Idris credit. We usually just like a little calmer bay. We could plug reforms and there's a couple of seats. We sanitise that ourselves. We washed it down, didn't see any clean of anywhere, washing anything in the reports to re sanitise that ourselves. Put your gloves on and we just stayed there with that E. Coli, although again we just stayed in this little call of the wheat self quarantined ourselves on whatever you want to see. If I cleaned all down, we went for a couple of walks. We didn't hear anyone, and so eventually have tto have along. Six. I was. We were able to then cheque in cheque and open for the next flight. It's on again Thankfully, we could cheque. It was a lovely girl there from Jetstar. Don't talkto heart, I said, How you doing? She's like, Yeah, I lost my job. I'm like, God, yeah, I'm gonna be let off a few months. No. So absolutely lovely with me. But again, this is the reality of this treason Jean these people off losing their jobs, You know what I mean? So she goes, checked in. I explained the situation to her again. I know that she was clueless, but she went through. She read the restrictions on line that were available. Have, at times, she's like, You gotta work visa. Yeah. Yeah. You got this. You got that? Yeah. You guys, you should be okay. Don't worry. Should be located. So at this point, we started to breathe a little bit, right? But, like, booked on the flight to Saigon and there was like, a tiny percent of me was like thinking that maybe we would get home because we have this health certificate form because we had a work visa was maybe the let's go home. Just self isolate. Got my hopes. I know what it was like a little bit. So we go on. The flight on this point is what took another selfie the Jenkins get for the flight to Saigon. It was like a different world, every single person in the background and a mask on. Most people had gloves on like everyone. You could just see the difference between the people flying to Vietnam That says the people who are just going about the life in Australia. So we go on the flight, we sanitise the cheer of screen t but which upon we should probably do that anyway on every flavour but But we we clean new breathing down Before we touch anything, we kept a mask. So we kept our gloves on for pretty much the region of the flight in the background Is the plane going overhead? So they're all still playing. Finally taken off flying still cleans Find way. Go back to Saigon. No, it still gets more dramatic

spk_1:   1:9:00
already So long It

spk_0:   1:9:03
doesn't matter. Let's go. You tell why I'm

spk_1:   1:9:06
okay. So yeah, despite wait bought Friday was like super super stressful and apart from like trying to be hyper vigilant about cleanliness and sanitisation saying my sensitisation on DH not spreading and not picking up anything. It was relatively smooth sailing like there were no issues. And we got into Vietnam and the plane landed and it was the longest line ever apart from that, so there was like, the health deck elation that you had to fill out. We couldn't fill that out until we got to Sydney, because you need to put your flight number here and start your seat number. And so we feel that before we got on the plane and then he landed. We have, you know, our little Q R code up. We're ready to go through The Health Declaration line was quite long way. Didn't see any other foreigners on like insight. We're in the very back of the aeroplane, so I tossed. It just seemed like it was mostly be any citizens and residents returning home, I

spk_0:   1:10:04
think mostly students, right? Yes, the studio.

spk_1:   1:10:07
Younger people. So we got in the line, we waited, we waited, We finally got up to the front, and as soon as they saw her passport, they didn't even look at our bar codes are health regulation. They just basically, like, sent us away somewhat. We don't really know where they just over there Turns out over there is kind of if you've ever gotten a visa on arrival at the Vietnamese. Sorry, the Thames And yet airport. That's basically where Over there. Waas. So get there. And the rest of the foreigners that clearly must have been on our flight we're sitting there is. Well, there was probably between, like, 10 12 other Western people. Um, we're not beating these people for non residents. I guess some people were his descent and there wasn't really a lot of like we didn't really know what's going on in typical fashion, I suppose, with the language barrier and a lot of people kind of just like walking around and stuff. So they took our passports. They took our like health declaration. We are not our health declaration at this point. It was just I give them the letter that we have gotten in in Wellington, our health cheque. So we gave them that along with the passports, along with the boarding passes, and they kind of just went away. I

spk_0:   1:11:19
was gonna just picture at this point is the literally looks like something out of a movie that people in blue suits everywhere. Gold goes masks, gloves. Um, I mean, the only people who will not just like that. Whether passengers off the plane there was panic. People everywhere is screening. Sat out like it was literally like a movie, right?

spk_1:   1:11:41
I wouldn't say there was much panic. I

spk_0:   1:11:44
saw few Western thing. I just

spk_1:   1:11:47
I think we're being mean people as long as they filled out. The health declaration is pretty much like not that different, because from our flight coming in Australia, those people were pretty much health. Circulation was fine and they got waves through to immigration line. No problem. There are few people sitting about. It wasn't as crazy as maybe some of the stuff that happened the previous week when they were helped checking. I'm testing everyone that came in and there are people waiting in the airport, so it wasn't like that for us. We landed about 9 30 then PM on Friday night and then so we had by this point. When we landed, I checked the news, of course, to see what had happened when we'd been in the air because our flight was like eight hours and the media had released the announcement that at midnight, so from the 20th 21st starting on the midnight the 21st everyone entering the country would go into mandatory quarantine, then midnight. The 22nd I believe, is when they were shutting the border to foreigners. So they're still like one more day foreigners to arrive, and those people on Saturday would go directly to quarantine. So we thought. And then there was also the announcement that, like the university dorms in two duck had been vacated and we're being cleaned and getting prepared for all the recent arrivals. So those were the news updates that we've missed on then one. We're waiting. It was a little bit, at least at first. I was kind of relaxed, just like letting people do what they needed to do. But then I started to over here other people's conversations and phone calls, and there was one, you know, older man that said they're not letting me in. I have to go back. There was another man that was getting quite flustered and panicked and raising his voice and saying, You know, I have nowhere to go in Australia. This is where I live. No one to take care of me. And then a couple other Westerners that were in the same boat. Not a lot of progress. They're basically trying to put us all back on the plane to Australia.

spk_0:   1:13:38
Yeah, so we can't really relieved to be back inside normally, right with me that I mean, we could see the customs in the boulder, so Well, it was so close. But then again, we moved into the Knicks fees on all these eventualities that we thought about that they all came into play like what's gonna happen? They gonna send us on a plane back, then we'll go back to Australia. Then how do we get back? Can we get back to New Zealand At this point, they're gonna send us back to our home countries. Like I mean, at that point, I was radio camp in the airport and the like, So I'll just live in the airport until this is all to

spk_1:   1:14:07
the Vietnamese people's credit, like the different people that were kind of helping, because there are some people that spoke English that we're dealing with us. And I don't think they had any authority they had, like Saigon Tourist Kind of badges on They were growing grass churches. Yeah, OK, But they weren't like the immigration officials. They weren't like the military they want. They didn't have a lot of authority. I think I was just helping translate for us and taking our passports and dealing with the relevant authorities. And to their credit, I think that they were They were kind of assessing each case on individual basis. At least it seems that way. But we are basically our situation. They told us you have you have two options one to go there like we're trying to figure out where you can go to get a cove in certificate. So they were like, maybe you could go to Thailand. Maybe you could go to Singapore, were like and I just head to the lady. I was like, You know, if you send his Thailand, we're not getting back in this country. And she was kind of like Did this, like micro nod like she knew that was a case then She was like, Well, where are you guys? Permanent residents of Australia. Can you go back to Australia like No. Our life is here. Our dog is here. Our apartment is here. Our work is here. We live here. We cannot go anywhere, you know? And I said to her, If you send us back to Australia, we will be homeless. WeII

spk_0:   1:15:23
Well, like begging by the people that you and tears were like we lived here for four years. Like, this is a way. Just want to come back like you can't send us away.

spk_1:   1:15:32
So and there were other people in the area that we're in the same situation as us. They had two years either. Work visas. They lived here. They had nowhere else to go. I'm not sure everyone's exact situation, but ended up happening. Wass thie again? They went away. They talked to someone. I think ultimately this is my Yeah. So this is my assessment of the situation. Um what one small blip was that came back with a stack of passport that all had new Jetstar boarding passes in them, which was absolutely terrifying because it seems like they were gonna round us up and put us back on the plane to Australia. There was one man there who had flown on them. Aaron all under the Japanese airline. He was the only one that wasn't on the Jet Star flight, and he was literally They're like trying to show him back to his gate. Um, anyway, my assessment of the situation is that they were waiting until the clock struck midnight to process as on Saturday as a Saturday arrival under the new guidance, because what they couldn't do, they couldn't admit us into the country on the 20th of March because none of us had a negative cove inserted certificate. A few of us had medals, gold decorations that said, can't get a Koven certificate clean bill of health, similar to what Neil and I had gotten in Wellington. They're a couple of people in the same situation, but a lot of people no one else had that. And I think that they couldn't process us on the Friday because they couldn't bend the rules. But if they waited until the Saturday, we could still go into mandatory quarantine as a Saturday international arrival. That's what I think The situation wass because the people that arrived on Saturday didn't need a cove in certificate. They just were automatically sent into quarantine. So they rounded up all the foreigners pretty much we kind of weight in the immigration line. And literally I checked my phone when they let us go through immigration, and it was 12 midnight on the dock. So they didn't process one single person from our plane until Saturday. The 21st march on Apollo single foreigner from our place, all the other Vietnamese people went through as

spk_0:   1:17:42
that's right and upon Lee is a pure speculation. But from the other foreigners that we were with their I think some of those other foreigners we know now and they are pretty well connected through the jobs I want. No. Apparently, there was some high level discussions through their connexions direct with those immigration people to be like war. Are you gonna do with these group of foreigners? So I don't know how how part of the luck of us getting in was just because we happen to be with this group of well connected people or if that was just gonna happen regardless because there was a treaty to midnight. But by this point now, Yeah, Midnight on Friday night, telling Saturday morning we got through immigration and then we go let Teo waiting area we picked up our bags way preventing snacks. I mean, they get the Vietnamese government. General have been praised you highly. I think, in general, and I will continue that provided snacks. It was all all delay. The process does. Basically waiting for, I think because we were all on the same flight they waited for all of us in Kruse's is all together.

spk_1:   1:18:48
It's just that we're all foreigners. Wait. That guy from that fight that wasn't he comes from

spk_0:   1:18:54
the way you're going, Teo. Uh, us. And we got this point intent of hell that we're going to the National University dorms, Ana. But because they're of course into Vina fastened. The bus driver got lost. Wei had on the map and we had to direct this driver. Did you have to get to Tio? We're going

spk_1:   1:19:21
there the like area of the university that we're in. It's like dorm dorms A And then there's, like, fatter, like 40 buildings.

spk_0:   1:19:29
Before we even got here was going down like streets on this massive bus getting way you like. It was like at this 0.3 in the morning and of course he's got his window. Danielle and I knew I couldn't see who he was yelling a little

spk_1:   1:19:40
woman who had a stall over

spk_0:   1:19:43
who's yelling at the direction that we're trying to show him. The forward take is here. So we manage. Tio needs to get here, and then you once we got here, it's a big complex and there's a bit of confusion of a war building. So there you go. I mean, I know you're very way quickly. All right, So we're gonna take a break because we've been talking for a long time. A very dramatic storey where emotionally exhausted, just telling it what we do, we will put this up is a single episode, and we're going to do we'll do another episode can explain more about the quarantine and what's happened since we got here. I just want to have Everything's fine. Someone laughed when I said It's not a prison. We just can't leave. So it's fine here. We get fed, we get looked after. We just we can leave our rooms. I mean, over a wall, which will do a couple of times a day. But generally like people in general, everything's okay. Well, fine. Well looked after. We just stay in the room. Stay away from people. Right now, we're on the E 14 so we're on the government's spiral downward slope. Not bad, but we're on the run that way. You don't go slow. I don't know if he's looking at me like I'm crazy, but anyway, so we enjoyed this episode. Thank you for listening. Sorry, it's been so long since the last season. If I can get the technology to work, hopefully do. Especially. This will be a special quarantine season or what? Don't season. We'll talk to some other people in Saigon. Maybe they're not necessarily quarantined, but maybe people in there and find out how they're coping. I hope everyone it warms, coping well, it's just a crazy situation right now for me. For E. T. The thing that I've taken the most from this is just people coming together. The fact that, like the outpouring of help and love that we've been given from people from Ew Zealand offering this day, we've had messages from people all over the world asking how we're doing with strangers offered to send us packages and things like that. People checking in on us that we haven't heard from in ages and then seeing other people looking after other people as well. And that's something that way. Get back once we get out of here as well. So I think if everyone sticks together this time, it's gonna be a tough one. As I said before, the sun is still shining will be looking so thank you for listening to a special episode of seven million bakes. Remember, you can if you're listening, you can follow us on Facebook. You can listen to your podcast anywhere on. If you want to send us a message and saying hello, then you can do on the feast piers, just with about seven million bait and thank you to a tree for being a guest on seven million dates. All right, Jews.