First of all, I have to say that I love my country a lot, and I’m proud to tell people that I’m Vietnamese. But sometimes, I feel bad just because I’m holding a Vietnamese passport. It happened again today at Chinese consulate in Kuching.

Visa application at Chinese consulate in Kuching only opens from 9am to 11.30am. On Monday, I called them in advance to ask for requirements for Vietnamese because I couldn’t find sufficient information anywhere on the Internet. I called the number they put on the website and the guy there told me to call to 2 other numbers. So I kept calling these 2 numbers for the whole morning. The first number, nobody picked up the phone. The second number was busy the whole time. After about 20 times, I called the number on the website again and talked to the guy. He told me that I needed to call these 2 numbers. I told him that but nobody picked up the phone. And he was annoyed at me, he said: “Then you have to keep calling until somebody picks up.”!!?

Pretty much pissed, I went directly to the consulate. There was a long queue of people applying for visa there. I queued and talked to the lady at the collection counter. She couldn’t speak English!!! An visa applicant there asked me in English where I was from and stuff, and everybody looked at me as an alien. It was about 11.20am, if I queued at another counter, by the time I reached the lady, the visa application would be closed already so I came home and came back again early this morning.

After filling the application form, I went to apply. As I’m a foreigner, I have to pay 4 times more than Malaysian. I don’t complain about that ‘cos it’s the rule at almost all embassies. But then they told me that I could only apply for visas to Hong Kong & Shenzhen. If I want to go to Macau, I have to come back to Vietnam to apply. Vietnam is one of 6 countries that need to apply for visa to Macau from home country.

No I can’t go back to Vietnam just for Macau visa thing. All my flights have been booked, if I go back to Vietnam, I will have to cancel a bunch of flights and book some more flights. It will cost me a fortune! I don’t believe that I can’t get my visa while I’m in Kuching. Here are some options I can think of:

1. Ask for a friend/travel agency to apply for my visa from Vietnam and mail it to me.

2. Apply for Macau visa through a travel agency in Macau.

3. Try to contact consul-general in Kuching to ask for help. Too bad I don’t know him.

4. I’m talking to some potential sponsors for my trip. I might come back to Vietnam to talk to them, so I might apply for Macau visa from there.

5. Don’t go to Macau anymore.

6. Just go there and try to get visa upon arrival.

Somebody help me please!!!