Around South East Asia: Part Seventeen

In which I got readied for the land of the Rising Dragon

The sole reason for choosing this country was to celebrate Women’s Day with self. I was planning for Kohima tour. This country was never in my bucket list, but travel taught me in years that destination chooses you rather than you choosing it. I had already celebrated Women’s Day March 2020, with self at the Imagica Theme Park. Now from the post title, you would have guessed that this country is in South-East Asia. This post is in continuation of the South East Asia series. Part 1 to 5 are for Malaysia, Part 6 to 12 for Singapore, Part 13 to 16 for Thailand, Part 17 onwards for Vietnam. Having travelled so far, meeting new people on every tour; I wished I could travel with friends or at least co-travelers (cum travel buddies) from previous tours. I booked the tour in first week of Feb and messaged Manasi Paradkar (my roommate from previous tour) if she was interested to see a lesser-known part of Vietnam. And to my surprise she had booked the same tour! We asked our respective travel agents to pair us. So, the roommate thing was sorted. Roommate is a surprise element on women special for those who travel solo. The visa process was online. I had to submit the scanned copy of passport and studio copy of my photo with the mentioned specifications. Rest was taken care of by Veena World. The air tickets were mailed and I got to known that Roopali Kamble, co-traveler from the Bhutan tour of Nov 2025 was a part of this tour. There was a pre-departure zoom meeting scheduled which elaborated the tour sightseeing, weather conditions, food, currency, dos and don’ts, etc. Unfortunately, I missed the same! I got the Vietnamese Dongs from a friend of mine, who had recently visited this place and had the money left. So, the forex thing was sorted a few days before the tour. 

There was a change in itinerary as per the feedback from visited guests, few sightseeing’s were added/removed. The list seemed to be good. I received a WhatsApp message from Tour Manager Sachin Temak. Finally, the visa copy was received on 26^th Feb on my mail id, so the visa thing sorted. One duffel trolley bag 9kg, one handbag 2kg, one sling bag, was my luggage. I always pack as much as I can pick up on my own. Well, the packing style varies from person to person. The most important thing to be packed was the PASSPORT. I forwarded passport copy, visa copy, flight details, hotel details and itinerary to my sister. So, in this way I got tour ready for the next 7days, make new friends, get to know more about the places I would visit, capture memories in my camera and my eyes and have loads of fun. 

Departure from Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport, Mumbai: 02.03.2026

I was grateful to God that my tour was on and I was flying to my Women’s Day celebration country amidst the current war situation. I felt sad for my travel buddies whose Women’s Day celebration tours got cancelled/postponed indefinitely. Good that these buddies were still in India. While on the way to the airport, I called up Sachin to ask whether the check-in counter has started and the Gate. The counter started at 08:15pm at the Gate C. I reached the airport at 09:10pm, so obviously there was a long queue now. Passport and flight ticket were checked and I entered the airport. I met Sachin, collected the passport pouch and pink cap, and queued up for the boarding pass. There was another Veena World Vietnam group tour. I met Manasi after she had received the boarding pass. It was nice meeting her after 10 months. Roopali had already checked-in and gone ahead. I checked in my duffle bag at the VietJet airlines counter and got the boarding pass. Travellers were getting clicked at the flight poster, so did I! Today was Holi festival. 

I reached the security check counter at 10:10pm and the Immigration counter at 10:20pm for there was lesser crowd. I received the departure stamp and off I went to McDonalds for my airport dinner, fries and chocolate mousse. 

There was a wifi kiosk near Crossword wherein you must scan the passport and boarding pass to get a code voucher. Sign-in to airport wifi, use the code and enter the otp sent on our mobile number. Then we can use free wifi for an hour. I walked towards the Gate 70, traversing through arrows and travelators. The boarding was supposed to start at 11:30pm and there was hardly any crowd near the gate. Then I realized that the boarding had started already. I quickly rushed to the restroom for a final time and my periods have started! We are used to flight delays, here everything was going on before time. The VietJet Airline VJ910, flying to Hanoi, had seat arrangement as ABC | DEF and my seat was 38F. I met Roopali on the way to my seat. The flight took off at 12:10am, way ahead from its scheduled time of 12:40am. I saw the million lights view of Aamchi Mumbai from my window and bid goodbye to India and dozed off. The meal was served at 01:30am: malai kofta and folded paratha. 

I had a disturbed sleep, a bit of suffocation and stomach cramps. Finally, the flight landed at 04:10am IST in Hanoi, which means 05:40am Indochina time (ICT). Indochina consists of five main countries located on the peninsula in Mainland Southeast Asia: Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, and Myanmar. So, we were 1 hours and 30 minutes ahead of India time. The time I would mention now on, would be local time. It took 15 mins to alight from the flight, get in the bus, to the airport terminal. Here I met Sachin and the group, most wearing yellow. We entered the Nội Bài International Airport. Sachin gave preliminary instructions and we walked and walked towards the Immigration Counter. We got the passport stamped by 06:30am and proceeded to the baggage belt. The luggage was yet to arrive so I freshened up at the washroom. I carry a small paste and toothbrush, face wipes, one top in my handbag so that I don’t have to wait for my trolley bag. I got my bag at 7am and had to exchange few things from the handbag into it according to the weather. Sachin explained the analogy between India and Vietnam for the places we would be visiting. Consider Hanoi as Delhi, we were going to Kashmir (Sapa) by road, coming back to Hanoi, flying to the Andaman (Phu Quoc) and back to Hanoi. Few travellers got the USDs converted to Vietnamese Dongs at the forex counter. 

We left the airport at 07:45am. Luggage was loaded into the bus and we started our drive towards Sapa. More on this in next post.