Its funny….because when you travel around the world, you are constantly surprised that things don’t go according to plan…You would think that after a while, you would start to expect the unexpected (and sometimes you have smart moments where you prepare for the worst), but at the same time there’s that small optimistic hope that things will work out in some organized fashion that you have mentally and physically prepared for.
Well, it seems that I need to turn off that optimistic hopeful side a little more sometimes and shift my expectations to a more realistic mindset. The realistic side being that small voice in my head that reminds me in an escalating volume that “THIS IS NOT AMERICA!!!”
Amy and I have been here in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia for two weeks now. No, we did not need to take a break from our grueling Thai life (actually just the opposite, we wish that we could have stayed there and actually being “home” is quite the opposite of grueling…), we came to Malaysia in order to apply for our new visas for Thailand. Our time seemed to come up rather quickly in Thailand, and though we crossed the “Friendship Bridge” into Burma, we were only granted 15 more days in Thailand and had to promptly leave again for a longer termed solution.
The problem was, usually you must be in the US to apply for a one year Non-O visa. The second problem was we could in no way afford a quick trip back to the States to get a new visa. Solution: fly to Malaysia, mail our passports back home, and patiently wait, hoping that our visas are granted and our passports make it back to us in Malaysia (where the locals have told me the post is “unreliable” (great)). Risky right? Well we prayed about it and this is the route we chose.
So for the last two weeks we have been faithfully tracking our passports and as soon as we saw them heading back we booked a plane ticket (man those things were getting more expensive every day!). We booked our flight for early in the morning the day after our package was GUARENTEED by the US post and FedEx to reach us.
Yesterday was that day. You know, the “GUARENTEED” day. Amy and I waited all day down in our friend’s restaurant where our package was to be delivered. The day came, and the day went. It felt like a bad joke. We went to the main post office for all of Malaysia, spoke to someone, and for some reason they sent us to DHL. DHL of course sent us back to the restaurant. We waited again for a few hours and finally realized that everything was closed and it wasn’t coming. So, we put on our big girl pants, sucked it up, and took the train to our airline branch to change our flights (which I had a bad feeling about).
Sure enough, bad feeling correct. The airline does not change flights at all if it is less than 48 hours in advance. We spoke to a rep for a while, but it just looked like we were going to lose our whole ticket, with ZERO refund. We had both spent way more on this flight than we had planned and there was no way we could afford another one. Plan B would have been to just take a series of buses and trains to Chiang Mai, which would have taken days.
I was being very theoretical with the rep and I said, “So even like if someone’s passport was stolen, you guys don’t do anything?” He looked at me, asked me to wait a moment and went to speak with someone in the back room. When he came back he said, “So your passport was stolen?” and I had to awkwardly re-explain our situation. He seemed pretty confused by it all and so he just repeated that the only way he could help us is if we had a police report. I thanked him and we walked out.
Amy and I walked through the building to find a place to sit and think. When we started talking about our options, after initially ignoring it, I felt like we should ACTUALLY go file a police report. There really was a chance that something had happened to our passports in the mail. They had arrived back in Malaysia, and then the tracking had suddenly stopped and they hadn’t moved all day.
We agreed to go pursue the option and just see what happened. To make a long story short, we met two very friendly and helpful Malaysian officers in an office, who, after trying to battle the language barrier, wrote us a report! Amy mentioned later that she felt like there must have been a hidden camera in the room because the whole experience was so funny. They immediately put me in a better mood and we all went back and forth just laughing about all the confusion and trying to get the story straight.
I wish you could read the report. It basically just tells the story of us sending our passports to America and at the end it says that they did not arrive by the “guaranteed” date and so we are not exactly sure where they are. We wanted to be 100% truthful with our story because we felt weird reporting them stolen or something, but in the end we didn’t even have to be specific! The police kept telling us to write something very short. We told them all we really needed was an official report to show the airlines. Kind of a weird loophole.
Voila! Report in hand, we headed back to the airline and were able to change our flights to the following day. We only ended up having to pay $30 to change it as opposed to another huge charge for transportation! We left praising God!
So that brings us to today…A few more problems trying to track down our passports, a few calls, and another visit to the post office. Then, as we were sitting at the post office trying to find them, I got a text that they arrived at the restaurant!! Again Amy and I left praising the Lord. More praises upon arrival at the restaurant and seeing our lovely little blue books with those pristine stamps and knowing that it had all worked out J
Thank you for your prayers through this process! God is so good and faithful. We don’t always understand why things happen, but its nice to know that at least God does.
Home never felt so sweet…
