Day 134. Kyle & Leanne joint blog.

As we bid Thailand farewell, we travel to Hanoi, Vietnam today.  It is only 1,000 miles as the crow flies but since there are no direct flights and with transport times, we are looking at full day of travel: Railay Beach hotel -> boat -> van -> Krabi Airport -> fly to Bangkok -> 3 hour layover -> Fly to Hanoi -> Hanoi airport -> taxi -> hotel.

As the clan piles into the water taxi at the Rayadavee, Leanne stands wistfully on the beach repeating “I’m not leaving” over and over again. The hotel employee who is escorting us to the boat stands there unsure what to do next.  “Have you ever had anyone refuse to leave the resort property upon checkout?” Kyle asks her.  “Ummm, no,” she responds wondering what she’ll do if Leanne grabs the resort sign and refuses to budge. Eventually Kyle is able to convince Leanne to board the boat before hotel security shows up.

We have our airport travel routine down after four plus months on the road.  Kyle even gets cash in Thai Bhat and has to flip into Vietnam Dong at the money exchange in order to pay for the Vietnam visa upon getting off the plane as we won’t have access to a Vietnamese ATM until after immigration.

On the flight from Krabi to Bangkok, Kyle runs into a guy with a Dartmouth t-shirt.  Turns out he is a Dartmouth alumni, Lincoln, from class of 2001 who lives in Hong Kong and was vacationing in Krabi.  We chat with him as we deplane and make out way to the main terminal.

The layover and flight from Bangkok to Hanoi are equally uneventful thus providing no fodder for the blog.  Upon arriving in Hanoi, we have to get our visa upon arrival processed and paid.  Kyle have gotten the initial e-visa online and opted to pay a small extra fee for expedited processing upon arrival.  Kyle figures that if they are offering it as an option, the regular processing time could be quite lengthy.  As we arrive at immigration, a person is holding a sign with our name.  She collects my mound of paperwork and money, leads us to a waiting area and disappears.   

For the regular process, one submits the paperwork and money and waits to be called up.  The size of the group waiting is large but not out-of-control big causing Kyle to question whether it was worth paying the extra fee for the  expedited processing.   As we wait, the source of the problem becomes apparent – they call up one person every five minutes.  That would take 35 minutes just to process our group.  Kyle does some quick math on the 40 people in the waiting room and estimates our wait time would have been 3-4 hours.  Instead, our assigned person appears within 10 minutes with all seven visa perfectly mounted in our passports. Home run!  No, Grand Slam!

We catch a van to our hotel in Old Hanoi. The street the hotel is located produces and immediate sensory overload with lights flashing, people bustling and mopeds zipping.  We check in and half the crew falls into bed exhausted opting to skip dinner with Kyle, John & Justin grab a quick dinner in the hotel almost too tired to talk.  Kyle falls into bed hoping for a good night’s sleep…

At 3:30 am, we are awoken to a knocking on the door.  Kyle gets up assuming it’s one of the kids knocking on our door not feeling well or needing something.  Kyle opens the door and realizes that it is not one of our kids but a guy knocking on the door of the room next to us.  The hallway is dark and the man mumbles “I’m so sorry” as Kyle closes the door figuring his roommate will soon let him in.

The knocking continues as the man is pleading “let me in” and “please open the door.”  At first we think the roommate must be fast asleep but then Kyle hears a female voice responding to him; however the door is still locked shut. We figure it’s a lovers spat with a bit of romance gone wrong in the wee hours of the night.

The man’s knocking has turned into a pounding and his voice has turned from pleading to sounding rather pissed off with “open this door, NOW!” and “LET ME IN!” After 20 minutes of this, Kyle has had enough of the dude’s unproductive begging and banging and gets up to tell the guy he needs to stop and go down to the front desk and get a new key.  

Kyle swings open the door and steps into the hallway and his jaw drops open. Standing there in the hallway is a horrified, embarrassed buck-naked man.  “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry,” he kept repeating over and over again.  It’s not often Kyle is at an utter and complete loss for words but this is one of those times.  Kyle just turns and goes back into the room.

“What did the guy say?” Leanne asks.  “Ummm…he was naked,” Kyle responds.  

“What do you mean?” “I mean the dude was standing the hallway completely naked – no clothes.” 

“Well who was he?” “I don’t know, I didn’t really feel like having a get-to-know-you conversation with a strange naked man in the hallway at 4am.”

If I were filling out a police report, this would be my description – a Caucasian male approximately 40 years of age, slightly balding, unknown national origin but English was his native language, no tan (definitely no tan). He could have been American and with the luck we’ve had running into people from our hometown, he could have been a nearby neighbor back home. 

Kyle gets an idea and grabs a towel from the bathroom.  He steals himself, opens the door and steps back into the hallway.  “Ok, I see you’re in a predicament here but this banging and shouting has to stop.  Here, take this towel and go down to the lobby and get a new key.” Naked guy takes the towel but wails at Kyle “I can’t go downstairs, I just can’t!”   He’s clearly in one embarrassing predicament. 

Kyle has had enough being now short one shower towel and still long one naked guy.  “Dude, I’m sorry, I’m going to have to call security, I need to get some sleep and this has been going on for over 30 minutes.”

Apparently the “security” word must have had some effect and Kyle comes back in the room and is fumbling around for the hotel phone to call downstairs when we hear the door open and can almost feel a palpable sigh of relief emanating from the naked guy. 

This has never happened to either of us in our entire lives.  Chalk up another first for the trip although certainly not one we’d like to repeat.  

The next day is spent theorizing on exactly how the dude ended up naked in the hallway in the first place.  “Maybe, he was really drunk or high,” Leanne suggests.  “Ok, but the rest of the drunk hotel guests usually don’t end up naked in the hallway.” “Maybe he thought it was the bathroom door instead of the hallway door.” “Yes, but once he opened it, he’d see the hallway and wouldn’t keep going out and closing the door behind him.” Kyle settles on a theory that he brought back a “lady of the night”, she gets him to play a game of naked hide and seek and when he is hiding in the hallway, she locks him out and attempts to steal his wallet.

Leanne starts to wonder how many stars this hotel has.  “It seems like a nice enough establishment?” ponders Leanne. At breakfast, the staff person Julie even texts Kyle to see how he slept.  Kyle uses the opportunity to respond, “well, since you asked ...” and goes on to describe the unfortunate 4 a.m. incident.  He finishes the text with “it was very strange, does this happen often in your hotel?”  

Julie was both apologetic and shocked saying she would report it to her boss, the service manager, immediately.  The Essence Hotel has a 5.0 star rating on trip advisor and I’m guessing they’re in a state of semi-panic at the potential of a review describing a naked guy running around their hotel terrorizing the other guests at 4 in the morning.