A Tale of Thai Visas

This story is a little belated...but none the less blog worthy.

While in Beijing we set aside a specific day for acquiring our Thai visas that we'll need for our two month stay in Thailand this September. So bright and early that Thursday morning we made our way to the Thai Embassy. After our taxi driver finally figured out exactly where it was we pulled up in front only to be greeted by a guard with a paper in hand titled "We've Moved!" ... or something to that effect.
So we got back in our taxi cab and took off to the destination listed on the paper. This place is some sort of international building with all sorts of offices inside. When we arrived & headed towards the door decorated in all things Thai we were quite disappointed to see the doors chained shut and all the lights off inside. Completely bewildered, we looked to the ladies standing behind a counter near the doors. Their reply? "Buddha Day!" Apparently it was some sort of Buddhist holiday and they failed to mention they'd be closed on the day we said we'd be there.
Oh well...shrug it off...we'll come back tomorrow.

Friday rolls around and we wake up bright and early again, hoping Buddha day only lasted one day, to head downtown to the Embassy. Making sure we had all necessary requirements for applying for the visa, we head out the door...thus making our first mistake. Online they posted the specific photo requirements (that we all know can be quite picky) and we just assumed that any place doing Visa & Passport paperwork would have a camera & printer on hand for fulfilling those specifications. I mean, that's the way we do it in America...so logic told us that's the way they'd do it here as well.
Seriously, after living overseas for 10 months you'd think we'd know better by now. Our motto from now on: Never Assume. Because most often the things that make total sense to us are usually exactly opposite in China. (and apparently Thailand as well)

So, after we filled out all the paper work they gave us directions to a little Kodak shop across the highway where we could have pictures taken and developed (because apparently they've been in this situation before of people making assumptions). So we cross the highway and walk in to the closest Kodak place that we see. We show the guy behind the counter what we're needing and he literally starts yelling at us. I'm not talking about a raised voice...this was all out yelling...in unintelligible Chinese...for no apparent reason. Shocked and a little frightened, we both just gave him the "wow that was really strange and unnecessary" look and scurried off.
We rounded the corner outside hoping that wasn't the Kodak store we were supposed to go to, and sure enough a big yellow Kodak sign appeared up ahead.

As we neared this store we could both tell something was awry. The lights were all off inside. Not having a good feeling about what we were about to hear we ventured in and told them what we needed.
"Sorry, no electricity. Come back in one hour."

Not having an hour to spare we began to frantically search for another photo store. We crossed streets, asked passers-by, & I'm sure looked like lost little tourists.
Then suddenly, like a beautiful ray of sunlight shining through the darkness, we both noticed a sign with a huge arrow marked: USA VISA. We were so happy we could have stopped and sang the National Anthem right then.
Still a little unsure if this was evil big-city-Beijing trickery, we followed the arrows cautiously and lo and behold! they led us straight to the strategically placed American Embassy. Hoping all American logic would not be cast aside at this embassy, we prayed they'd have a camera, white back drop, and printer on hand. Sure enough...12,000 miles from home, American Logic is still at work in the American Embassy in Beijing!
We paid our hefty dues for the small 2x2 inch Visa photos & made our way back to the Thai Embassy completely satisfied for being scrappy and so Amazing Race-like.

Three days later we picked up our passports with our newly stamped Thai Visas inside!

And three days after arriving back in our city Brandon's passport was stolen! booooooooooo

So, today my friends, he is in Beijing picking up his new emergency passport at the strategically placed American Embassy with the working camera, white back-drop, and printer. And after that he'll head to the Thai Embassy where he'll attempt to replay the story I have just told you...only without Buddha day (hopefully) and having 2x2 photos already in hand.