But first.. Noru happened..
Around 2 weeks before our trip to South-East Asia there was a typhoon named Noru on the way to Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and Laos. It started as a Super Typhoon and hit the Philippines really hard it then proceeded directly to Vietnam and its neighbouring countries. It was supposed to hit very hard and I was quite worried, wasn’t sure if we should even proceed with the trip or cancel it. Our flights were not getting cancelled and I wasn’t sure if it was because of China Airlines who wanted to not cancel and still make money despite the risk, or because it was actually safe to fly. I kept an eye on the flights but no.. they weren’t getting canceled. I also kept track of the events unfolding on Twitter as well as on a special website tracking hurricanes (Until then I didn’t know that you call it a hurricane if it’s over the North Atlantic or Central or Eastern Pacific oceans and typhoon over the West-North Pacific, i thought they were basically interchangeable terms).
The countries on the path of Noru were getting prepared.. People were putting sandbags on their roofs so it wouldn’t fly away (we saw some of these things when we arrived later), but according to Wikipedia, the local communities in Vietnam called for residents to evacuate from risky areas. Da Nang and three other provinces. Da Nang authorities have also ordered people to stay indoors from 8 pm on September 27 until further notice. More than 100,000 households of 400,000 people were evacuated as Noru neared. Approximately 270,000 military personnel were placed on standby. Hundreds of flights were canceled. At least 327,937 people were evacuated across the provinces. A curfew was imposed and a curfew was effective, which started on September 29 in Quang Nam and Da Nang.
But by the time of our flights, the typhoon had already passed over Vietnam and scaled down to a tropical depression somewhere over Cambodia, if i remember correctly. Check this video of the Typhoon over Vietnam (Da Nang) and the damage to everything in Hoi An. Luckily, by the time we went there, tourists and locals had jumped in together to clean the town of Hoi An and when we went there just 2 weeks later, it was unbelievable, like nothing ever happened there. Amazing work! Below is my photo from a flight over the area 2 weeks after Noru.
Typhoon Noru makes #Landfall in Vietnam, national forecaster says
— Disaster News (@Top_Disaster) September 28, 2022
After ripping through the Northern part of the Philippines, Typhoon Noru (Karding) is now hammering Vietnam
#TyphoonNoru #Noru #Vietnam #TyphoonKarding #Viral #Climate #Rain #Storm #Tornado #Tropicswx pic.twitter.com/S3ZL55PUCt
The fight to the other side of the world..
We started our trip to South-East Asia, our first Asia trip ever, on a criminally long 13h direct flight from Amsterdam to Taipei, Taiwan with China Airlines. Since it was still a post-covid time, despite the majority of the world having abandoned the face masks by then, China airlines were still requiring you to wear a mask. Fill really hated the idea, I thought it was fine to wear it, but that turned out to be a very wrong way of thinking.. We literally couldn’t take them off unless we’re eating, so basically it was kind of suffocating inside that mask. The airline served some VERY STINKY noodles, you know they cook with tons of spices and in general that’s OK, but on a plane with no ventilation option, that’s.. mildly said, quite terrible! We were in the middle row of 4 seats and somehow I ended up sitting next to a Chinese guy who had some sort of a weird rash (Monkeypox? 😀 haha, joking but still.. back in the days of the flight, the monkeypox worries were starting to grow), the guy was constantly itching and scratching himself and this, I later realized, did have a psychological effect on me too, you know like if someone vomits on a boat from sea sickness, everyone starts vomiting. The same kind of thing happened – I could see his rash all over his face and arms and he didn’t stop scratching for a minute, I started itching too. I became quite anxious the longer we stayed on the plane. Of course, I told myself that China Airlines are so strict, they wouldn’t let someone with a real, contagious medical issue get on the plane, so that’s how i calmed myself down, or.. tried to at least. At some point, close to the end of the flight that issue, along with the stinky food they served in the morning, close to landing, took its toll on me and I was SO close to throwing up, I was barely holding on until we landed and was craving for some fresh water to drink. However.. well.. we landed at 4 AM or so and there was absolutely NOTHING open at the Taipei airport, we had to wait for 3h for the next flight to Hanoi and the only option to buy something, was from the vending machines, but these did not accept card, only cash.. and only local cash, so basically we couldn’t even get water. Thankfully, after another 3-hour flight, we arrived in Hanoi. A tip which you might know already, is to buy a local SIM card from your destination country, because they usually offer prepaid cards for tourists with different options for how much data you get. This allows you to get free local calls or at least cheap local calls and data for your navigation, googling, posting etc. And it’s usually a pretty good deal, but ofc, i’d suggest not streaming music or TV shows because then you’ll need a very big amount of data so it might not be that cheap anymore. So we got our SIM cards. We needed a SIM card also because we planned to use the local “Uber” version, called Grab. It requires a local SIM card to work with, you can then set a credit card inside and you travel just like with Uber and it’s muuuch, much cheaper than a taxi. Also, you can get a taxi car or a tuk-tuk, or a motorbike 😀 (though, i definitely wouldn’t recommend the latter, especially if you are a solo female traveler, i’ve heard horror stories about these motorbike drivers..).