The whole visa process is an interesting concept, allowing people to visit the country with a fee. This error, is classic me, careless and rushed. Ho Chi Minh Sea Port. I'll never make that mistake again. What proved to be an expensive exercise. 250 USD for an express visa , cancelation of original flights 120 USD, rebooking of new flights 320 USD. So almost 690 USD dollars, here we are, back on course, just 10 hours later, with spiked stress, a layover in Da Nang. Be we made it!
After all that, I've received an offer - not exactly what I'm after - but still negotiating. There's obvious sacrifices, but lots of opportunity, I guess these decisions aren't always clear up. The negotiation continues. It comes down to the push/pull. What's pushing me away, what's pulling me towards.
Nice 5 day break in Hong Kong - pretty relaxed, couple of hikes, couple of catch ups. The office is so quiet, it feels like we're still in holiday mode.
Spending close to seven months in Sydney, has made me look forward to heading back even more. The main differences this time around is that we actually had a summer, we actually managed to gather as an extended family for Christmas and I made it into the city for New Year's Eve. Other side notes, lots of friends returning to Sydney, had a classic Australian Backyard gathering in Sutherland, caught up with lost touch uni friends and stayed in my first Sydney Airport hotel. Oddly enough, the Christmas gathering ended up being a mini covid event, thankfully all who contracted it recovered fairly fast.
Took me a while to acclimatise to Sydney, that Thailand trip did a real number on my system, I remember describing it as if I had a combination of jet lag and insomnia. Will try to make more a conscious effort to get back to Sydney more often. Farewell, again.
Despite spending majority of the year overseas I find myself closing out the year with a fair amount of annual leave. Unfortunately, work policy has once again changed, with the carry-over leave amount being reduced back to 5 days.
So here I am, in December, with 12 days of 'use-it-or-lose-it' leave. It also feels like that the "Work from Home" initiative is slowly losing its legitimacy. So with that being said, I decide to spend the remaining 3 weeks in Bangkok and Sydney.
All, in all, I've spent over 7 months outside of Hong Kong in 2023.
