It's here...

I was pleasantly surprised to receive an email last night from DHL indicating that my passport is on its way back to Singapore.

Yup, apparently, the visa is processed in Kuala Lumpur.

It was very impressive how fast and efficient the embassy was. I applied for my visa Tuesday noontime. The day after, it was already in Kuala Lumpur for processing and was bound to arrive in Singapore today.

When I checked the tracking information when I got back at the office from lunch, I saw that the parcel has already been delivered and received by our receptionist.

Woohooo!

I checked with her and after confirming that the parcel has arrived, I went to the seventh floor to get the package.

As soon as I got back to my desk, I carefully opened the package, took out my passport and looked for the page with the sacred Schengen visa. Hehe!

Multiple entry. 30 days.

Woohoooo!!!!!

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Lordy!

By the way, I dunno with the other EU member states but with the Netherlands embassy, they have a service whereby the passport may be delivered to the passport holder via DHL. The fee is a minimal SGD10. This is just awesome since I dun have to head back to the embassy for passport collection!

Anyway...

So, yeah, see you Europa in April.

See you soon, Myanmar...

I finally got my visa for Burma. (Hmm, for this one sentence, I'm going to use Burma instead of Myanmar. The former sounds more exotic. Hehe!)

There were really no plans to visit the said country this year, but a little prodding from MkSurf8 and Chris was all it needed to get me to say yes. Hehe!

The 2011 trip to Ho Chi Minh with these two guys was definitely one of the most unforgettable ever (lol!), so I'm quite sure that the trip to Myanmar would also be a good one.

Initially, the plan was MkSurf8, RKGreg, Chris, Chase plus me. However, Chase had to back out at the last minute because of a work trip.

Going back to the trip, because I took some time deciding on whether I will go or not, I missed the JetStar seat sale. The good thing was Air Asia had a somewhat similar seat sale. The downside (which later turned out not to be so much of a downside) - it's flying from Kuala Lumpur and I'll be arriving in Yangon early evening while MkSurf8, RKGreg and Chris arrive much earlier.

But I'm glad I was able to get the sale.

Next up was getting the visa. I dun really know why I have to get a visa and why I have to pay for a visa, when Myanmar is an Asean member. Anyway, the visa is SGD35.

Initially, I was thinking of going to the embassy myself to apply for the visa.

In the end, I did what MkSurf8 and Chris did. I went to a travel agent to process the visa for me. The cost was about SGD55. It was good enough considering that I dun have to queue at the embassy, I dun have to take half-day off from work.

The travel agent I went to is at Peninsula Plaza (adjacent to St. Andrew's Cathedral at City Hall MRT). I hardly go there. Apparently, as MkSurf8 said, it's the Burmese version of Lucky Plaza.

I gave my documents to the travel agent, and that was it. I just had to wait for a few days for them to process the visa at the embassy.

The Myanmar embassy says that the passport may be collected after 3 working days. Mine took a little longer than that but it was okay.

Just glad to have gotten the visa. Yey!

Can't wait.

Taw Win Oo (Singapore) Pte. Ltd.
111 North Bridge Road,#02-40, Peninsula Plaza
65 976-55184; 65 6338-6273