New Zealand: My Worst Travel Fail //当你没有签证

What was 10 beautiful days in New Zealand didn’t come without its own couple of mishaps.

Thinking back on all of the things we did, I am just now realizing how much room there was for disaster. With the little accidents that we did encounter I am thankful that nothing worse happened…

The first slip-up we ran into, and my worst travel fail ever, was at the Pudong airport before we even left Shanghai. We were at the check-in counter dropping off our luggage when we realized there was a problem with our passports.

For some reason the system wasn’t registering our IDs and the puzzled look on the attendants face didn’t do anything to calm us.

With each unsuccessful swipe of our passports, the anxiety grew. Then the attendant asked us in Mandarin if we had visas to enter New Zealand. My heart plummeted.

It was my responsibility to make sure we didn’t need visas. I researched online months ago and found that both Americans and Canadians can stay in New Zealand for at least 30 days without visas so I thought we didn’t need to apply for one.

The trip flashed before my eyes as I imagined the plane leaving without us and then returning to work tomorrow depressed and totally devastated. Jess looked at me like she was going to kill me and I was just thinking to myself “how could I let this happen.”

We had done so much planning and preparation and all of a sudden our expectations were shattered.

We did the only thing we could – fought back our tears and pleaded that we just didn’t know. We begged the attendant and asked if there was anything that could be done because our flight was leaving in an hour. He didn’t give us any reassurance but suddenly picked up his phone and asked his manager to come aid the situation.

Still unable to accept this news, I snatched my phone and hurriedly searched online to confirm that we didn’t need visas to enter New Zealand. After five very long minutes the manager finally arrived and took a look at our passports again.

He asked us if this was our first time to New Zealand, which it was, and how long we would be staying, which was 10 days. We repeated again that we didn’t know that we were supposed to have visas and he responded, “Everyone needs a visa to enter New Zealand.”

I was in total denial and kept searching my phone for some kind of confirmation so that I could defend my case. I swiped through official government travel sites and travel blogs finding nothing while my conscious kept repeating “Ally you really screwed up this time. You are totally fucked”.

Standing there with our travel gear, Airbnb and hostel reservations and our adventure-packed itinerary, I was on the verge of breaking down. All we could do was stand there silent and motionless in disbelief while the manager scanned our passports and typed away on the computer. Our fate was in his hands.

All of a sudden there was the most beautiful *beep* and the computer began to print Jess’s boarding pass. The Canadian was going to New Zealand. The Canadian was going to New Zealand without me.

Then another *beep* and my boarding pass followed. Our eyes met in simultaneous astonishment, the color in our faces started to slowly return and the corners of our mouths lifted into smiles. We realized we were actually getting on that plane and didn’t have to sulk into work tomorrow.

But were we going to get through customs once we arrived in New Zealand? We scanned our passports and saw that the manager had approved our ID’s and stamped in visas for entry. I could’ve kissed that old man I was so happy.

A wave of relief washed over us however we weren’t on that plane yet. All of a sudden time was no longer slow-motion and everything began to move in a scary, fast-forward speed.

We looked at our phones. We were way behind schedule and had to get on a plane that was going to be leaving without us whether we had our visas or not. We left our luggage, tucked away our passports and snatched our boarding passes for dear life.

We pushed through security and ran to the gate to board the plane just in time. We were the last ones on the plane.

Three, Two, One, Take off. New Zealand here we come.