Written by Jamie Mackinnon, Saturday 9th Jul 2011
Visa run from HELL

Having been on many visa run’s before it doesn’t make them any easier as you know what you are in for. My visa was due to expire on the 7th so I had booked a visa run to Burma for that date. For all who don’t know the Burma run is an approx 12hr round trip in a mini bus.

The mini bus was suppose to pick me up outside TMT at 6am but being Thailand I knew it would not be on time. After sitting half asleep until 6.40am I started to think something was wrong. Not having any contact info for the company I sat waiting with my fingers crossed but to no evail. 7am came and the TMT office opened, Nui was able to call the company only to be told that they had forgot to inform me that they had problems and would not be able to go on the run. I was kind of pissed off as this meant I would be over staying my visa and would be charged 500 baht per day. I spoke to the man and told him about this and he told me that we would go on the 8th and that he would cover the overstay charge. So tired and a little pissed off I went back to my room to sleep and get set for going the next day.

Waking up tired and crabby on Friday I headed to TMT to start the wait again. Sitting on the office step with my head in my hands I was surprised to hear someone say ‘ sir, you go visa run’ I looked up and said yes only to see a Thai lady in a car. I was glad to hear that the lady was only picking up a few people from around Chalong and meeting the mini bus later. I had spoke to the lady about the previous days problem and she told me to talk to the driver in the mini bus.

After picking up another 4 people we went to meet up with the mini bus which was looking full. I was hoping that it wouldn’t be busy so I could sprawl myself over the back seats and make the run as comfortable as possible. Not being the case I was lucky to be the last one on the mini bus picking up the single seat next to the door allowing me to stretch my legs out, so was not all bad. We set off and I quickly got myself settled and tried to get some sleep.

We stopped for some food and I spoke to the driver about the overstay issue, but as I had expected he hadn’t been told about this and I was going to need to pay myself :( As we were eating the driver came round giving us the paperwork we needed but when I looked the arrival card was for Malaysia not Burma. I questioned him about this and he said ‘no problem same same go Ranong’ I had know idea where we were going and having only basic Thai langauge skills I just sat down and hoped it would all be cool. As if things couldn’t get worse, shortly after eating the older lady sitting across from me started to be sick in some plastic bags. The mini bus was hot and stuffy and now had the smell of fresh sick, I was just wanting the ground to swollow me by this point.

After a further 3hrs of crazy driving on the bumpy roads we finially made it to the checkpoint which was not Ranong but Wang Kelian Malaysia. Being greeted by the “cheerful” officers we queued up and waited to be called. With the driver infoming the officer I had overstayed I was called into the office to pay my fine. This was the first time I had overstayed and was unsure how things worked, if it was a case of slipping the officer 500 baht under the table and getting stamped or if they would actually do things legit. In the office I handed my passport and the officer started to fill out the paper work so for a change things were being done legit. Getting everything sorted and getting my 90 days stamp I was just wanting to get back home. We all got back in the mini bus to start what would end up to be the 6hr drive back to Phuket.

In the end it ended up being a 14 and a half hour round trip even worse than the Ranong run, I still don’t know why we never went to ranong but I am just happy it is all over and don’t have to do it again for another 90 days.