Mysterious Ditty

A strange amendment pointed out to me on the foriegn office website is causing me some confusion (see here and below)

From 15 October - 25 November 2006, category D visas, which are issued to visitors who have no sponsorship for their visit, will not be issued. Holders of this type of visa will not be granted entry during this period. You should check your visa carefully before travelling to Vietnam and arrange appropriate sponsorship from your business partners, friends or travel agent if necessary.

1) I'm not sure what a catagory D visa is.

2) I see no mention of it or the restrictions on the website of the Vietnam Embassy in London.

3) If you have friends coming to visit Vietnam in this period, best check they have the right visa! It seems to say that even if you have already had the visa issued you will be denied entry.

4) Can anyone shed some light on a) what is a catagory 'd' visa and b) why these restrictions for only 6 weeks?!

Football stuff

Saigon Raiders won again, beating the HCMC People's Comittee team 5-4, our first victory against them after previously losing 6-1 and then drawing 2-2.

The previous week we got a good spanking, 11-0. This was by a Nigerean team (it was actually me who organised the game). They train every morning in D7 and most are young lads looking for a club to play pro here. They had fitness levels which would embarass Linford Christie, and a game to match. We simply could not get the ball from them and spent 90 minutes running around in circles. Credit to us though, it was only 3-0 at half time, and there was a period of 20 or so minutes in the second half where we didn't concede, but then followed 10 minutes of watching them jog from the centre circle, put the ball in our net, then calmy jog back and do it again.

To put it in perspective, they were all no older than 30, trian every day, they have a manager (we don't) and they had what must have been the entire Nigerean contingent of HCMC down to support them. We had a squad of 14 players and after 10 minutes one was injured. That means 2 subs for the whole game in the beating afternoon sun. Our average age is a little higher, and level of training and fitness considerably lower (about half the team lights up after the final whistle!). Overall, as we all agreed, it was a good reminder of the level we play at!

The second week of Ocotber sees the start of the Saigon International Football League, or SIFL as football writers from across the globe like to call it. We've been unable to change the 6 team format from last year, with some teams coming and going. This year we have:

1) The Saigon Raiders (mostly European players)
2) The Saigon Saints (mostly European players)
3) Japan (mostly, err, Japanese players)
4) FOSCO (Vietnamese team)
5) RMIT (RMIT students, Vietnamese)
6) Olympique Saigon (French team)

By the way, we need a goalkeeper and a manager. Anyone can come along to our open training sessions on Tuesday nights at Parklands in Anh Phu from 7.00. That's the first step to becoming involved with the Raiders!