China - Day, well Night, 1.

This post was meant to be made yesterday (7/4) but due to the lack of internet it never made it. But better late than never...

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We made it! As I type this Terri and I are sitting at, of all places, an airport Starbucks. Leave it the two of us to start our adventure in China at a good old Starbucks. Ha! Looks like the same as at home down to the English writing on the walls and tables.

So things went smoothly. Minus a few bumps here and there in the air, the flight was quiet enjoyable. And actually, I can't believe how fast the flight was. I know that sounds odd, especially since it was just under 13 hours long but it seemed like I had barely fallen asleep when they were waking me up for dinner. First class was nice too. How could it not be right? I was totally spoiled. Terri and I sat across from each other in our own personal suites, mine of course was a window seat. Anyone who knows me knows I need my window seat. There were maybe 10-12 of us up front. The flight attendants were great and the service is what one would expect. We were fed two full meals, plenty of snacks and rinks. I have photos that should be posted below.

My seat was super comfortable too. It reclined to lay flat for sleeping and adjusted in so many ways it reminded me of those adjustable beds you always see commercials for on tv. There was even a built in back massager which helped my poor upper back a lot. I took full advantage of that throughout the flight and believe me, it helped me sleep well. Maybe too well since I'm wide awake right now as I type this. I'm not sure how long I was out but Terri said it was a while since I slept much longer than she did. It's times like these that I'm very thankful for my ability to fall asleep any where at any time. I did, however, take some Advil PM to help with my knee and back pain but that only can do so much for helping you sleep. I thank my body for the rest. The only time I woke up once they dimmed the lights before the flight crew's "good morning" was during the 3 pages for a doctor on board. I have no idea what happened but that lead me to wonder why on long flights they don't have some sort of EMT or medical professional on staff. Hmm.

After landing we had to wait in our seats while the medical quarantine group came through and scanned all of our foreheads for fevers. They came on, all women, wearing masks, goggles and converse bags. They went row by row, person by person, and scanned each forehead until the device beeped. You then got a quick look before they moved on. We had to wait until they cleared the entire plane before we could leave. Then we still had to go through another area where they verified these health information cards we had to fill out, our passports/visas and scanned us with infrared cameras to check for body heat. From that point on we were free to proceed to immigration. Wasn't too bad and I'm very thankful that it all went as smoothly as it did.

Anyways, I'm here and it's still hard to believe. It was weird standing in the "foreigners" line of immigration but very cool to earn my first stamp in my passport. And yes Kevin, all I keep thinking now is that everyone looks like you, lol. :) On the shuttle buss from Terminal 3 to Terminal 2 a little boy, probably around 2 years old, kept staring at me. I'm sure I was probably the first blonde haired, blue eyed white girl he's ever seen. His mom tried to get him to wave and he finally smiled at me once his dad told him it was okay. I smiled back, waved and attempted to say hello in Chinese. He giggled and hid in his mother's arms.

Now we just need to wait for the rest of our group, the law students, to arrive so that we can board the bus and head to our hotel in Tianjin. Exciting, that's for sure. Although it's probably dark out so I can't imagine we'll see much on the ride down. But oh well, it's still China. YAY!!!

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Photos: Since I'm sending this blog post via email I'm not sure how the photos are going to look and if I can caption them or not, so here's a quick description of each for you to try to match up.

1 - My little "suite" on the airplane, seat 3K.

2 - Each seat had a tv full of on-demand programming including movies and tv. I caught up on a few episodes of Entourage as well as watched "Marley and Me".

3 - There was an interactive map on the tv. This one shows our flight path, as you can see we were still over Canada.

4 - My lunch, it was yummy.

Great Firewall of China

This post is a test. This is only a test....

Alright everyone, so it turns out that blogger is blocked here in China thanks to the great firewall. Until I figure out how to find a proxy work around (maybe, maybe not) I might not be posting much as I'd like. I'm hoping that sending posts through my email to the blog will work for now, if not I'll email the posts to my brother and he'll throw them up for me. We'll see. If not I really apologize for not posting as often or if the formatting is off since I can't really control that.

Kind of sucks. I have 1 post complete and another started that I wanted to put up today. Hopefully I can get them up here to share.

Alright, so we'll end this test for now. Happy 4th of July (what's left of it) from the 5th of July! 

O' Canada

Well the day has finally arrived. Terri and I are sitting in the Maple Leaf lounge of the Toronto airport enjoying comfy chairs, free food/drink, free wi-fi and all the comforts that traveling first class brings you. For me, perhaps, the best part is the free wi-fi. YAY Internet! Man, it's kind of sad that free wi-fi makes me happy. :)

Getting to Toronto last night was fine. Thankfully the screaming annoying kids I kept trying to avoid at O'Hare were sitting in the back of the plane so the only thing I really had to deal with was the poor puppy in cargo barking right before take off and after landing. Poor little guy. I wouldn't want to fly in cargo either. And for perhaps the first time ever, if not in a really long time, I was quite happy with my seat-mate. If I remember correctly his name was Randy and although he was probably a few years short of 50 he was a joy to talk to. In the hour we had in the air we talked about everything from where we were from/going to, the travels ahead of us, and what we do for a living. An outsider probably would have thought we were old friends from the way we kept going on and on. In fact the flight attendant thought we were traveling together and only offered us one customs form.

Randy, an MRI tech who taught me all about how they work, was a cool guy. He had been traveling all day from Alaska (thru Juno, Seattle and then Chicago) on his way here to Toronto where he's beginning a 3 week bicycle trip through the country, eventually ending in Boston where he'll fly home. All he had with him was a single small duffel bag (that included a tent in it) and his bike, both to which he checked. He was doing the entire journey by himself, I couldn't believe it. He's biked all over the US/Canada like that for the past 10 years. And where I found myself a little green with envy that he can just take off like that and go, he was totally jealous that I would be 1/2 way around the world in only a few short hours. It was kind of funny.

This morning Terri and I basically got up, lounged around for a little bit, finished packing up and then grabbed lunch at the hotel restaurant before hoping on the airport tram to Terminal 1. After a smooth executive first class check in, and an uber smooth security check (didn't have to take my shoes or my coat off), we find ourselves comfortably relaxing. In approximately 2 hours we'll start the boarding process for our 13 hour journey to China. Crazy. I still can't believe I'll be in China by tomorrow afternoon. And for the few of you who knew how nervous I had been, let's just say I'm much much better now. Like I said, as soon as I made it thru customs, got to the hotel and saw Terri when she opened the room door, all of those nerves went out the window. I actually got a full nights sleep. :)

So in case this is the last time I post for a day or so b/c of the whole plane ride and all, happy 4th of July to all of you in the States. Eat a hot dog and watch some fireworks for me.

Sitting @ O'Hare

Well the time has come. I'm sitting at my gate waiting for the
boarding call. Good old ORD. Thankfully my flight is on time. Can't
say that for some United passengers. Crazy. The terminals are full
though, and totally overrun with families. You can tell it's a holiday
weekend.

Speaking of, this will be my first 4th of July not in the States.
Feels odd. No fireworks, no family picnics, no hot dogs or sparklers.
Sure I'm trading up but it will still be weird. Especially being 12-13
hrs ahead (more depending on where you are as you read this) of
everything. Oh well. It will be a 4th I will remember forever.

So tonight I arrive and sleep in Toronto, then tomorrow Terri (my
sister-in-law) and I are off to China. Oh the adventures we'll have!
I'm only a little bit nervous now, and a whole bunch excited. Now
hopefully my back pain will cooperate. Thankfully flying first class
will ease my pain. ;)

I will try to post one more time before that 13 hr flight, fingers
crossed I'll be able to. Hopefully I'll have WiFi access. If not the
next time you'll head from me I'll be in the future. Lol.

Canada, here I come!

Sent from my iPhone

2 going on 1

It's almost 1:30am already and I think I can finally say I'm about 85% packed. I have a few small things that I use on a daily basis that cannot be packed until the last minute (like my phone charger and computer, hair brush, etc.) still left along with the clothes that are still drying from my last minute laundry session. Everything else is ready to be shoved into a bag if it's not there already. Poor Boots Boots is freaking out. There's stuff every where and the suitcases are out. Never a good sign in his book.

I feel like I've packed more than enough, and that I'm probably over-packing, but the last thing I want to do is be unprepared in a foreign country. That might sound silly but anyone who knows me knows I'm a planner. I plan for EVERYTHING. Just ask Helen one day about my emergency wedding kit I had packed in May...and it wasn't even my wedding, lol.

Tomorrow all I've have left to do is backup/pack my computer and camera, fold up the last few pieces of clothes and pick out probably 1-2 more pairs of shoes (one pair to which I'll be wearing on the plane). Not bad. All in all I'll have 3 bags, each which would fit or work as a carry-on if necessary. 1 small weekend type suitcase, an even smaller suitcase/carry bag and finally my laptop bag. The 2 red suitcases will be checked. For a 10-11 day trip I think that's pretty good. Especially for me.

Okay time to put some heat on my aching back and go to bed. I think I've finally worn myself out enough tonight that I'll actually be able to sleep through the nerves.

3

Three nights from tonight I'll be sitting in a Toronto hotel room most likely watching the clock slowly tick the hours away until go time. That thought actually kind of scares me, in a good way of course. I'm not sure if I'm ready for this trip, and judging my the pile of clothes and random items stacked on my dining room table I'm sure as heck not packed. So much to do and so little time to do it all. It's a shame that laundry doesn't do itself and suitcases aren't packed by happy little elves while you sleep.

But other than packing, which is no small feat, I think things are starting to come together. I've slowly been making all of the necessary arrangements, calling and notifying banks/credit card companies/etc. of my upcoming travel and have a final little shopping list of things I need to pick up before I go. If any of you out there in blog land have suggestions of things I might need to do, pick up or pack for my travels, please don't be shy.

Hopefully come Wed. night I'll be ready. Fingers crossed I can do it all b/c really, I'm not sure I have any other choice.

Now if only the nerves would fade so I could get some sleep...

China countdown - T minus 4 days...

My trip to China is almost here, I can't believe it. I still remember reading my older brother's email about the possibility of me going and responding with, "you have got to be kidding me". Well he wasn't, and several shots and 1 Chinese visa later the trip is finally becoming a reality. Wow...

Today it really started to hit me as I was shopping at Target picking up all the different travel items I'm going to need. I'm going to China. I'm actually going to China. This will be my first real official, passport needing trip outside of the states, and I'm both nervous and excited. Other than quick border hoping trips to Toronto and, well, Tijuana, I've never left the states. So this trip is a really big deal for me and I want to share every part of it with all of you.

So since I'll most likely be out of touch with most of you while I'm away I plan on blogging about my experience. This blog will not only be a way to keep an active journal/record of all that I'll be doing and encountering, but it will also be a way to tell all of you about it shortly (hopefully) after it happens. I plan on posting as often as I can (aka when wifi is available) and will include photos and videos whenever I get a chance so check back often. I'll also be posting, hopefully, on Twitter and Facebook and will unlock my profile for any of you who choose to follow. I've also set up a Skype account (rad1je) just in case any of you would like to chat.

Well I better get packing. I've got a lot to do and only 4 days left. Wish me luck.