"The Amazing Race" From Beijing to Jinhua (May 12th)

I was awake at 2:30 in the morning (China time) and could not go back to sleep! Richard is picking me up at “half past seven” to go back to the airport. I swear it seems as though we are hundreds of miles away from there but I’m sure it’s really not as bad as I think. I’m awake at 2:30 in the morning! Welcome to a time zone 12 hours difference from yours. I did fall back asleep around 4:45 to about 5:30 though. Richard arrives in his black Toyota Camry at 7:50 and checks me out of the hotel. We didn’t drive straight to the airport, instead we went to a parking area right across the street from the “Birds Nest”, or stadium, home to the Beijing Summer Olympics of 2008! So my inner tourist came out and of course was excited to see something recognizable. I saw the Olympic rings and the torch area. There is a hotel to the left of the stadium that has a T.G.I.Friday restaurant. Am I in China?

From there we took a taxi to the airport. The Beijing airport seems ginormous – I would guess so since this place is amazingly huge! The interesting thing about this airport is that you don’t go directly to China Air to check in. You have to go to a specific counter for your flight. I exchange $200 for 1167 RMB. I really have no idea how much money I’m going to need but figured that would be good to get me started. We proceed to security where it is not much different from the States. You aren’t allowed liquids, you have to take out your laptops, but you do not have to take off your shoes nor body scanners. It was a pretty easy and quick process.

We finally board the flight around 10:45. I am pretty sure I’m the only blonde on the entire flight! This plane was what I’m used to 3 and 3 seats. It seemed newer with the drop down screens to show the emergency procedures. There are messages from flight attendants given in Chinese and then also in English – whew! We had to sit on the runway for quite some time – probably 15 or more minutes until we took off for our about two hour flight.

Our flight included lunch which surprised me – we don’t have that in the States anymore! Chicken and noodles or something and rice were the options for today. I went with the chicken and noodles which thankfully were just lo mein noodles. We also had a celery salad with some other stuff in there which I didn’t care for, a half a peach and pear, and a roll with something in it – I didn’t eat that either.

 Welcome to Hangzhou! I think the pilots parked the plane in the middle of nowhere – we didn’t pull up to a gate, instead we went down the stairs to a bus to take us to the terminal. We picked up the bags and thought we were going to have to wait awhile until it was time for the bus, or as Richard called it, the coach. Nope – it was leaving in 20 minutes. I had no idea how long of a ride this was going to be and dozed off quite a bit. We were on the coach for nearly two and a half hours before we were dropped off in the middle of an intersection in the middle of nowhere! Literally, the coach got to the end of the road into Jinhua and dropped us off. Richard is on his phone with who knows who and then suddenly here comes Gary, a teacher, to pick us up. The traffic is just like that of Beijing and I find out that you must be 18 to drive. The way these people drive, I wouldn’t think you should drive until you are 25!

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We pulled into an apartment complex and I have to register with the doorman, more like gateman to get the key. Apartment 2304 is mine. Poor Gary and Richard carried my luggage up three flights of stairs – yeah, I’m on the third floor (the second number in the apartment number determines the floor) and there are no elevators here. Erin comes over and welcomes me. It’s so nice to be able to talk to someone who knows English as their first language! Meanwhile, Richard and Gary are working on my Internet. Unfortunately, Gary has the information at his office so I’m still not connected to the world.

Next on the agenda is for Richard to go check into his hotel while Erin and I talk and go meet some other teachers (not from Kaplan) in the apartment complex. Tom is two doors down and he’s from Canada. Tom is an older gentleman, I’d say 55ish and has cerebral palsy. He and Erin invite me to their Sunday coffee dates. At the end of the floor past Tom’s apartment is Kareem from Memphis. He along with Chinese girlfriend, Jeannie stop to say hello.

Gary and Richard come to pick up Erin, Tom, and me for dinner. This is where it gets fun, folks. We went to the Broadway Hotel for a traditional Chinese meal. I really wish I would have had my camera for this but I didn’t. We meet Mr. Lou (Lo), someone at the college outside and go into the restaurant/hotel. We have a private room where I learn the most respected (and the one paying the bill) sits facing the door while the honorary person sits to their right, in this case, it was me. The first awkward moment is that there are chopsticks, the second is that Mr. Lou doesn’t speak English and he’s talking to me, the third is when the food starts coming in, the fourth is when our glasses are filled with Great Wall red wine. I could write a book on my first “traditional Chinese meal”!

They were gracious enough to give me a fork – whew – what a relief! There were probably five different things on the lazy suzan type table. You spin the table around and take what you want, everyone just sticks their chopsticks, or forks in my case, and grabs and growls. The food doesn’t seem to stop, they keep bringing and bringing and bringing. I’m still waiting for the orange chicken, the general tso, or the sweet and sour. Oh folks, this is not the China Buffet in Chambersburg! I think Mr. Lou wanted me to try everything but I just couldn’t do it! I definitely did step out of my comfort zone here … but I had to! Here’s some of the food we had, at least what I can remember: shrimp with heads, a black jell-o looking something, cabbage, some meat that was maybe pork (I don’t know but I ate it), chicken feet, tofu, a tofu and broccoli wrap type thing, fish with scales and all, Jinhua ham with a white tasteless something, steak, not our kind of steak, with a bone, a sweet dessert type roll that reminded me of a non-flaky baklava, “Indian pancakes” which were also sweet with poppy seeds in them, mushroom soup, noodles, and other food that I just can’t remember.

So, what did I eat? Good question. I had steak, yes – even though there were bones. I had to try a bite of the fish but Mr. Lou gave me the part with no bones. I’m not a fan! I had some Jinhua ham, two or three bites of mushroom soup, noodles, two baklava roll things, those are Erin’s favorite, an Indian pancake thing, and wine. We had LOTS of wine. The traditional Chinese custom is to “cheers” the entire dinner and your glass is to never be empty. I’ve also learned the gumbay means to chug it more or less. Mr. Lou was so gracious to cheers and gumbay me several times. I think at this point I’m about half intoxicated and TIRED. I’m very tired! Allison comes to dinner to meet me, she is the teaching assistant in my classroom. She has been teaching the students for the past two weeks since the other guy up and left. Yep, it wasn’t an emergency at home – he just up and left for whatever reason. Erin said he was threatening to leave since he got here. Back to dinner, suddenly, Mr. Lou, Richard, and Gary get up and say it’s time to go so we went outside to wait for Gary to arrive. He was out buying an outlet power strip thing and a kettle pot thing to boil my water. I suppose it is a welcome gift.

We get back to the apartment and I spend some time in Erin’s room talking and getting online to email home since it’s Mother’s Day and I’m 7000 miles away and my Internet doesn’t work yet.

I have a nice big king size bed but don’t let the size of it fool you. It is like sleeping on concrete! This thing is so incredibly hard! I think this may be how the Chinese have flat butts! I was sleeping by 10:30 only to wake up at 4:30 … this jet lag thing is for the birds!