The Slow Boat to China

Before the Wright brothers invented the airplane and until engineers enabled it to travel thousands of miles, the only two major routes to China were Marco Polo’s Silk Road, a long series of land and waterways through Eurasia, or a slightly shorter water route around the Cape of Good Hope and past India.  The European merchants, of course, preferred the all water route.  Although this was shorter than Marco Polo’s Silk Road, it was still one of the longest possible journeys a westerner could make.  Even though the advancement of airplanes has dramatically shortened the duration of a trip to China, flying coach for 16 hours is no picnic.

 

After being dropped off by my parents, I sat through an AFS orientation with my mind on the next six months of my life.  I then talked with some other AFS students, going to China, Japan, Indonesia and Australia, got a wonderful two hours of sleep and left for the airport at three in the morning.  We arrived at about four, went through all of the fun security measures typical of any modern airport and waited two more hours before we left for San Francisco.  Upon our arrival, we looked for as many ways as we could to waste time before the flight (which was about four hours away).  We ate at a Japanese restaurant and walked around the airport looking for some trivial way to pass the time.  After what seemed like forever, we boarded the flight (I had a window seat the entire way, including the flight from LAX to SFX).  The first few hours passed quickly enough, I watched Iron Man 2 on the TV as others dozed off into deep sleeps.

  

About eight hours into the flight it became unbearable.  With some of my new found friends from the AFS program, I headed to the back of the plane with my deck of cards in hand (a brilliant suggestion from my mother).  We played BS and Go Fish for the next few hours, talking about the little we knew about our host families and what we hoped to gain from the Far East experience.  (Just in case anybody is wondering, luck was on my side as I won every single game I participated in - quite a feat considering the fact that we played for hours!)

The next few hours were even worse.  We disbanded and headed to our respective seats, waiting for the longest day of our lives to finally end.  The plane landed eventually, but the day was not yet over, as our journey was just beginning.

AFS volunteers at Beijing airport met us.  The Airport was quite a sight! It was bustling with what seemed like millions of people.  It was only four o’clock in the afternoon in Beijing, and we were pumping adrenalin over-time to take in everything we could of this new and very different culture.  Little did I know at the time that I would be soon facing a 24-hour train ride to my final destination – more on that in the next post. I also hope to be posting pictures as well.

I have been challenged by the fact that the blog has been blocked (a strong reminder that this is not America!).  I am researching the possibility of a Chinese blog.  In the meantime, I will email my parents and they will cut and paste my posts and pictures into the Blog.  

Thanks for following!