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Harbin, China
I made it safe and sound. I'm in Beijing right now in an internet bar. It is so nice to not be on the plane anymore. Today we will have a brief orientation where they will explain some rules to us and little things like that. We'll send our checked bags to Harbin ahead of us and then I'll have some free time to explore Beijing. After dinner we all get on the train for Harbin.
Yesterday was a tad painful. It started out nice when I woke up to rain. I got up at 4:30 am because I had to be at the airport at 5:30. My sister-in-law gave me a cute journal as a going-away gift and then we drove to the airport. Both my flights were delayed and I had some unnecessary issues with by check-on bag. This airline worker woman told me that my check-on was too wide and took it from me to be put with the checked luggage after she lectured me for ten minutes on how irresponsible and clueless I was. She was scary. It was, for the record, small enough because I had a security guy okay it before I got to my terminal. I hope her day got better. I didn't have to pay for it so I was ruffled.
My flight from San Fran to Beijing wasn't too bad. I think in total I was on the plane for 13 hours. I sat next to a Chinaman who only spoke Mandarin, so of course I got to freshen up on my conversation skills during the flight. Our conversations made me realize how much vocabulary I couldn't recall, but on the bright side, he didn't have any trouble understanding what I said to him. I didn't sleep much. I'm mildly clausterphobic and I like to sleep on my side. It amazes me how I can easily fall asleep in class but give me an airplane seat for 13 hours and I can't snooze to save my life.
When we were landing it became obvious how polluted Beijing was. You knew it was a nice day because about 86 degrees but there was no way you would see clouds or blue sky. It's humid here too. On the busride to the hotel I got acquainted with the Chinese driving style. We pulled two u-turns on our way over and our driver probably has a permanent dent on the horn. At one point during a U-turn we were looking at three or four cars who could have simultaneously T-boned us. Everyone on the road has to honk every few minutes because there are so many pedestrians walking around on the main roads and bikers riding in the same lanes as cars. I noticed as we were driving around that many men walking about had their shirts pulled up because it was so hot.
There was about 17 of us who went out to dinner together last night. We split up 7 and 10 at the restaurant. My group of 7 was mostly from the east coast. There were several from Georgetown, one from New Jersey and I forgot the rest. We ate spicy eggplant, sweet and sour chicken, and duck. It is traditional in China to eat family-style at restaurants, which means we all share the dishes ordered. It was good. When we all split up the bill it ended up costing each of us $6. Of course, Chinese custom is for one person to cover the bill and it's called "Qing ke" or if we Americanize the pronounciation "Ching Ke"
My roommate at the hotel is from Ohio but she goes to school at Carleton College. She actually stayed here in the summer and taught English in Qingdao. She is really nice. She will also be my suite mate in Harbin. Each of us have a Chinese roommate and there are two rooms and a bathroom per suite.
I'm getting close to my time-limit now. I love you all very much and I hope you enjoyed my first blog entry. I'll try and update you guys as often as I can.
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