Day 1
Let me say that I did not travel with the other 2 teachers that I am here with. My visa was not ready so I had to go it alone. The day started well enough. My wife, 2 daughters and my mom, who was out visiting my oldest daughter for her birthday, saw me off at the airport. One of the toughest things I have done. I have never left my family for more than 5 days ever. Everything was smooth sailing until I walked up to the gate to fly to San Francisco. The gate keeper made announcement saying we were delayed for fog or some sort of air traffic control issue. He also said that if you had an international connection to go to customer service down a few gates. So I took off and headed there. I was good and there were only 4 people ahead of me. It turns out that was the biggest patience test ever. When I was 2nd in line, it took almost an hour to chat with a customer service person. In the airline industry if you pay big bucks you get your own line and can skip ahead of the economy people. The poor woman in front of me was having a tougher time with it than me. So with the delay I was going to miss my flight to Beijing so they put me on an Air China flight that would put me in a couple of hours after the first one. I did have a whole row to myself picked out on my original flight to Beijing. No big deal, the flight to San Francisco was uneventful, the middle seat was empty so I could lean and not get crushed by the carts.
So I arrive in San Francisco and I am looking at the departure board and I do not see any flights to Beijing. So I go to customer service and ask them about my Beijing flight, which my ticket had very little about. They tell me it's on time and will be down in the international terminal. I arrived in San Fran about 11:30 and the Air China flight was 2:50. So I go down to the gate listed and I do not see a plane at that gate matching an Air China description. I download their app. It turns out that flight was late and was going off at 6:50pm. So it turns out I had around 5-6 hours to kill. Having been in San Fran before for NSTA, I knew it was easy to get downtown from the airport so I decided to go to Union Square and ride the cable ca over to Fisherman's wharf and grab some In N Out. Well, the line for the cable car was long so I jumped back on the BART to go to Embacadero and walk down to the Wharf from there. It's a longer walk than I remember but it was nice and I had a long flight so exercise was not the worse idea ever. In N Out was hopping and the double double with fries and shake hit the spot. Back up to the BART and Back to the airport to board a plane.
I then get on a very full flight to Beijing, aisle seat so getting crushed by the carts is an issue. I learned that using devices on the flight is prohibited so I cannot read on my iPad, listen to music on my phone, or play games on my phone. I did have seat back entertainment with some choice headphones. I watched the new CHIPs the new King Kong, the Disney China movie and a couple of more. I managed to sleep in some small chunks. The flight was tough on me. The time changes mess with your head a bit. They feed you, then turn the lights off until about 4 hours to go then feed you again and land. So I got into to Beijing around 10 pm local time. I made it through immigration and customs. To my surprise my bag and my ride Zoe found me. Zoe is a saint and took me from the airport to a hotel about 40 minutes to the west of the airport, as far as I can tell. The taxi driver was fun. I am not sure if passing on the shoulder is legal in China but he did it 13 times. He was in and out in traffic but I never feared my life until a dump truck was doing 2 km/hr on an exit ramp. I then WeChatted Kara and the girls and saw the new llama. Cute as heck. I showered and slept on the couch. The beds here feel like a thin layer of cushion over some plywood. The adventure begins tomorrow when we head up to camp.
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