Right now, I'm in the lobby of the Holiday Inn Golden Mile in Hong Kong using their computers to check email and block. The past two days have been a blur. It's Wednesday here, about 11 am. We are 13 hours ahead of Eau Claire, WI.
On Monday morning, Joni and I arrived at the same time early early at the Chippewa Valley Regional Airport and ran into Dr. Tim Vaughan and his son Michael . Dr. Vaughan will be teaching here this summer,.
We arrived in Chicago O'Hare about 6:45 am with the Chicago skyline, my kind of town and former city. Then the wait began for our 1:30 pm flight, and the time passed quickly.
Sitting in C18 while waiting for a flight to Shanghai leave, and being surrounded by Chinese speakers all around, I truly felt like a minority. It reminded me of one of my first visits to Chicago with a friend from college to the south side of Chicago Black Muslim Louis Farrahkahn Family Day. One stylish black woman walked up to me, and asked me, the only white woman for miles, what I was doing at Family Day. I replied "to learn," and my friend Carlos Mohammed Green interjected: "she's cool, she's cool, she's a journalist."
By midday, we move to C16 as our flight has been delayed due to maintenance problems, and we're unsure exactly when we're going to leave. But having been a road warrior in the corporate business world for years, I'm unphased. You learn to control what you can, and what you can't, you go with the flow. But in addition to maintenance problems now, there are weight problems, and United Airlines is offering $500 plus hotel stay plus guarantee on the next day's flight to Hong Kong. A group of students of 8 steps up to the plate. Still not enough. Closer to the boarding time, United has upped the ante to $600.
Finally, we start boarding at about 3 pm. And once we are on the tarmac, we are delayed once again for Air Force One. President Obama is in town for the NATO, G-8 Conference, although I recall hearing on the news that most of the conference occured at Camp David. So everything at O'Hare is shut down to clear the airspace for the President of the United States. Makes sense to me.
The wheels come up and we take flight at 5 pm. And I settle back and meet my seat mates Mr. and Mrs. Poon, a retired school teacher and IT professional from Hong Kong. Their children were educated in the United States, and have remained there. One is a physician in Boston, the other an IT professional in San Francisco's Silicon Valley. They have just completed their annual visit.
The flight is 15 hours, and remarkably the time flew by. Our flight pattener is northerly westerly through Canada and around Alaska, and then back down again through Russian, northern China, we even fly over Zhuhai where we are going to be most of the time. Every time I raise the window, it's sunny outside until we approach Hong Kong. Then dusk has fallen.
The hotel accommodations are luxurious even by western standards. And the breakfast buffet this morning, I can only describe as East meets West for the tastebuds. What didn't they have? I heard one of my classmates took photos; so perhaps they will post. Just about every nationality was covered: Chinese, Indian, English, American, French. I'm a huge breakfast eater, so I had a three course breakfast.
In 15 minutes, it's 11:15 am here right now, we'll be boarding the ferry for Jinan University at Zhuhai. And meeting our student buddies, who will be with us everywhere and help translate. This is the first time I've gone to another country where I don't have better grasp of the language. I'm so grateful for our buddies.
Who knows if we'll be able to access Google and Blogger on mainland China? If so, you'll hear from me again. If not, then later. Ba Ba La
On Monday morning, Joni and I arrived at the same time early early at the Chippewa Valley Regional Airport and ran into Dr. Tim Vaughan and his son Michael . Dr. Vaughan will be teaching here this summer,.
We arrived in Chicago O'Hare about 6:45 am with the Chicago skyline, my kind of town and former city. Then the wait began for our 1:30 pm flight, and the time passed quickly.
Sitting in C18 while waiting for a flight to Shanghai leave, and being surrounded by Chinese speakers all around, I truly felt like a minority. It reminded me of one of my first visits to Chicago with a friend from college to the south side of Chicago Black Muslim Louis Farrahkahn Family Day. One stylish black woman walked up to me, and asked me, the only white woman for miles, what I was doing at Family Day. I replied "to learn," and my friend Carlos Mohammed Green interjected: "she's cool, she's cool, she's a journalist."
By midday, we move to C16 as our flight has been delayed due to maintenance problems, and we're unsure exactly when we're going to leave. But having been a road warrior in the corporate business world for years, I'm unphased. You learn to control what you can, and what you can't, you go with the flow. But in addition to maintenance problems now, there are weight problems, and United Airlines is offering $500 plus hotel stay plus guarantee on the next day's flight to Hong Kong. A group of students of 8 steps up to the plate. Still not enough. Closer to the boarding time, United has upped the ante to $600.
Finally, we start boarding at about 3 pm. And once we are on the tarmac, we are delayed once again for Air Force One. President Obama is in town for the NATO, G-8 Conference, although I recall hearing on the news that most of the conference occured at Camp David. So everything at O'Hare is shut down to clear the airspace for the President of the United States. Makes sense to me.
The wheels come up and we take flight at 5 pm. And I settle back and meet my seat mates Mr. and Mrs. Poon, a retired school teacher and IT professional from Hong Kong. Their children were educated in the United States, and have remained there. One is a physician in Boston, the other an IT professional in San Francisco's Silicon Valley. They have just completed their annual visit.
The flight is 15 hours, and remarkably the time flew by. Our flight pattener is northerly westerly through Canada and around Alaska, and then back down again through Russian, northern China, we even fly over Zhuhai where we are going to be most of the time. Every time I raise the window, it's sunny outside until we approach Hong Kong. Then dusk has fallen.
The hotel accommodations are luxurious even by western standards. And the breakfast buffet this morning, I can only describe as East meets West for the tastebuds. What didn't they have? I heard one of my classmates took photos; so perhaps they will post. Just about every nationality was covered: Chinese, Indian, English, American, French. I'm a huge breakfast eater, so I had a three course breakfast.
In 15 minutes, it's 11:15 am here right now, we'll be boarding the ferry for Jinan University at Zhuhai. And meeting our student buddies, who will be with us everywhere and help translate. This is the first time I've gone to another country where I don't have better grasp of the language. I'm so grateful for our buddies.
Who knows if we'll be able to access Google and Blogger on mainland China? If so, you'll hear from me again. If not, then later. Ba Ba La
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