Today is a Chinese National Labor Day. The crowds of people at these national landmarks were unbelievable. We got to this location buy the Beijing subway. Right off the subway we came up at the performing arts center, which is an amazing building which has laser light shows reflected off the side of it and it appears to floating on a reflecting pond.
While around the performance center it seems that a local felt bad about the way I tease and torment Mengchen that he decides to flog me with a paper brochure!
Continue reading "Performance Center, Tian'anmen Square, and the..." »
Well we left the airport and took a cab ride that rivals any amusement park roller coaster in the United States. It was full of U-Turns and dead end streets. It is quite funny here how the cars and people interact on the streets, the cars drive into hoards of people and the people don't even bat an eye at the cars ready to run them down. I am very thankful that Mengchen was here to help direct the cabbie. We finally get to the hotel where I got checked into the room and left my things while we start out on our days set of events. Mengchen told me that she would tell me when I can take her picture, I must have missed the translation as you will later see.
Continue reading "First Beijing Cab ride." »
Well I made it! And it was no small feet. For those who do not know, I brought a water filter pitcher with me and an extra filter. In Phoenix, then made me unpack my entire suitcase to find these filters. It seems the dense mass made them think the filters where explosive and they sent me to the explosive station for testing of the filters. At least they were not because I had not opened them yet. The flight to LosAngles was fine without a problem. When I got to LA, despite my reluctance I had to exit security to go to the internation terminal. Now this is where my adventure gets interesting. I got on the bus and went to the terminal that said China Air, I stood in line for a little while and when I final got to the counter. I found out that where I needed to be was Air China, not China Air. That was a close call, lucky for me I was able to get to the other terminal in no time at all and make my flight. My flight to China left LA on time and I was able to sleep the majority of the 12, almost 13 hour flight. When I arrived it seemed that it took forever to make my way through the customs. Once I got through it was no time and I was out of the baggage area. Mengchen was right there as I walked out of the baggage area. She was easy to spot as soon as I walked out the she started to smile and giggle. From that point forward the bet was on that we had made weeks before in who would fall asleep first. She thought that I would be jet legged since I was coming out of a long flight. Even my own mother thought that she would win! Although, she was giving me odds that even if I was dead tired I would continue on. Time will only tell on this one. Now our day begins.