Day 1, Sept 25: Arriving in China

My first visit abroad was not disappointing! I've always loved traveling and am so lucky that with my dad such a traveler and then moving around after college I've been to many places in the U.S. In fact, I only have one state left to visit: Rhode Island, though I've barely been to Massachusetts, so I'd love to visit both some day.

The trip out to Quzhou (for non-Chinese speakers, I think I'm getting the pronunciation down and I think the closest pronunciation tip I can give you is something like chew-Joe) was long. 1.5 hr flight to Chicago, 2hr lay over, 14+hr flight to Shanghai, 5 hr bus ride to Quzhou. The flight was pretty amazing in that we were able to move around the airplane a lot and we even found a window back by the rear exit that we could open the shade of periodically to look out. I was able to see out as we flew over the very far northern coast of Alaska. Even though it was hard to tell what was ice and what was water, you could see distinct barren land, with the exception of one very small air field. Later, we looked out over Siberia and were able to get a phenomenal view of the Verkhoyansk Range.

From China

The bus ride to Quzhou was also out of this world. It was a police van and the driver pretty much had his horn going the entire ride trying to clear the road for us. Not only did he use his horn/siren and ride right up to the back of cars and the lanes were very fluid, but the other cars never seemed to mind that he was trying to get them to move.

When we arrived we were given 15 minutes to get into our rooms and then meet on the second floor for dinner. I jumped in the shower to rinse off some of the travel grime and wake-up before dinner. Several folks with connections to Red Wing, Quzhou, or the Foreign Affairs office joined us for dinner. Looking back, I think I was very nervous. I don't think I said too much other than asking what the dish in front of me is or saying something stupid--luckily My Anchor was sitting next to me and elbowed me a few times to remind me to bite my tongue! Foot in mouth is an awful disease.

From China

Finally we were done with day one and off to sleep. I fell asleep quickly but it seemed like a short night.