Ni hao Shanghai!

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Disclaimer 1: I cannot promise that within these posts you will find proper grammer, spelling, or puncuation. If you cannot handle it, I will tell you all about my trip when I get home! 😊


Day 1 June 22nd/ June 23rd, 2011. Things started out a little rocky when I started my journey. Mom and I went to the airport and 4am only to be told my flight had been canceled due to bad weather in Chicago (which I was o so happy about). After explaining to United why I could not wait until Friday to fly out, I was told to come back later and catch a flight on Delta to Detroit and then to Shanghai. So Mom and I headed home (well first to Denny's) to get a few more hours of sleep.
Around 11am I said goodbye to my Momma (as she took many pictures of me) and got on my first flight to Detroit. Now the last time I was in Detroit I had a meltdown because my plane was late so I missed my connecting flight home for Easter. Needless to say I was a little weary about having a connection through Detroit again. It all worked out well though and my previous experience in Detroit served me well. I found my flight to Shanghai in no time and has lots of time to wait with the hundreds of Asians on my plane with me.
After waiting a couple hours, I boarded the BIGGEST plane I have ever seen in my life. THERE WERE TWO FLOORS! All of the passangers were on the bottom floor, as far as I observed. I wanted to take a picture but in the rush to get on and off the plane there was no time for loidering.
I smiled my way through customs 😊 and got my little stamp that said I was ok to get into the country. I was thinking this was all going along so quickly and then we get to baggage claim. Well of course that took forever(My flight got in at 6:30ish but I didn't get out of the airport till 8:30ish. I was standing there just watching the same bag with the rainbow belt around it go by for the fifth time and even though I see hundreds of other people still waiting to get their bags I start to panic. "What if they lost my bag?!?!?!" Eventually I got it and put all of my four bags on my cart(I overpacked...big shocker) and made my way outside where all of these cute little asian girls in uniforms were asking "You need taxi?" and "Taxi?". I just smiled and said no and kept walking till I saw someone with a Disney English shirt on holding a sign with my name on it.
In all of my information and talks with my disney recruter I was told that I would be met at the airport and then driven to my hotel. This however, was not the case There was one guy waiting all day a for every summer trainer that was arriving. Because of the timing of my new flight he could not take me to my hotel so he told the driver where to go and then told me goodbye while I am sure I stared at him open mouthed because he was leaving me alone.
The taxi cabs was very interesting to me. The driver has a large plastic shield around him that extends to the front passanger seat (where I learned later I should have sat). It was a beautiful night so I put down my window so I could take pictures on my first night in Shanghai. It was then quickly put back up by my cab driver(I did not try to put it back down). My driver got lost but I eventually was taken to my hotel where I paid 195.00y(thank god I had exchanged money in the airport). But because disney is amazing I will be rebursed. I walked into my hotel, got my welcome packet, found my room, and passed out. And this concluded my last day in Ohio/ first day in China.

Disclaimer 2: I can't promise that I will give this much detail as the posts go on. I will keep trying to tell you what I do every day! Thanks for reading and I will try to post what I have done on day two and three soon!

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