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Published: February 9th 2006
On Tuesday we were going to leave for a three night trip to Xi'an. Getting there, however, proved to be more of an adventure than we expected.
The plan was to meet at 8:30 AM in the Beijing International Hotel lobby. The plan was to catch the shuttle bus from the hotel to the airport at 9:00. Get to the airport in 40 minutes and have pleanty of time before the flight at 10:50. However, after 8:30, nothing went to plan.
Hans gets me to the Hotel by 8:30, everyone else makes it before 8:35. The group goes through a checklist; unfortunatly, we find out that a couple people (Jill, Elliot and I) forgot his/her passport. We scramble for phones and numbers to try and contact our host parents so that they might be able to drop off the passport either at the hotel in the next half hour, or at the airport where our flight is. Hans cannot reach his father (my host father) and is forced to go back home, pick up my passport, and take a taxi to the airport where he would wait for me. He gets the number for Ting Ting's cell phone in case he has to contact us. He leaves. Meanwhile, the rest of the gang is getting shuttle bus tickets.
Sometime durring all this, Ting Ting (a fluent speaker of Chinese) is speaking with Jill's host mom to see if she can't meet Jill at the airport with the ticket. Jill's mom asks Ting Ting a terrifying question: "Which Airport?" The entire group didn't know there was more than one airport; now, we are not sure if the shuttle bus is going to the right airport. We send Steph (another fluent speaker) to ask the front gate if they could tell us which airport these tickets are for. They tell us that the tickets are not for the Beijing International Airport (I don't know the name of the other Airport) but, rather, this other one we have never heard of. This creates two problems:
1. The shuttle bus isn't going to that airport, and we must find another way to get there.
2. Hans doesn't know which airport to go to.
We split up into three groups and hop into cabs. We tell the cab driver to go to the "Airport." He asks "which one." We say "NOT the Beijing International Airport." We leave the hotel at around 9:10 (The first problem is solved).
The second problem proved more difficult. In the cab, Ting Ting calls my host mom and finds out the cell phone number Hans is carrying with him. It takes us about 20 minutes before we finally get in contact with Han's dad due to miss-dials (the phone numbers here are 10 digits) or lack of adaquate service. We try to tell him the name of the airport but cannot. The cab driver understands what we are trying to say and asks for the Cell phone. We give him the cell phone and he informs my dad where to go.
Because of the axiety (I still don't have my passport), it was the longest Cab ride I have ever experienced. Ting Ting calls him again to ask at which gate he is. We get there and I see him, I run over to him and give him a big hug. I got my passport.
We still haven't checked in...and it was past 10:00.
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Eric M
non-member comment
What a nightmare man. Haha, you have a nice mastery of suspense, however, leaving off the blog entry without telling us the ending. It's like a miniature 24. Hope everything worked out OK