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Published: August 25th 2010
That time has come and we are back in China. Our 7 weeks flew by that we spent with family and friends while in the USA.
I wanted to write about a few things that came to mind when I look back at our long day of travel from San Fran to Vancouver to Shanghai on Air Canada.
First, Air Canada was amazing in the fact that they had On Demand movies for our total of 14 hrs of flying today(2 hrs from San Fran to Vancouver and 11 hrs 45 mins onto Shanghai). Next, we both got our first stamp from Canada in our passports passing through the airport today. Then, how we were once again the minority on our plane to Shanghai.
Being in the minority is not a bad thing and I find it actually quite rewarding to put ourselves outside our typical comfort level. Living in China and traveling around has made both of us appreciate the simple things in life and how to live a simpler life. Except, this time we packed LOTS more belongings as we will experience a colder winter and I just wanted to have a bigger variety of clothes/shoes to choose from when I get dressed in China.
On the flight I slept off and on most of the way due to us staying up all by 2.5 hrs Monday night before our 7:30am departure from SFO Tuesday morning. I watched 2 movies on the plane, Hot Tub Time Machine and The Joneses. Hot Tub Time Machine I had heard good things about and it was quite funny. The Joneses on the otherhand I had never heard of but was an AMAZING movie about my point of living a simpler life. If you haven't seen you should rent it and check it out plus Demi Moore looks stunning in this film.
Back to my list of things I thought about today. On a HSBC advertisement in Vancouver airport it said "In China more people are learning English than 5 times the population of England." WOW, think about that and yes we get to be a part of this by teaching English in China. Next, I read that 49% of licensed drivers in China just received their permit in the last 5 years, another amazing factoid on why the driving here is chaotic. If you haven't heard, Beijing just had a 10 day traffic jam. Well, the traffic jam was blamed on coal trucks delivering coal to power stations to keep up the 2nd largest economy now in the world and to continues its growth.
When our plane landed in Shanghai I was reminded of the "little" things that bother me about the society in China. For all my friends that have lived here and experienced this you can appreciate or laugh about the next few things I will say.
As we were taxing to the gate 2 or 3 women stood up out of their seats to get their baggage out of the overhead bins. The flight attendants had to say over the speaker again to remain seated while the aircraft was moving and get up to go motion to them to sit down. This happens on EVERY single flight I have been on in China, not sure why. Next, as we lined up to exit the plane a man 3 rows in front of us was sitting by the window, pushed the man next to him to get into the aisle as it was packed full of people including a small child and woman, proceeded to walk towards to rear of the plane to get his carry on luggage out of an overhead bin. LOL I just thought to myself "China you never let me down with your crazy manners or lack there of" I also thought "Am I really ready for this pushing and shoving society as we are now back in China."
Well ready or not, we are here and are excited for our adventure of teaching college students this year.
We arrived at Shanghai PuDong airport at 2:15pm local time, got through immigration, picked up our checked luggage and met our recruiter, David, inside the arrival hall. I asked him to have a sign with our name as there are always HUNDREDS of people waiting to pick up passengers. We found him easily and got on a direct bus to Hangzhou by 3:30pm.
The bus ride was 3 hrs and Pete wondered why we didn't take the train but since the school was reimbursing us we figured they paid for the slowest/cheapest mode of transportation. The school is still on summer holiday until Thursday for all employees so their driver wasn't available. Once the 3 of us arrived in Hangzhou a woman from the Foreign Affairs office and her husband picked us up in their Jetta. The car fit all 5 of us and all our luggage.
They took us to a very nice hotel(paid for by our college) near the campus, we checked into the room and had dinner with them along with another assistant from the Foreign Affairs office that met us at the hotel restaurant. We arrived back in our room at 8:15pm when Pete crashed and I of course got on the internet. I soon found out our VPN(access to blocked websites) isn't working so Pete will have to call them in the morning. I can't NOT have Facebook and he needs ESPN as football will begin soon. We have breakfast at the hotel included with the room and will check out at 11am. Our school will meet us in the lobby and take us to our apartment on campus to do a walk through to make sure everything is as said in the contract.
I am crossing my fingers everything goes well tomorrow. The hotel room was a surprise to us tonight but kind of nice that we can just crash and relax.
I already have an example of Nowism at its best. A CTLC teacher from last year's program is teaching college in Guangzhou this year. She arrived in China last week, traveled to Beijing to get back into the Chinese way of life. When she returned from her travels her school advised her the students have military training and that she won't start teaching until Sept 20th. Pros and Cons to that situation. Nothing to us just yet, YET!
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sunketing
Sunketing
Nowism, continued
I just found out that I'll be teaching the upperclassmen after all (after being assigned to them first) so I start Monday. But this does mean I get my winter holiday earlier, so I'm happy about it. For VPN, try astrill. I'm using them and Martin and Stacy used them at the end of last year. I'm having great success.