On my last full day in Beijing, I got an Erhu (two-stringed Chinese violin) for an early birthday present. While the tuning, sitting posture, bridge and bow are similar to a cello, the front of erhus are covered with python skin, which is kinda gross and kinda cool at the same time. Cellos would be much more bad-ass if the front was snake skin. I'm just saying. Anyway, there is an entire district in Beijing where the music stores live, just like there are bar districts and mall districts. The shop owner was VERY excited that I played cello and gave me a lesson on my new instrument. He spoke much better English that I spoke Chinese and he is an incredible, though very humble, player.
The next morning, I headed for the airport bright and early to start my long voyage home. The line at the check-in counter was pretty epic long. After two hours of waiting, I realized the flight was delayed. After three hours, it was finally my turn at the counter. I checked in and had an eight hour wait until my new flight time. This called for lunch, naps, and sudoku to fill my time.
A mere nine hours later, I was on a plane! The boarding process was an incredible event to watch. I've learned the cultural differences regarding organization: while in the U.S. it is considered incredibly rude to cut in line, the Chinese do it all the time. So. Instead of boarding the plane by rows or by section, the Chinese gate crew sounded an air horn. A loud cheer went up and everyone surged forward. It was awesome! On the way down the ramp, all bags were hand-checked (again) and everyone had a complete pat-down (again). We all sat down surprisingly fast, given the chaotic order folks entered the plane, and the the shortest night ever began. While my flight to Beijing had an eight-hour sunset, my flight back had darkness for about three and half hours.
During the flight, the American-only flight crew just about went mad. The same cultural norms that don't worry about standing in line showed up when it came to waiting for bathrooms, wanting to watch the brilliantly bright sunrise in the completely darkened cabin, and standing right in front of the movie screen when you get tired of sitting. The one translator was kept busy all night between complaining Americans and curious Chinese.
My flight out to Beijing had been about 90% Americans due to an enormous tour group taking up most the seats. However, my flight back was probably 40% American, which was much more amusing for me to watch. Once upon a time, I was in Greece and our tour guide there said Americans are the second-most whiny/complainy tourists, and this flight back from Beijing really demonstrated that. (French are the most whiny, according to the Greek guide. She also said that Americans usually calmed right down if they were promised air conditioning and shopping opportunities.)
My second favorite part of this airport adventure (after the airhorn boarding call) was a conversation I overhead in the waiting area. An American husband and wife were recording their experiences in China as YouTube movies; which I'm pretty sure were incredibly boring, based on the episode they recorded right behind me. They were bitching about the nine hour delay (of course) and their airport adventures trying to use their meal vouchers.
While I ended up having some awesome, noodly Chinese dish with my meal voucher, no problem, they had decided they wanted hamburgers and chocolate milkshakes. After they each took time to tell YouTube ALL the ingredients they ordered on their hamburgers (they seriously started off their list with, "two buns, meat..." They discovered, to their great surprise, that a Chinese chocolate milkshake and hamburger taste VERY much worse than the American versions. And this lead to great anger and indignation on their part. People are very silly it turns out. And thankfully, YouTube is now able to well-document that silliness.
Anyway, by the time the flight arrived in Seattle, all the connecting flights had already left for the day. The airline had re-booked everyone and we all had rooms at various hotels throughout the city. My body's unique way of coping with jet lag has been to sleep for three hours and then be awake for 10 hours. I have cycled through various times of day and was very grateful for the 24-hour Denny's next to the hotel that accepted meal vouchers.
I'll be very glad to be home again. Big, big adventures require some recharging time. I will hopefully return to a more regular life schedule quickly, since the world is eerily quiet at 3:30 in the morning. And on that note, I've been awake for six hours and want to use my final meal voucher on a delicious Seattle latte...
An Erinku:
despite
what restaurants think
melons aren't a
"tasty side of fruit"
No comments:
Post a Comment