We’re in Chicago O’Hare, waiting to board our tons-o-fun thirteen hour flight straight to Shanghai, and I still can’t believe that I’m about to spend four weeks halfway around the globe. I’ve been spending the last several hours getting better acquainted with my classmates on the trip. Some I know pretty well, some I’ve talked to once or twice, and there are even a couple that I’ve never actually seen before. Who knew UCA’s Chinese program was so varied? I managed to make an idiot of myself approximately two minutes into boarding our plane from Little Rock to Chicago by asking the guy in the seat next to me his name and if his final destination was Chicago. Turns out his name is Justin, and he’s actually with our group, and everyone else had that tidbit of information but me. Go Julie.
Monday May 11, 2009
Day two of our Shanghai journey is off to a pretty interesting start. We landed at Shanghai Pudong International Airport at around 1:30 this afternoon, but it feels like early morning and the end of the day all at once. I’m completely exhausted but I still feel like I couldn’t possibly sleep. I’ve never traveled over more than one time zone, so I guess this is what jetlag feels like.
As we were descending into Shanghai the flight attendants informed us that because of the swine flu scare, Chinese health officials would be coming aboard to inspect us before we could get off the plane. I expected it to be a little weird, because I didn’t know exactly how detailed this inspection was going to get. Turns out that it wasn’t incredibly intensive, but the whole experience was a little surreal. Take a look at this:
I never thought I would have my temperature taken with a laser by a guy in a full-on clean suit and goggles, but hey, here’s to new experiences. I wasn’t the only one who reacted with a bit of shock and a good deal of amusement, though. A ton of people (me included, of course; I’m shameless) on the plane were unabashedly taking pictures of the inspection process, so I don’t know who was more freaked out, the inspectors or the inspected.
We made it through the airport checking in and whatnot pretty quickly, which kind of surprised me. Everything ran really smoothly, and it was strangely quiet. Even though there were a lot of people around, the airport seemed empty. That too was a little surreal, because if you’ve ever been in an American airport I doubt you’ve experienced it being quiet and running smoothly. We had an hour-long bus ride to our school—East China Normal University—but it didn’t feel like it took that long. Our entire group was pretty excited to be there, so we talked nonstop the whole way into the city.
There are eleven students in our group and I think one of the advantages of taking an entire day to get from the United States to China was the opportunity to get to know everybody. Before we started our trip the only people I knew fairly well were my roommate Melissa, who has also been my conversation partner for two semesters, and the two other girls besides us, Emi and Autumn, who are in my Honors College class. Judging from the past few days I think our crowd is going to be pretty amazing to share this experience with. We all get along really well and everyone is really outgoing and adventurous. I think we’re going to have a lot of fun with one another. Before we left, Adam (one of the professors leading the trip) told us that by the end of the trip we would be pretty tight, and so far I believe him.
I think that pretty much wraps up the journey from the Arkansas to Shanghai, but there’s definitely more to come. Stay tuned!
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