Longest Day Ever!

I finally made it to China!! I lost an entire day in the process but that's what happens when you fly half way around the world! My flight itinerary said I was to leave Salt Lake on Tuesday morning at 8:59 and have a 2 hour flight to San Francisco. Then there would be a 3 hour layover and at 12:45 we would board the plane to Hong Kong landing at 6:40 pm Wednesday! (Time travel is possible people!!!) Then, we'd have a 30 min ferry ride to get into China, then a bus ride (we weren't told how long) to get to our apartments. That all sounds pretty simple and easy right?! Well when you're traveling with a huge group of foreigners that have no idea what they are doing it ends up taking quite a bit longer! 

So here's how my past 29 hour travel day went: 

They want us at the airport at 6:30am. So I woke up at 5am and Todd drove me to the airport around 5:45am

I got through customs and security and went to wait for my flight. 

8:45am - Our flight was delayed to we had to wait another hour before we could leave. Boarded and left around 9:45.

Get to San Francisco around 11:00am and think we have to get to our connecting flight by 12:45

We wait for our flight to board and are told that our airplane is out of service, so they have to redirect us to another airplane. We don't leave San Francisco until 2:00pm.

(Insert 13 hours on a plane here) --->
I watched three movies and maybe slept for an hour that whole flight!

We land in Hong Kong around 7:15pm Wednesday evening. (See, time travel!)

Then it takes us forever to get off the plane and figure out where we have to go to get on the ferry that will take us to China. Once we figure that out we have to wait another hour or so. The ferry doesn't leave until 10pm. At this point I was able to meet up with my friend Marilee! :) That was happy! A familiar face!

We finally make it into China around 10:30pm, but it takes us a good half hour just to get all of our luggage. We had to drag all of our luggage from the ferry to a bus. And when I say all the luggage I mean each person had AT LEAST 3 bags! It was rough! Not to mention that it was sweltering hot! Seriously, just sweat dripping down my face, back, everything. Mind you it's late at night and it's that hot. Imagine how it will be during the day! AH!

From there we had a 2 hour bus ride to get to Kaiyin. That's the city and school I will be teaching at and where we are living. By this time it is 2am! 2am people!!!!! And I think in all of that time I maybe slept for 2 or 3 hours total. I don't do well sleeping on planes or any sort of automobile. 

So, my math may be a little off and it may seem like some time was lost somewhere in that hullabaloo, I just attribute it to the luggage shifting and group traveling.

 But there ya have it. My first experience in China. I made it alive and safe and I'm excited for the adventure to continue.