Wednesday, April 30, 2008

"Are we stuck in the sky?"










































This is a reasonable question for a five-year-old to ask after the umpteenth hour of flying in a 747. So I said, "seems like it," just as Shanghai loomed into view out the window.

These pics are from earlier in that day, sometime before we got stuck up there. In Asia people make the peace sign a lot when they have their photo taken. We weren't in Asia yet, but we are peace loving. We're going to teach Zhi about that... Jing Jing too.

But now we are here. That's "there" to you. Feels less faraway than ever before, though. Shanghai is becoming closer to the rest of the world than it once was. That's good for China, I reckon. Sort of sad for the adventurer in all of us. Time to think about going to Rangoon if you want to get your adventure on. I wonder if there's a Starbucks in Rangoon... there's a bunch here that's for sure. And every other kind of coffee, too. But I don't know if I could stand too much more adventure. Not with an occasionally toxic five year old in tow. Very occasionally, btw. Jing Jing has mostly been a travel champ. But who loves jet lag? Especially when your whole time space frame work is pretty undeveloped... it's like a cruel joke. Speaking of cruel jokes it's always a good idea to include some crazy mixed up translations in any travel writing about China. I don't want to be accused of not being de rigeur so put that in your "bottom sink type spuare" which is actually very nice if you've not been there.

Alright. Let us catch up on our sleep and then we'll tell you more. Until then we are... zzzzzz

Saturday, April 26, 2008

Two Days Out

Enough people have asked me, "Are you going to blog about your China trip?" that I decided to see exactly how easy it would be to do... and damn if it ain't like falling off a log. So thems as encouraged me in this way, thank you.

We're counting down now. It feels like we're leaving at any moment. But really we're not gone until Monday. Wait a minute, that's practically tomorrow by now. We ARE leaving at any moment. We got a message from our agency months ago it seems that read, "Time to pack your bags!" and of course we ignored it. And now here we are, looking at a pretty unmanageable pile and a too big bag and wondering how we're going to get it all in and once we do, how we're going to lug the thing on and off planes, trains and buses in China. Hmmm.

Anyway, this is our blog. Time to get more serious about the pack.