Ask me what I've been doing the last few weeks and I have 4 answers for you.
1) Working. Lots of school work getting this new 6th grade up and running.
2) Tennis. That's my release from a tense day at work.
3) Sleeping. I LOVE to sleep.
4) Planning. I need to feel prepared in life so when it comes to
visiting another continent, well that just takes planning to an all new
level for me.
I'm starting this blog here in the US, with the expectation that I
personally will not be able to access it while traveling in China. So, I
PLAN to email my posts to my friend Molly, who will upload for me each
day. Thanks, Molly!
This whole idea of visiting China began years ago. I enjoy traveling and
taking on new adventures. I've always wanted to visit an Asian country
because I acknowledged how seemingly different their culture is. Then,
my friend Megan that I taught with 2 years ago, left the US to go to
Shanghai to teach. Since she's been in China, it brought back up all of
those ideas of mine to visit that area of the world. I never acted on it
because flights were just too expensive.
Just a few weeks ago, I filed my taxes and saw that I had a pretty
sizable refund coming to me and bored that night, I starting searching
on Orbitz. As I had expected, flights to China over my summer break were
pushing $2000....otherwise known as TOO much. For the heck of it, I
decided to put in the dates for my Spring Break. I couldn't believe my
eyes! The prices for that time of year (6 weeks away at the time) were
in the $1300s!! I excitedly got on Facebook to chat with Megan and she
confirmed that she hadn't seen them lower than that.
This initially random google search put wheels in motion for me pretty
quickly. I had so many things to do to begin the planning process. I
first had to confirm that Megan was going to be in town because she's
ALWAYS travelling to cool places when she's not teaching. I next had to
ask for permission to take a day off of work. Well, Megan was in
Vietnam while I was trying to connect. In the meantime, I started
searching for housing accommodations and read lots and lots and lots of
reviews and found a few places that seemed perfect for me. I finally got
in touch with Megan and her reply was that she wasn't sure when the
next break was and she wouldn't find out for 2 more weeks. I decided
that I couldn't wait two more weeks, because that would be cutting it
too close to get my VIsa.
After hearing back from my principal giving me permission to take the
day off, I decided that I was just going to hope for best and hope that
Megan was in town while I was there. If she wasn't, I would just have to
figure it out, much like I'm doing when I head up to Beijing without
her. I purchased my flight tickets.I booked my room in Rockwood Hostel
in Shanghai and Old Beijing Square in Beijing. My plans were to fly into
Shanghai, stay 3-4 days, take the high-speed train north to Beijing,
stay 3-4 days and then fly home.
Following the booking of the flight and rooms, I had to fill out a
lengthy Chinese Visa application and mail it in along with MY PASSPORT,
which terrified me, because I only had 5 weeks before my trip. It all
came back safely in a week and I felt much better. I also found out that
Megan was going to be in town for the few days that I was in Shaghai.
That left me with Beijing. What was I going to do ALL BY MYSELF in
Beijing?
Here enters, Snow, the Chinese teacher at my school. It turns out that
Snow is from Beijing!! I then had a few conversations with Snow and
about what to do and where to go. She typed up a long list of places I
should visit, food I should eat, and sites I should see. The most
comforting thing she did was to give me the names, phone numbers and
email addresses of some friends of hers that are in Beijing, that speak
English and that are willing to help me if I need anything. That was
huge!!
With all of the major ideas in place, that left me with the details and
hours, upon hours of surfing the web, and scanning a book or two. I
created many "Notes" pages on my computer, that transfer to my phone and
iPad, with details such as addresses of my hotels in English and
Chinese, potential itineraries, helpful phrases, budgets and so on. I've
been adding to them daily it seems. Because I had my places to visit in
a list, I couldn't visualize where everything was. So I went to google
maps and just started entering in addresses of all of my places to see
where they were in relation to everything else. I then discovered a
feature on google maps that lets you "Make a Map." On this feature, you
can add pins, which isn't new, add details that you'd like to include,
add all of the places you want and save the map. The coolest feature is
that you can draw a line connecting point to point. In my case, I had
three line-paths drawn in Shanghai, signifying each of the days I was
going to be there. The same is true for Beijing. The interesting thing
to me is whether I will be able to actually use the maps while in
China....we'll see.
While I was planning my trip, I noticed on Facebook that a tennis friend
of mine was getting ready to go to China. When she returned a few days
ago, we met for dinner and she shared with me some of her experiences
during her trip. She also lent me some books of hers and some Chinese
currency, which is nice, because my bank didn't have any Yuan and I was a
little nervous about trying to find it when I arrived. So, now I'm all
set with money for a little bit.
It seems with 10 days to go, I'm ready. Am I nervous? Of course!! I
don't know their language, I don't know what to expect, I don't know if
my plans to Skype and Email will work. I have tons of uncertainty that
will have to be just that, until I throw myself out there with the
millions.
Here are the two maps I've made for my proposed travels:
Shanghai My Way
Beijing Discovered
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| Necessities for the trip...yes, that's a roll of TP that I will be taking...BYOTP!! |
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