03 October 2007
China, Part I
As Roland said, "Only Henry can go to China." So as a public service I will attempt to relate part of the history of our trip to China.
As the story starts I catch a flight out of GR for Detroit. Somehow they have a bunch of planes in GR that could not get into Detroit earlier due to weather. So they have me board an earlier flight to help me out. The funny part is that we don't board thru a jetway but thru the rear door of the plane.
Then while I am sitting in Detroit I look on my boarding pass for my flight from D-town to Tokyo. At the bottom it says "Visa Required." Now I kinda freaked out because, while I do have a Visa for China, I never even thought about needed a Visa for Japan. Would I get to Tokyo and then be denied access to my flight to China because I cannot walk thru the airport? Maybe foolishly I decided to go ahead and board the plane and take my chances.
The flight was a mere 13 hours, and our great circle path took us over Hudson Bay and northern Alaska before coming down the coast of Russia and then over Japan. Thankfully, on my arrival in Japan I was granted access to their airport and allowed to get onto my flight to China. Surprisingly, that flight is over 3 hours (not allowed to fly over North Korea).
My first impression on China is that labor is so cheap that they have people doing all kinds of jobs that would never happen in a developed country. They had four guys organizing the bags at the baggage carousel. I couldn't believe how easy it was to pass thru customs... much easier than the US.
In the Lonely Planet they say that the best thing to do to avoid jet lag is to get plenty of water (not alcohol) and to get to bed at the appropriate local time. So naturally, the four of us (Paul, Karl, Lynn and I) went directly out to the bars, had many beers, and didn't get to bed until 2am.
By the way, Tsingtao is pronounced ching-dow.
Stay posted for Part II. ¶ 18:44
As the story starts I catch a flight out of GR for Detroit. Somehow they have a bunch of planes in GR that could not get into Detroit earlier due to weather. So they have me board an earlier flight to help me out. The funny part is that we don't board thru a jetway but thru the rear door of the plane.
Then while I am sitting in Detroit I look on my boarding pass for my flight from D-town to Tokyo. At the bottom it says "Visa Required." Now I kinda freaked out because, while I do have a Visa for China, I never even thought about needed a Visa for Japan. Would I get to Tokyo and then be denied access to my flight to China because I cannot walk thru the airport? Maybe foolishly I decided to go ahead and board the plane and take my chances.
The flight was a mere 13 hours, and our great circle path took us over Hudson Bay and northern Alaska before coming down the coast of Russia and then over Japan. Thankfully, on my arrival in Japan I was granted access to their airport and allowed to get onto my flight to China. Surprisingly, that flight is over 3 hours (not allowed to fly over North Korea).
My first impression on China is that labor is so cheap that they have people doing all kinds of jobs that would never happen in a developed country. They had four guys organizing the bags at the baggage carousel. I couldn't believe how easy it was to pass thru customs... much easier than the US.
In the Lonely Planet they say that the best thing to do to avoid jet lag is to get plenty of water (not alcohol) and to get to bed at the appropriate local time. So naturally, the four of us (Paul, Karl, Lynn and I) went directly out to the bars, had many beers, and didn't get to bed until 2am.
By the way, Tsingtao is pronounced ching-dow.
Stay posted for Part II. ¶ 18:44
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