Ni Hao China!

So I bought a personal VPN service to bypass the Chinese internet restrictions, and it does not seem to be working right now.  I have a request for help in with the company (crazy hard to submit because the entire company website was blocked here, but luckily I found an email, and they gave me a website address that wasn't blocked yet).  They'll hopefully get us an answer to our problem so that we can get on blogger and facebook.  Until then I'm going to try to update things by email.  If not, I'll keep a record and submit a monster blog post when we get home.  Hopefully it won't come to that.  For now, I'm having issues submitting any pictures, so I'll have to wait and see if we can get this personal VPN working.  Otherwise, I'll have to paint the pictures with my words.  Unfortunately right now I'm still pretty jetlagged, so my mind is sluggish.  Hopefully I'll get better in the next couple of days.  

Eight Blaus Working Through the TSA Line at St. Louis
We made it!

We finally made it!  It is hard to believe that after over a year of planning, we finally have made it to China.  And what a journey it has been.  We left from St. Louis what feels like this morning, but was actually yesterday.  Our flight left at 9:30, and we decided to go ahead and stay in St. Louis last night so that we wouldn't have to worry too much about making it to the airport on time.  I'm glad we did because neither Herman nor I slept well at all.  I'm not sure why Herman had trouble sleeping.  I was just thinking over and over and over again about what I might have forgotten or what might go wrong with the travel plans.  Then I started worrying about whether I was adequately prepared to meet Minsy.  So overall I was just a bundle of nerves before we left. 

We met my brother, Joe, early so that he could drive us in our van to the airport.  Then he will have the van during our time in China, saving us a bundle of money in airport parking fees.  That will be a blessing.  I was totally stressed out about what would happen as we tried to take all eight of us through the security line.  I had visions of angry passengers griping as I tried to maneuver all of the kids and all of our luggage through the TSA lines.  Luckily it all went fairly smoothly.  We did take a lot of time, and it seems like we stuck too much stuff in the bins together, but the workers seemed to take pity on us, and we got through without a problem.  The guy in line behind us was very supportive and patient, and he mentioned that he comes from a family of ten, so he understood.  So, hurray, one worry of mine never came to pass.  We were off on the right foot. 

On the flight to Chicago

Getting cozy for our long trip to China

Our flight from St. Louis to Chicago was a piece of cake.  It was a super small plane, but it was only an hour flight, so there were no complaints.  The bigger concern was going to be the main flight from Chicago to Beijing.  Thirteen and a half hours nonstop.  I had no idea what to expect from the kids.  They are normally very well behaved in these types of situations, but we've never put them in a spot where they were going to have to relax and sit still for such a long period of time.  We planned for this.  We brought lots of electronic entertainment options.  I packed lots of snacks and coloring activities for the younger kids.  The older kids planned their own entertainment activities.  Unfortunately United Airlines didn't provide the best options for a trip to Asia.  Although their website said that there would be plugins, there weren't any.  Several of the electronic devices ran out of power too soon.  We had some plans to buy any wifi service offered by the airline so that there were some options there, but that wasn't offered on these flights either.  Everything wasn't working out just as I had planned, and there was great potential for disaster, but the Blau kids came through with flying colors.  No one complained about the lack of electronic entertainment.  They were content to read or color, and they enjoyed watching several of the movies offered by the airline.  We didn't have one problem the entire trip.  No one even complained that they were bored.  I was shocked.  Even I was tired of the flight by the fourth hour or so, but I didn't hear a word of complaint from any of the kids.  What a blessing!

Not very comfortable,
but we made it work

That plane ride, despite the great behavior from our children, was such a pain.  I don't think I have ever been so uncomfortable on a flight.  There was absolutely no leg room at all.  I had maybe an inch between my knee and the seat in front of me.  I don't know how someone taller could ever manage sitting in those seats.  By the middle of the flight I think I had lost all feeling in my knees, despite my attempts to keep circulation going through them.  The in-flight movies were the type of movies that Katie loves, which means that they didn't really appeal to anyone else.  The air in the cabin was sooooo dry.  My nose was itching the entire trip.   It was just so incredibly long.  But, you know what, considering everything, it wasn't horrible.  We did survive, and it was over before we knew it.  We gained half a day with the flight over, so despite it being a thirteen hour trip, we arrived in Beijing at 3:30 the next day (Saturday).

The nice lady who sat next to Laney on the trip

I got my first little taste of the problem of Chinese lines while we were on the plane.  I have heard that there really isn't such a thing as an organized line in China.  People just push forward without rhyme or reason to get where they need to be, and things work out, just not as we see in the US.  I was waiting in a moderately long line for the bathrooms on the plane along with Hyrum and Katie.  Despite the line a Chinese woman on the plane just walked ahead of everyone and grabbed the next stall.  She didn't seem to be in any sort of hurry.  She just didn't recognize the order of the line.  No one even blinked when she did it.  Even though I was standing there with my young children who were doing the potty dance, waiting to get into the bathroom, there was no recognition of any order.  The next time I was back there I saw her approaching the bathrooms again.  This time I decided to give myself a wide presence to prevent line breaking.  I'm sure it wouldn't have ruined the world if she had gone straight to the front of the line again, but I was tired, and when I'm super tired I couldn't help but think that if there was not order and solid queue lines in the world then the world would descend into total chaos.  Where would we be then?  I had a duty as a citizen of the world to stand my ground.  On this day, on this airplane, the line would not be breached!!!!  I'm happy to report that all those in the line were able to get to the bathroom without an accident at all.  Mission accomplished.  World saved.

Entering China as a Foreigner

So with our flight over, the real adventure began.  We have nothing here but our wits to help us get around.  It was crazy walking through the airport.  There were absolutely no big families there.  There really weren't any children either.  If there was a child it was just one child with a parent.  We definitely stood out.  You could see people stopping to count all of us as we passed.  Each of the workers who helped us get through the entry procedure for the country spoke a bit of English, but all of them simply asked how many kids I had and then said, "Brave Mama."  When we exited the terminal there were a ton of people with signs waiting to pick up whoever they were driving or leading on tours.  As we walked through this sea of people it almost felt like we were rock stars.  People just stared and stared and pointed at our large family.  I have already come to see that this will be a common occurence while we are here.  We stand out as foreigners, but we doubly stand out because of the size of our group.  Luckily the stares seem to be friendly, and I can deal with that. Here are some things I've noticed about China so far:

BARGAINING:  The first big challenge was figuring out how to get us from the airport to our hotel.  We didn't know if they even had vans equipped to take such a large group.  We were sooo excited to find a van ready to take us right off the bat.  While everyone else had to wait in line for the smaller cabs, we were able to go right to the front of the line and hire a van to get us to our hotel.  The driver quoted us a price.  It was our first experience dealing with Chinese money, and we failed miserably.  We agreed right away to his price.  We were just so happy to find a driver who could get us in one car that we really didn't think about the price like we would have in America.  As we were driving we thought a little harder about the price, and we realized that we didn't even begin to attempt to haggle with him.  We had "SUCKER" written all over our forehead.  Oh well!  I don't think we really paid way too much for the ride, but I'm comparing it to a New York cab ride, not what one should be in China.  It's a lesson learned, I guess. 

Isn't this a friendly little reminder from a cute little policeman?
But the police are not quite so helpful, and no one buckles up.

TRAFFIC:  The ride itself was interesting.  I was facing backwards, so I missed some of the drama of the drive.  Herman commented a bit on how crazy the driving is in China, but I was facing to the rear of the van, so I never noticed it.  At one point a group in a car in front of us stopped in the middle of the highway and did a Chinese fire drill right in the middle of traffic.  Craziness!  I guess when you've got to change drivers, you've got to change drivers.  The funniest thing was hearing Herman trying to have a conversation with the cabbie like he always does.  The driver spoke almost no English -- just enough to quote us a price.  Yet Herman still tried to have a conversation on our hour long drive to the hotel.  It seemed like the driver wanted to know where we were from, so we said USA.  Then he seemed to ask where.  We described it to him, but to him there was only one city in the USA, and that was New York City, so finally we just smiled and said, yes, we were from NYC. 

The Kids Watching Beijing Go By in Our Taxi

BEIJING:  They are not kidding when they describe the haze of Beijing. It is smoggy everywhere. We didn't even really see the city until we had almost landed. There is a haze affecting visibility and giving the city an almost dirty look. You can even smell the pollution in the air.  It may not be this way every day, but it is definitely the way we found the city today.  However, once we could overlook the haze it is clear that there is much beauty to see in this city. I can't wait to explore. I'm just glad that I packed some Claritin for this trip. I can tell that the smog is going to mess with my allergies.  This is definitely a city on the move with lots to see. 

HOTELS:  We are staying at the Days Inn at the Forbidden City.  The rooms are really small compared to US hotel rooms, but it suits us just fine. It smells a little funny -- maybe like it has been used as a smoking room in the past, but we'll survive for a week.  The staff were really nice, and even though I hardly understood a word they said, we got ourselves checked in.  The lighting situation in the hotel makes no sense to me.  I couldn't turn off the light right over my head at night without turning off electricity to the entire room, so I kept it on.  It made it hard to sleep even though I was exhausted.  Finally after an hour of silent curses I was able to come up with a solution. The room never gets really warm.  Luckily, we're here in the fall when it isn't horribly cold outside.   It isn't the greatest hotel in the world, but it will be great for us to have this week.  I love the location, and that will make up for any deficiencies in the room itself.

Heading Out for Our First Beijing Excursion

EATING:  The hotel is in a wonderful neighborhood.  We walked around a bit once we arrived even though we were all pretty much running on empty.  We needed to find somewhere to eat, and we thought that it would be good to find a little hole-in-the-wall place to try out first.  There are several little shops around this neighborhood which fit that description.  I was terrified to enter a place where we would not be able to be understood, but Herman had no problem with this, so he finally chose a little place nearby.  No one spoke a bit of English.  They did have an English menu, which was helpful, but it was a conversation full of stutters between all of us as we attempted to order.  Even when we would point to the item and the waitress would repeat it we were never quite sure that she got it right.  Well, whatever we thought we ordered, what they brought out was delicious.  Once again, I think that we might have overpaid here, but it was still much cheaper than what we would have paid in the US for the same items, so it worked out okay.

Our First Meal in Beijing -- You can tell that Spencer is exhausted.

BEING THE FOREIGNER:  I loved walking through the neighborhood teeming with so many people and little shops.  It seems so alive.  It is fascinating to be in a city where we are definite minorities.  We don't hear English around us.  We don't understand anything that is being said.  There is something a little bit scary and a little bit exhilarating about being in an atmosphere where we understand so little.  We are obviously out of place here, but we are treated with kindness.  We are obviously curiosities to those around us.  I can't help but think about Minsy while we are experiencing this.  In a few weeks she will be in this exact same situation as she enters the US knowing little to no English and having no clue about the life she is about to begin.  I have been trying to notice the things that comfort me while I am in this unfamiliar environment in Beijing so that I will be prepared to comfort Minsy when she enters an unfamiliar situation.  Hopefully I'll be able to give her some comfort.

So now I'm exhausted, but I'm trying to get on this Beijing schedule, so hopefully I can hold out for a bit before crashing.  Everyone else is already asleep except for JoJo.  He slept a bunch on the plane, and now he is wound up with excitement, so we're just hanging out in the hotel room watching the new Karate Kid movie.  JoJo likes it a lot.  I think it doesn't compare at all with the original. 

At least we have finally arrived.  Tomorrow we are going to try to figure out the subways and find the church here.  Then we'll do a bit more exploring in the neighborhood.  On Monday we head to the Great Wall.   We're so excited to be here!  Nine more days until we meet Minsy!

Hopefully I'll get this picture situation figured out soon, and I'll add some pics.