6 months in Wuhan, China 2008

Getting to Wuhan:

A trip to China is never an easy one especially with children ages 7 and 11. Preparation began for our 6 month stay in Wuhan before X-mas with worries over plastic freezer bags and electrical charging issues for video games and continued up to 1 hour prior to leaving. There is always something...

Departure from Madison,Wi :

The last hour in Madison had our friends and neighbors (Fred and Christine) ready to haul us off to the UW Memorial Union for a bus ride with our well weighed out luggage (4 bags 20Kg +/- 1Kg) along with 4 carry-ons, 2 backpacks and 2 computers. We were sure we could make it if there were no problems, unfortunately we know as travelers there are always problems. We just kept our fingers crossed the problems would be minimal. The schedule according to Central time was as follows:

5PM leave Madison
1AM leave Chicago
3:30 PM arrive in Korea
6:30 PM leave Korea
8:00 PM arrive in Beijing
2:00 AM leave Beijing
4:00 AM arrive in Wuhan
5:30 AM arrive at Lan's parents

36 hours to the otherside of the Earth:

The ride to Chicago was easy but had 4 stops, each of which woke the kids from a superficial sleep. The plan to leave at 1AM on the Korean airline Asiana saved a chunk of money on the oneway tickets and would hopefully keep the kids in a sleepy state so they could make it through the layovers with little difficulty. Reality was they were wide awake and ready to play their video games on the plane...for hours on end. Another reality was the sleepless baby (~6 months old) crying and crying and crying eventually sounding like a sick cat in a loud raspy howl that went on also for hours. We were situated in the 4 seats in the middle of the plane with myself nearest the baby across the aisle. I was tolerant yet sad when they changed the baby's stinky diaper near me and the smell woke me up.
When we arrived in Korea the kids were hungry after sidewalk traveling/walking ~1 mile through the giant international airport at Incheon. We had delicious Italian gellato for ~$3.50 a cup and were very content. At the very place they sold the gelato they had cookies for sale labeled in great Asian-English typo style as “Peanutbutter Cockys”. A certain someone giggled for quite awhile. Many other typos are expected to show up on this trip and documenting them will be high on the list of fun. The flight to Beijing was only 5% full so there was stretching room but the enjoyment ended quickly due to proximity issues between the cities. Beijing airport customs went quick and was far less painful than expected but we had a 5 hour layover and our gate was not going to be assigned until 2 hours before takeoff. Interestingly when it was assigned it was wrong (25D vs 25B). Time to kill with lethargic kids that were slowly but surely showing sleep deprivation was somewhat difficult. We pushed 2 carts around with all our stuff until we found a place to sit and have the luggage watched. After ~1 1/2 hours we moved around to The Lucky Shamrock which featured American cuisine and had many foreigners present often with Chinese helping them navigate through Beijing. We didn't go for the food but the comfy chairs and Chinese ginger ale that was very similar to the Jamaican ginger ale we like back home. Here we encountered another typo (or was it?).

If it was a villainous hot dog they had great mustard and ketchup technique. Finally we moved on to our last resting/waiting place in the Beijing airport and it went smoothly until Hunter could not wake up and carry his stuff to the shuttle bus to get to the airplane. Crystal was hard to move also but realized the seriousness of the situation and got her act together so she could sleep on the plane to Wuhan. Of course most of the burden was on me with 2 large carry ons, 2 backpacks, and a computer plus trying to hold up Hunter on his feet standing in line, getting on the bus, waiting on the bus, riding ~ 3 miles from where we were, walking up onto the plane and once the commotion settled and I was ready to sleep for ~ 1 3/4 hours ended up sitting next to a crying baby who wept differently and even louder than the one from Chicago to Korea.

The kids didn’t bat an eye after they immediately fell asleep on the plane to Wuhan. They were like mini-zombies when we arrived.

Once we made it to Wuhan airport chaos reigned supreme with everyone for themselves as a full plane of people lined up and readied themselves for the door as soon as the plane hit the runway long before stopping. I always wondered why they cannot relax and allow the plane to stop before they line up but everyone likes to be ahead of someone (even though they all end up waiting for there luggage at least 15 minutes at the terminal). “Hurry up and wait” should be the national slogan since the scenario is played out over and over again. Our good friends from the University we will be working at helped us out with kids and luggage. Yao was able to convince the guard keeping the mass of crowd waiting for people (there were hundreds waiting) to allow him to sneak through to help us very cleverly pointing out the helpless looking mother and children needed assistance (while I was waiting for luggage) and either he or the guard should do something...the guard then let him through. I on the other hand had to find 3 pushcarts had to leave the airport through throngs of people, cross the street through people yelling “Taxi! Taxi!” “Hello! What is your name?” avoid cars trying to get to who knows where and return. It took awhile and by the time I returned Shao had already commandeered 2 carts and the luggage was just starting to arrive. We minivanned it out of there as fast as possible and in ~ 1 hour through the foggy crowded city we made it to Lan's parents dragging our stuff up 3 flights of stairs. The apartment was cold but the spaceheaters were on and waiting.
We slept well..