Saturday morning, 4am, my parents and I arrived, bleary eyed, to Denver International Airport. My checked luggage was (hurrah!) not overweight and thus, toting my nifty new backpack (thanks Joshi and Fam!) and clutching a bag stuffed full of important papers and my regulatory plastic ziplock of toothpaste and contact solution, we sat down to coffee and thick muffins. I made it through some rigorous inspection, waved to my dear padres kneeling to peek at me from under the frosted glass surrounding the security checkpoint and stepped onto the plane for Salt Lake City. The connection there to LA was remarkably on time but then I had to walk out of the terminal and head around the sidewalk to the International Terminal. So odd! There I checked in to China Eastern Airline, feeling foreign already with my brown curls. I proceeded to place a call to the Joshi I left behind at home and cry bitterly into the plastic receiver. Thankfully he knew what to say to set me on my feet again towards a meal, a beer, and a bit of a moment to relax and remember I was just me and would be just fine. There was again the rigmarole of security checkpoints but soon I was seated on a large plane with my wool sweater, pillow and book in what was clearly an eastern Chinese flight. It was a bit of a shock at first but I recalled Joshi's words reminding me we are all just penguins under the sun. I smiled at the baseball-capped grandfatherly man beside me and he smiled back. Yes, we may not speak the same words but a smile is a smile is a smile and all was well.
39 long hours later I arrived in to Harbin airport and happily scooped up my luggage (I almost clapped to see it had not been lost). Guodong, a small young looking Chinese man with a large smile greeted me. It must have been almost 1am and he looked as though he had just woken, showered and popped over from next door. (The more I see Guodong the more I realize he always looks like this --- I wonder if he sleeps and what his trick is). We drove through some lovely brush sort of forest and into an ominous looking city, very little traffic at that hour. Eventually we passed through a gate and drove around HIT (the university) arriving to a tall building, "Foreign Students Dormitory." I was neatly deposited with a few instructions into a rather large but unfriendly seeming apartment on the 16th floor (aka the top floor). At this point everything appeared threatening, new and far to overwhelming but thankfully the bed was clean and firm and I rested.
Yes, this is the end of side one. You will just have to wait in gleeful anticipation for the continuation. To be continued…
