Yay Finally Here.

Thank you God, we are in China. United Airlines: we’re not friends right now. However, I did appreciate the brownie you served earlier. Props on the brownie. Anyway, the airport here in Shanghai is absolutely fabulous. The architecture was sweet. Column like bars were hanging from the ceiling. It was really neat. We made it to the Bailemen Hotel, and it’s on Nanjing Street. Nanjing Street East is where the shopping is, so I have big plans for that, and seeing the Bund. Tomorrow should be interesting, we have a meeting at 1:45, but I hope to do a little exploring. We’re across the street from a Buddhist Temple, so I plan to see that. It’s very western here. There’s an H&M really close, and an ad featuring Forrest Whittaker outside. Kinda nice…not too big of a culture shock yet. We’ll see what tomorrow brings.

FINALLY

It’s 7pm and we are just now boarding our flight…almost 9 hours after our original scheduled departure time.

WHAT IT'S LIKE TO WAIT

We’ve been at O’Hare International Airport since 8:30AM and we’re all eager to start our flight but we’re not scheduled to begin boarding for about three hours.  I asked Ted Land and John Paul what it feels like to wait just a little while longer for the next leg of our much anticipated journey. 

Ted Land:
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John Paul:
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Wasting time and lounging

United’s planes have mechanical issues - apparently and we got to lounge and pay for even that. What a wonderful life.

This is how it looks when you have to waste time...:
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DELAYED

We all managed to get to the Illini Union by 5AM for our bus ride to O’Hare.  Just before arriving at the airport, we found out our flight that had been scheduled to depart at 10:42AM had been delayed until 6:15PM.  That puts our new arrival into Shanghai at around 11PM Shanghai time, and means we had to cancel a dinner we had planned to have with our translators. 

We all managed to get checked in and were given meal vouchers to grab some lunch at Chili’s.  Our wonderful professor got us into the United Airlines Red Carpet Club where we’re resting and emailing. 

More updates soon!