The China Trip Begins

It's taken all of us months to really focus on this trip. It just wasn't real. We mad our airplane reservations in February, had endless helpful communiques galore with Michael Han and time to read the posts from a variety of groups devoted to going back to China. Not even irritating encounters with the Chinese consulate in my increasingly desperate quest for visas seemed to make this real.

Then Kate's school let out for the summer and the very next day she woke up early and packed her suitcase. I think that was the signal for all of us to take notice. Her previous ambivalence about the trip has seemed to diminish. She packed her suitcase, repacked her suitcase, at my instigation she made lists of what to pack and then packed the whole thing again. Arnie has now also packed. I'm still the
only one who hasn't packed. I've begun slinging stuff in the direction of my favorite orange suitcase, made
some notes about what I might pack, what I might really wear in high humidity and taken a crack at who
I wish to be during these two weeks: chic traveller, comfortable tourist or a combo of both. Those are
my image obsessions along with a real reluctance to acknowledge how long the flight is going to be. So of course along with the clothes are a ton of books.

We will leave on Thursday morning at 8:30 am for the airport, and if we're very lucky, then we and all our
little suitcases should surface in Beijing on Friday afternoon at about 5. Isn't that a daunting thought?
When I went to China in July of 1999 to pick up Kate, the entire flying thing was different. I used to go up
to the United checfk in desk and ask confidently for three empty seats together. And I got them on every leg of the trip. I somehow can't imagine doing that on this trip although my experience with Air Canada is nil. It's just that flying is like taking a greyhound bus now. Soon the stewardesses whatever they are called will really be teamsters. We are flying from New York to Toronto, changing planes and then flying from Toronto to Beijing.

We are all so excited.....Me, too even though I feel totally
absorbed in the details, such as remembering to pack a lunch for our trek, making sure that Michelle who will be dog sitting for Miss Murray knows where the fuse box is, thats just in case she turns on two air conditioners at the same time and tries to iron anything, picks up the right key so that the dog walkers can still get into the apartment, etc. Enough already! this is my vacation and a two week vacation at that.