Journey from Vancouver to China! (August 27th/28th, 2013)

-Met up with Cyrus, Julia and Erik at YVR and we board our flight to Shanghai! Our flight was perfectly on time and as soon as I got on the plane, I got very excited! That was it, after the whole summer of waiting and anticipating; I was actually on my flight to China! We took off at 1:20pm and were due to arrive in Shanghai at 4:35pm the next day. It was about an 11 and a half hour flight across the Pacific Ocean, and it was daylight the entire time! I sat next to a very nice Chinese lady who told me that the people in the Province where I would be living were very nice and that I would enjoy my time there. It was a very reassuring thing to hear, especially since I have never been to China or anywhere in Asia before. During the flight I saw the Aleutian Islands of Alaska and I could see Japan! It was very cool to see both of those from the airplane window! We also flew very close to a portion of Russia, but I could not see it, as I was on the wrong side of the plane. We arrived in Shanghai only about a half hour late, and the flight in was very smoggy and I couldn’t see any of the city, I only saw the countryside, the river, port, and industrial areas where there were some windmills. It was interesting nonetheless. The airport was very large and modern. Chinese Customs took no time at all, and they didn’t even ask me a single question, even though I would be employed in China for 4 months. They just checked off my Visa and gave me a stamp in my passport. After customs we had to check in for our domestic flight to Qingdao, which was just a quick flight. Upon arriving in that city, I saw tons of fireworks in every direction when we were landing. Apparently it was the God of Fortune’s birthday and people were celebrating, so they weren’t just celebrating my arrival…..hahahaha. Season was there waiting for us, along with Paul, another Co-op student who had arrived earlier in the day. We took a 2.5 hour bus ride to Weifang, during which we slept most of the time because we had been up for 24 hours and counting.