The Family Trip to China

Hi readers! Not a very long hiatus between posts this time round, eh? Count yourselves lucky, because I decided to update my blog just to keep a journal of something that happened last week. Just to give you a background information, I flew to Tianjin, China last Wednesday and just returned today.  The plan was for my family (and I) to attend my elder brother's graduation ceremony but because we bought our tickets before the graduation date is confirmed, it turned out that the graduation would be on Sunday and we already purchased our return tickets on Saturday. Despite the trip being extremely exhausting, things did not go as planned, and we ended up not doing what we intended to do for the trip (attending the graduation) it was nevertheless a fulfilling one for me.

So, the trip. In the first place, something was already wrong with the way we (or I) planned the trip. My family arrived in Tianjin on Tuesday evening while I was scheduled to arrive on the night the day after. However, for whatever reason, my connecting flight from Shanghai to Tianjin was cancelled, and I had to stay there overnight, waiting for the next flight. Fortunately, I took a non-budget airlines (I don't think there is a budget airline that serve such a long-haul flight), so lodging and the substitute flight was provided for free. Things did not go so smoothly, though.

Firstly, apparently there are a lot (I mean A LOT) of connecting flights from the same airlines (China Eastern) was cancelled that particular evening, so the queue for the counter where we were supposed to arrange for the substitute flight was really long, not to mention those people who tried to get something more out of the situation by acting as if he/she/they was/were extremely inconvenienced by the cancellation, which held up the queue for well-behaving passengers (like myself, lol).

Admittedly, some of the inconvenience was caused by my indecisiveness. Because of this turn of event, there were a few choices posed to us people who were stranded there. First, we could get the next flight to our destination. Straight forward for people who were going far away like LA (yes, there were Americans who don't speak Chinese for the lives of them and got stranded in Shanghai! Poor thing!) For people who were flying to (relatively) nearby cities like me, however, had a choice of going to the other airport in Shanghai (虹桥 Hongqiao Airport) for an earlier flight or take the same flight on the next day (which means wasting 24 hours in Shanghai doing nothing). Also, I also had another choice, which was to cancel my connecting flight and then take another mode of transport (eg the bullet train, 高铁) to Tianjin. However, I would lose my free lodging and I have to arrange for the other transport myself. After a 10 hours flight, it was quite a challenge for the exhausted me. However, the benefit of doing a refund was that I would be able to buy a return ticket for the day after so that I could attend my brother's graduation, which was the purpose of the trip in the first place.

After some considerations (and many phone calls to my elder brother, and multiple visits to the counter and enquiring about my options), I decided to take the morning flight from the other airport and claimed my free lodging. Fortunately (and unfortunately at the same time), seemed like hotels near the 浦东 Pudong Airport (the airport I was at) was fully booked so the airline got us a hotel that was quite a distance from the airport. It was somewhat beneficial for me because the Hongqiao airport was on the other end of Shanghai, so the further the hotel is from Pudong, the closer it is to Hongqiao.

During the hoo-ha of arranging the substitute flight and lodging, I got to know some nice people who were met with the same predicament as I was. When I was still unsure whether the airline would provide us with accommodation, I asked a friendly young Chinese lady who just left the queue if she was asking about lodging (turned out I was right!) with my broken Chinese, mixed with some English. She was really understanding of the trouble I was in, not being fluent enough in Chinese to get around and so she offered me to follow her so that I wouldn't get lost amidst the confusion and lack of proper handling by the airlines regarding the flight cancellations. She also brought my passport to me when I left it on the bus provided by the airlines to bring us to the hotel! Whew! If I didn't take my chances to ask if she was asking about lodging in that particular moment, I might not have lost my passport then, and I would have had the worst period of my life there. In China, with limited Chinese, and no passport. Not only I would have flied to China for nothing, but I would have had the worst time of my life and paid hefty amount for it! I was not able to sleep well that night. Other than the fact that so many things could have gone wrong - but fortunately it did not, I was afraid that I would wake up late from the exhaustion. It was already 1+ and my flight was at 9.10, and I did not know how long it would take me to get to the airport. Fortunately, I was sleeping with a Chinese guy who can speak English quite well (turned out he is studying in the US) so I had one less thing to worry about.

This is a shout out to that lady, whose name I did not ask, unfortunately. Thank you for your help and kindness, and especially for returning my passport when I left it on the bus! I am forever in debt to you! I did not get to thank her properly, since I left very early in the morning to catch my flight from the other airport. She actually headed to Tianjin too, but she decided to take the same flight on the next day.

Whew, still just the first part of my trip and it is already 8 paragraphs long! Glad that you readers are still reading!

So finally I managed to get myself to Tianjin. So glad that I was already familiar with the city, being there for a couple of times last year when I was on exchange. It didn't take long for me to get to the subway and took the train to meet with my family at the Tianjin railway station (note the difference between subway and railway in China. Subway is the intra-city trains - 地铁, while railway is the inter-city trains - 火车). It was again, not without a slight hiccup. In China, for (probably) security reasons, a lot of walkways and footpaths are blocked, making it really hard for you just to get from one side of a building to the other side. So my story was that I exited the subway on the north plaza of the railway station, but my family was on the south plaza. It took me no less than half an hour to find my way to the south plaza. So yeah, despite the hurdles along the way, I was finally reunited with my family once more! You could not imagine the relief, with the exhaustion from the long flight and sleeplessness the night before. Finally I could rest and let my elder brother took the wheel!

We took the bullet train (高铁) to Beijing from the railway station.

Things did not go smoothly still after I was regrouped with my family. There were 5 of us then so we could not take the taxi to get to our hotel. This made me feel bad because I made the group odd-numbered. I was having second thoughts again about being there, whether I was doing the right thing to spend a lot of money just to be a fifth person in a nicely-numbered 4-person group. We decided to take the subway and once we were close enough to the hotel, 4 of us took the taxi while my brother took a bus to get to the hotel. It delayed us quite a bit, resulting in us missing the entry to the Forbidden City. However, we were somewhat on time for the Flag-lowering Parade in Tiananmen Square, which was a scene that I did not get to see when I was on exchange. Also, my brother's girlfriend joined the group, making us a 6-person group, which made me feel better since I was no longer the person who made the group odd-numbered.

After watching the parade, we headed to one of the best roasted duck place in Beijing (hint: not 全聚德) which was around the 前门 area. We -walked- the long way round because of road closures (damn road closures, man) and waited for about one hour for a table. I just realized I should have taken a picture of the place just to make you readers surprised how could such a small restaurant be so famous - I was surprised myself. The wait was worth it; it was definitely the nicest roasted duck I have eaten my entire life, even beating the most famous Beijing roasted duck restaurant on the Internet, 全聚德. In case you guys are wondering what the name of the shop is, it is 四季民福. Located inside the traditional alleys - 胡同 in 前门 area.

The next day, we planned to climb the Great Wall because, "Don't claim that you have gone to China if you have not climbed the Great Wall", right? Well, unfortunately, as I learned from my exchange last year, it was difficult to get to any section of the Great Wall from Beijing. The *real* public bus that goes there is located in a very obscure section of the terminal, and many travel agents with illegal cars (黑车) around, trying to give you false information and convince you to go with them instead. Unfortunately, it was quite some time since the last time my brother or his girlfriend went to the Great Wall by themselves (usually there is a group of 8-12 people going and they would hire a minibus instead), so they did not know how to get there. It was hot, without shelter nearby whatsoever despite the fact that it is a friggin bus terminal, and it was noon. Could not have been worse. The person who knows where the real bus is could not be contacted (which was understandable, her father passed away recently so she was probably busy with it) and asking around is useless as the people who were willing to answer are the travel agents, while the officials are rude and unwilling to help.

After waiting about one hour under the sun (fortunately with the help of umbrellas), the brother managed to contact the person who knows the real bus, but to get to the terminal was quite troublesome, and it was past noon already. I suggested that we skipped the Wall as we wouldn't have enough time to go back from the Great Wall to get back to Tianjin on time. I knew it was a rather difficult decision because it was another highlight of the journey skipped (the first being my brother's graduation), but I thought it was the right thing to do. In the end we agreed that it was not worth it and decided to go to the Temple of Heaven (天坛) instead. It was really fortunate that we managed to finish visiting all the highlights of the place as suddenly a light sandstorm swept over the place. We hurried to the nearest subway to go to the Bird's Nest stadium (鸟巢, the Beijing 2008 Olympic Stadium). Fortunately again, there was no sandstorm by the time we reached there (either the sandstorm did not pass through the area or it had stopped) so the journey was smooth afterwards. We called for a Chinese Uber-like service to order a bigger car so that the 6 of us can go to the hotel to fetch our luggage and get to the railway station to go back to Tianjin by ordering another 7-seater from the same service. It was 嘀嘀打车, using the 专车 functionality, for those who are familiar with these Chinese services. We managed to get to Tianjin and checked in to our hotel smoothly (the hotel was just beside the railway station, fortunately), and got some rest.

On our last day in China, we went to my brother's campus to do some "graduation photo-shoot" (it was not the actual graduation day, but my brother bought a graduation suit) and to help my brother bring some stuff back home. Another rushed day, but my Mom and my sister managed to catch their flight. My father stayed back in China to settle some PhD stuff in another city in China, while I was taking a different flight an hour later.

And thus my trip to China last week. There were a few notable things that happened on my flight back to Sydney (such as me being mistaken as his friend by some random guy, but I quickly caught that he was Australian from him calling me "Mate" and reduced the awkwardness between us), I realized that I had been to the Guangzhou airport before (I transited at Guangzhou), and sat beside a UTS staff on my flight back, but I have bored you readers enough by a long post, and I think it is time to conclude the post with some last words.

The trip, despite all the troubles that happened, had been a memorable one to me. Firstly, I was able to practice my Chinese again before it got more and more rusty as I have not used it for very long. Secondly, I met with many amazing people along the way (especially during the cancelled flight in Shanghai), which made me much more optimistic about the world we live in. Besides, I got to see some of my friends I made in Beijing last year, because of the stop we made in the area near Tsinghua University. It was great catching up with them! Also, I cannot really explain why, but the way my brother and his girlfriend interacted made me feel really happy for him. I mean, there was nothing special about the way they interact. No lovey-dovey or whatever, but it is just that.. When I was bringing my Mom around Singapore, it was a very stressful and exhausting thing for me, as I had to make her walk a lot and if we are too late for things, things got cancelled and that made me really sad for not being able to fulfil my Mom's wishes. It must have been stressful for my brother too, and I was glad that he had someone to share his burden with him, at least when we were in Beijing. With these tough experiences, I know my brother and his girlfriend can only get better together, and that filled my heart with warmth and happiness. The fact that I do not have the same privileges as he did did not bother me at all. It was probably the very definition of empathy? The word that we use every so often, but do we really know what it means? If we do, do we really feel it every time we said it? I don't think so, at least I know I don't. It is not every day that I felt that way whenever I saw someone happy, or saw someone having the privilege to share someone's burden with his/her loved one, and not feeling the slightest tinge of envy; just pure happiness and best wishes for them.

My last words became really long and I am sorry for that. Now let me really close my post in this very paragraph. I hope for the very best for my brother, someone who I looked up to ever since I knew what he has achieved when I was on exchange last year. I hope for the very best for his career, his relationship, and his life. Happy graduation, my dear brother! :D

For the rest of you, all the best in your endeavours!