Yesterday was a very long day, although I'm still not exactly sure just how long is was. I woke up at 3:45am PST on August 22, and I landed in Beijing at 3:45pm Beijing time on August 23. I don't think it ever got dark when we were on the plane, and it was only (!) a 12 hour flight. When I went to bed, my phone said it was 4am, but I'm still not sure what happened to all the other hours in between. I tried to do the math, and I don't think I was awake for quite 24 hours, but who knows.
It is now 12:45 in the daytime. For those of you on the east coast, just add (or is it subtract?) 12 hours from whatever time it is there. I am officially on the other half of the globe. It's a 15 hour difference if you're on the west coast, and something in the middle if you are anywhere in between.
My flight was uneventful and the process at the airport was very straight forward. I stood in a lot of lines, but that was about the extent of it. I arrived around the same time as one of the new math teachers, so she and I have become best friends.
The cell phone situation is a disaster. I managed to make some phone calls yesterday (at $2.75/minute), but today it doesn't seem to be working so much. I knew I'd need a Chinese phone, and it is becoming something of a priority for me. Maybe one day I'll have a working phone. No one seems to separate their numbers around here -- it's going to be interesting trying to memorize them.
I have a two-bedroom apartment across a rather busy street from the school. They are newly renovated, and things mostly work. The AC works like a champ, although I need an extension cord to plug in the refrigerator. The plugs are all three pin, so nothing I have can be plugged in. I need a visit to the Chinese equivalent of Radio Shack for some adapters. They set us up with stuff from Ikea, and my couch is something else. It is fuchsia. Bright fuchsia. Those of you who love pink should be very, very jealous. (Miriam, think of your new fingernail polish.)
We had a wonderful dinner last night with lots and lots of food. The Kung Pao Chicken was way better than anything you get in the states. I also had a great eggplant and soybean dish. Yummy.
Everyone is lovely (can you hear the British slang already creeping into my voice?).
Off to grab some lunch before heading off to get our residency permits.
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