I'm actually here!

Bye USA


Hello Beijing!


This is what I wrote earlier when I was on the plane over:

OMG I wanna die. My left knee is killing me. It seems like every movie they are showing has either Steve Carrel or Paul Rudd in it. I've watched 40 Year Old Virgin, some serious movie with John C. Riley in it, and Dinner for Schmucks twice. OMG I would not be surprised if my leg falls off when I get off this plane. We have about 6 more hours left till we land. I spoke with a stuart named Tim who is half Chinese and half Vietnamese (like me!) who says he will hook me up with an amazing tailor in Beijing. He was cool...too bad I am not a drinker, he pretty much opened up the mini bar and asked if I wanted anything. Later I met an American guy from Eerie, PA who lived in Beijing for 15 years and can speak fluent Chinese. He said he owns his own company that makes parts for aerospace and nuclear-something-or-other. God I don't know if I can take it on this plane much longer. Okay, I'm going to watch Jonah Hex now.

Now it's noon. We seem to be about two hours away from Beijing. I haven't been able to sleep at all during this flight. I have a headache.


This morning mom came by to take me to the airport.
My first flight was to D.C. on this tiny jet.

It was so small that we had to store our carry-on bags under the plane.

When I got to D.C. I had about 40 mins til my next flight, but the airport was so big that it took that long just to walk from one gate to the other.
By the time I got to my gate, most everyone was already boarded.

I had seat 39 J - way in the back by the window - and I was seated next to this little old Asian grandma. She was cute. She did not speak English and I gave her a pair of headphones so she could watch some of the movies.

The first thing I noticed when we landed was the SMOG! Good grief, the smog is terrible. You could hardly see anything and the sun looked like a big bright orange in the sky.
I met one of my co-workers at the airport.
Traffic here is terrible, like scary.
They are more aggressive here than in NY. I couldn't even watch while our guy was driving. I sat in the back.
We arrived at the Fraser where we will be staying and noticed right away that there is a Starbucks right in front of it.

The apartment is sooooo nice.
These pictures don't do it justice.

Living room - front door - kitchen

Couch

Cute little kitchen (also comes with rice cooker and electric kettle)

Kitchen

Living room - window

View from my room (8th floor) - Look at that smog! it stinks :(

My King size bed :)

My room

Bathroom

Shower and Western style toilet (thank you)

Glass sink

Luckily some of the employees here can speak some English.
To use the elevator you have to swipe your room key - fancy, and when I got in the elevator there was a button that took you to Papa John's in the lobby :)
I pointed to it and said "Pizza? " :P

Other than the confusion at check-in and the two hours it took to try and set up the internet/facebook, I think everything is working fine now.

Tomorrow (or later on today) I hope to meet up with the rest of the people I will be working with, get a local SIMS card for my phone, and go exploring.