Days 1 and 2 (and so it begins...)

Day 1 – Thursday, 2/10 – Washington, Dulles – departure flight through Newark to Beijing

Day 2 – Friday, 2/11 – Beijing – arrived in Beijing, checked into Radisson hotel, ate dinner at hotel Chinese restaurant, went shopping at Carrefour

So, we’ve already talked about the “Young Frankenstein” aspect of our flight. There were a few other highlights that are noteworthy. First, Lucy fought sleeping on the flight like I have never seen before. While this was extremely frustrating at the time, in retrospect, we think she might have been afraid that she would miss something on the plane. She slept less than 90 minutes on the whole flight. Yay. Second, our flight attendant, Debbie Reidy, was nothing short of awesome. She, like so many other people, fell in love with Lucy right away. We talked as often as her work would permit about our adoption journey and Lucy’s triumphant return to “her people” (Lucy’s words). Without any prompting or requesting, she brought several “extra” items back from the First Class section to Lucy, including the travel kit with lotion, lip balm, etc.; and a handful of chocolate truffles. We will certainly be sending a note of appreciation to Continental on her behalf.

We got into the Beijing airport without incident and found it to be very large, clean, and modern. This was no doubt due to the 2008 Olympics modernization efforts. Thankfully, all of our bags arrived at the airport and we cleared both immigration and customs without any major effort. Once we were officially processed into China, we met the AWAA guides, Lineker (“LEN-a-ker”) and Sherry, both of whom were two of our guides back in 2004. It was really good to see them again and Lucy couldn’t get enough of Sherry. From the first moment, Lucy was glued to Sherry and Sherry loved having Lucy as her shadow.

All seven families that were participating in the Beijing portion of the trip boarded the tour bus and rode to the Radisson Blu Hotel together. Along the way to the hotel, Sherry and Lineker gave us information about our trip and reviewed the schedule for the next few days. Once we arrived at the hotel, Sherry got us checked into our rooms, distributed our room keys, and reminded us of our schedule. We went to our room long enough for our bags to be delivered, then we went around the corner to Carrefour (a French version of a Super Wal-Mart) and did some shopping for food and supplies. We love shopping in these Chinese stores! There’s always something bizarre to be found and tried! Given the in-country luggage weight restrictions (mentioned in an earlier post), we decided not to go too crazy… yet…

So after buying a couple bags of things (including some apple soda), we returned to the hotel room to struggle through a difficult night’s sleep. While in the room, we got to enjoy the reminders of being in the middle of the two-week long celebration of Chinese New Year: decorations and firecrackers by the thousands.