Finally in Fuzhou

Today started rather abruptly when we all woke up around 6:40 AM…although we had planned to be out the door by 6:45. Oops. We still made it out in good time – Susan and Walter stopped by the bakery while Dad and I hailed a taxi, and we made it to the border gate by 7:10 AM. Dad joked about using the senior (65+ years) line, but hey, it got us through more quickly than Walter and Susan, who couldn’t pass as “companions.”

More trouble came when we hauled our suitcases over to the Gongbei coach station that I’ve used before to get to Guangzhou airport, only to find that the bus was leaving from ANOTHER station across the street and down the block. Dad and I rushed over there, making it with about 10 minutes to spare, but we were worried about Walter and Susan, who hadn’t shown up by 7:55, but the bus didn’t leave either. Around 8:00, a van pulled up next to us and they hopped out, so it was ok. It turns out that if we had waited at the first station, we too could have gotten the shuttle, but the station staff didn’t say anything about it.

The bus ride was fairly uneventful, minus a few people throwing up in the rows ahead of us, but there must have been something wrong with them because the ride wasn’t that rough. We arrived by 11:00, got slightly lost looking for the check-in counter, but then found the electronic check-in machines and printed out boarding passes. Susan and Walter went to gate 104 for their flight to Beijing, while Dad and I headed to gate 111 and just hung out there for a couple hours.

Around 1:00, however, things started going downhill again. We were wondering why things were so quiet – boarding was supposed to start at 12:50 PM for the 1:30 flight to Fuzhou. There was a plane outside the window, but mysteriously, it wasn’t connected to the boarding extension, it wasn’t being refueled, or anything. Suddenly, the gate sign flashed that the Fuzhou flight had been moved to Gate 103, so we rushed over only to find ourselves waiting for another half hour. Around 2:00, we finally boarded a bus that took us to the plane, got on, listened to the security features video, etc. After that, however, the plane just stayed put…and I dozed off =P

I woke up around 3:00 to find that the attendants were passing out food – noodles with chicken or pork, plus a small piece of cake, some dried fruit, and a choice of water or “liang cha” (cooling tea, with chrysanthemum, lotus, and a few other things). Apparently the delay was not because of problems in Guangzhou, although it was cloudy, but because of heavy rain in Fuzhou, so air traffic control wasn’t letting the plane take off. Everyone ate quickly and the flight attendants even had time to clean up before we finally started moving around 3:30, and we got to Fuzhou around 5:00.

Another 90 minutes later, we thankfully made it to the hotel via bus/taxi, which is where we are now. Dinner was just in the hotel restaurant downstairs for convenience, but the food was ok: tofu cubes stir-fried with young chives, another squash dish, and mushroom soup. They even gave us a bonus of two small zhong zi at the end, in honor of Duan Wu Jie (still kind of sad that I missed the dragon boat races in Macau, but oh well). As I’m writing this, Dad is watching something on TV about how to pick the best turtles for cooking, but he’s dozed off and I think I’m going to sleep early too. Good night!

Air Asia FAIL

For once, I'm blogging in real time, not post-dating after I've edited and uploaded photos. However, right now I should also be in the air on my way back to Macau. At the moment, though, it is impossible for me to be both online and in the air, ergo, I am not in the air as I should be.

The day started off well enough - I got a bunch of work done while hanging out with Joyce at her office (in the PEMANDU unit of the Malaysian Prime Minister's office, which is very nice). We went out for a late lunch, hugged goodbye at the airport entrance, and I checked in, went through security, etc. I even had time to stop at the airport McDonalds for a much-needed "Pineapple Passion McFlurry" (which must be a flavor unique to Malaysia or at least to SE Asia, because I haven't seen it even in Macau) and bought a jar of kaya with my leftover ringgit.

The first sign of trouble was when we got on the plane and it seemed, no, it WAS unusually warm. The captain apologized for the stuffiness: apparently the auxiliary power unit that normally powers ground AC was broken, but the AC should kick in again once the main engines were started. I took out my hand fan only to find that one end of the fabric had come unglued from the frame, but it was still usable enough to generate a slight breeze.

After another 10 minutes, however, we all started getting antsy, and the flight attendants at the front entrance looked worried. The captain also came out of the cockpit and looked out the front entrance, and then we knew something else must be up. I have no idea what this means, but if someone could explain this announcement, I would be much obliged: "The plane's nose oil is low...the plane's nose is lower than usual, so we can't close the door." Everyone got off the plane and we waited out on the tarmac for a while before being directed back to the (thankfully air-conditioned) waiting area while the plane was being repaired. That's where I am now...I can only hope the plane will get fixed and we'll be able to get off the ground in the next hour or so, so I can get back home before midnight -_-

EDIT: We got back on the plane a few minutes after I posted this, and finally landed around 10 PM. Photos below:

Uh, what's going on...

Everyone waiting around

On the road again...

As usual, I have lots that I want to write about, but very little time to sit down and type out my thoughts, never mind editing and putting in photos (even if I had my other laptop with Photoshop). After City Lights (the UM prom), I had to administer and grade the second exam for my students, grade their second speaking project, start checkout procedures, etc. On top of that, my mom and sister came to visit for over a week - they were perfectly cooperative when I said I had to get work done, but of course I wanted to spend lots of time with my family and show them Macau, right? A relatively new Facebook album documenting many of my wanderings is online, but there are lots of recent photos I haven't yet to sort through and upload (darn you, 200-photo/album limit!).

The main point of this post, however, is to note that I will be mostly traveling for the next 3 weeks, so if I'm in transit I'll try to catch up a bit on writing, then post intermittently when I get Internet access. Unfortunately, mainland China blocks Blogger, so I won't be able to get any of that online until I get back to the US in July. That said, here's the (rather hectic) schedule:

June 7-10 Ho Chi Minh City/Mekong Delta

June 11-14 Kuala Lumpur

June 15 Macau for a day; pick up Dad

June 16-20 Fuzhou

June 21-25 Beijing

June 26-28 Xi'an

June 29 Get back to Macau

June 30 Last day in Macau

July 1 Fly home via Taipei

Now, time to finish packing for HCMC/KL...see you all later!

P.S. I leave you with this soon-to-be-nostalgic photo of my sister and I with my EELC102 students at the end of the last class:

Narrative essay tidbits

For their narrative writing project, I gave my students the following assignment: Write about a day in the life of someone who is living in a different subculture from you. The subculture can be real or fictional, and the person can either be a celebrity or someone ordinary.

The following excerpts are from some of those essays, showcasing my students’ creativity, but also some of their (rather amusing) spelling/grammar errors, often the kind that Word won’t mark.

But I know that if I don’t run, I will be the fried chicken.

I regret being a wicker man.

Miao were hospital; I met a girl Zhuoma who is a native people.

After having pig between two sheets for my breakfast…

When I find my venery, I will hoist the Jolly Roger…The ship didn’t have enough water to wash my hear. So the hear will very dirty. […] And we like to drink rum very much.

Martin in a cult of the street culture…he very loves the Michael Jackson, the 50 cent, and the LBJ.

I took my weapon and woke up a pig who slept next to me.
“Hey, my silly partner, I think at this moment there isn’t a good sleep time.”
“Oh, what’s happening? You interrupted my sweet dream.”

I knew that guy; he is Pamela’s boyfriend – Ken, the person who may like the handsome prince of Pamela’s dream. Though I thought he looked more like the servants of Pamela’s dream.

There are old woman live in there. She is sawing the clothes.

I opened my eyes and saw a large golden Buddha in front of me. Also, a special smell of incense surrounded in the hall. “My god, I don’t have religious beliefs, and why have you chosen me to be a monk?” I felt helpless.

“We will support you, Pasu. You go first, and I need to install the programs about the usage of wooden stick,” Neo said dispassionately.
“You installed the usage of stick last time; there have any difference between stick and wooden stick?” I ask.
“Wooden stick will break easily, so that the usage is different,” he said.

After the classes, it was a happy hour time. I watched the Chinese opera with my beautiful concubine…After I finished dinner, I take a bath and change clothes, then I go to sleep with my lovely concubine.

She thought mike would make me stronger and bread was good tasting with mike. […] In fact, before I practice my radeo, I should feed my horse first, a little black horse. I called it omg, because it always surprised me.

Originally, I should have a lunch with my friends. But my mom said that I had to eat the food which made from the palace kitchen. First of all, my lunch is under the menu which the dietician formulated for my physical condition. Second, it is about my safety. Because I am a princess, maybe some one will use me to threaten my parents. For these reasons, I had to eat something that was not dedicious enough but healthy enough.

Fulbright film stars?

Last week when we first got down to thinking about how to plan a prom in 2 weeks, we worried about generating enough publicity to encourage students to come, especially since it was the end of the semester when many of them have exams (especially our own EELC102 students, who had an exam the next day). We batted around the idea of a video that could be shown on the TV screens around campus, but didn’t start writing or anything, first deciding to concentrate on a poster and asking the other ELC teachers to tell their classes.

Last Monday/Tuesday, however, we got serious. In a late-night flurry of inspiration, Sam/Susan/I hammered out an outline involving a couple getting ready for prom…but how could we make it funny? Throw in a fairy godmother…err, god-uncle, some McDonalds, a rockin’ soundtrack, and ta-da! For your watching pleasure, I present the promotional video for City Lights:

Seriously, making this thing will probably be one of my most hysterical memories from this year as an ETA. From Tom threatening to stuff a French fry up Austin’s nose to Sam’s fluttery eyelashes, it took us twice as long to film only because we were laughing so hard half the time. This video will also probably live on in infamy at the ELC…Janice (one of the teachers) wants to use it as a “perfect example of gestural communication” for her 200-level classes in years to come!