29 June

Touched down in Beijing at approximately 0400 hours Friday morning.

Was to touch down like 6:00 P.M. Thursday.

As I was saying in the last post: Get to JFK and through security around 2:30. I was told by a fellow passenger plane already delayed two hours.

Sometime thereafter, corrected information pops up on display: flight delayed til 8:00.

8:00 comes goes. Storms come. All other gates along the wing where out gate is announce delays, update their respective info for their passengers.

But not the flagship of the PRC.

Short version: Passengers get rerstless, almost unruly. We're boarded at 11:30. The girls are seated in the middle of 4-across on the world's oldest 747 that is still flying. I'm in the middle of 3-across. We're I am, there is no A/C, no adjustable vents. It's a sauna. Get repeatedly kicked by passenger behind me. All trip, I'll try to sleep, to no avail; get minutes on the hour.

Rewind: What's interesting about the boarding is that no other flight in our wing of International departures boarded because of the storm.

So it's not surprising that we end up on the plane, waiting, til takeoff. At about 0300 hours.

So, yeah, the flight sucked. Plane configured for maximum seating; no room. Minimal amenities. Rotten, limited food. Two bad movies. Theoretically not allowed to boot computer or DVD player. Boot them anyway, eventually and the flight starts to suck somewhat less.

Ugh.

Good point: Landed a half-hour early in Beijing.

Disembarking, I get call on cell from... a colleague who won't be named. And receive a text message Shayna sent from JFK Wednesday night (ET).

Taxi at an exorbitant rate to hotel (I was in too big a rush to get to hotel and shower to care about a relatively modest act of extortion.)

Check in; being a day late no problem. Shower, drop down for breakfast.

Meet someone from our tour; from our part of the world no less.

Return to room, and Shayna and I get hit if not by jet lag per se, the reality of pretty much being up very approximately 36-odd (some torturous) hours.

We're here!

-- mitchell