...And 31 hours later, I arrive in Changsha.

Ok, I've now been in China for not quite two days and I have about 6 million things to say. I'm at an internet cafe breathing in very smokey air being charged 3 quay an hour (about 35 cents). All of my internet browser buttons are in Chinese characters.
But let's start at the beginning, then random impressions.

My plane ride over, as I said, was very long. Minneapolis to Chicago, Chicago to LA. On that flight I sat next to this Latino family. The little girl copied eveything I was doing (putting on headphones, blanket, etc) then she explained to me where they had been and where they were going. In LA all the worldteach people meet for the first time. I rode on the airport suttle to the meeting and there were two other people obviously in the program due to the fact that 1) they had big travel backpacks like me and 2) they were talking very loudly about going to China. I decided to keep my identity hidden from them. We get to the hotel and do some ice-breakers. I swear its like first year orientation-week all over again (and still is). Everybody is very friendly, and they seem genuinly nice (all 26 of them) but its still a little disconcerting because everybody's kinda "on". But I'm picky. It is really a diverse group of people. Most are just out of college, but we have some mid-20's, one lady in her 40's, and a retired couple. There are two black guys, three Asians, and a Polenesian (from Hawaii). 27 of us total.

So we got onto the flight to Gaungzhou, a 14 hour flight. We were grouped together so there is much happy banter. They feed us a quick meal and then everybody's out like a light (it's 1 AM La time at this point) including me. I sleep for about 7 hours, but the next 6 go by more slowly by kinda half sleeping, listening to music, reading, etc. We land and go through customs which is remarkably fast, then have 5 hours to kill until our connecting flight to Changsha. It is now 4 AM local time.

During this layover I get my first taste of China. First off, the airport is remarkibly clean. The escalator turn themselves off and on via a motion sensor. We get wisked away by some guy in a white shirt to change money for the airport tax. It turns out he's a black market money changer. Dooped in my first hour in the country! The airport tax, however, is real, as is the money (it could have been counterfit) so all that resulted was I got a worse exchange rate than usual. We get back on a plane for a short flight to Changsha, and are greeted by our field director Josh Hill. He's lived in China 3 of the past 5 years, and seems to be both very knowlegdable about Chinese language and preparing us for our daunting task of teaching in a country we've never been before.

We leave the airport and enter real China. It is ridiculously hot. I believe I heard it was 40 degrees celcius, or like 104 ferinheit. Ridiculous. Today it rained and it cooled down alot. Much better. We have lunch at the hotel and talk a little. How (one of our orientation aids) takes us to the bank to change money and buy phone cards. The phone card place is closed. By the way, How and Elenore are our two aids. They are both former students of Josh's, are 18 and just graduated from Secondary school, very nice and speak very good English. So we get back and have an hour until dinner. We go back to the room and my roommate NaVarrio falls asleep as I write in my journal. Then I have a half hour and can think of nothing else to do (and it's so inviting) that I laydown too. Just for a bit. Well turns out we both sleep through dinner, and all night long. A total of 13 hours. And man was it smart, cuz today both of us are very rested and (as far as I can tell) pretty much in synch with the time zone now.

Today we had our first classes, which was just some basic overview of what we will be doing. The real work (Chinese classes and teaching practice sessions) start next Monday and go for a week and a half. The school year begins the following Monday (the 31st I think).

Now- Fun observations! China very much reminds me of Europe in its this-is-very similar-yet-somehow-very different sense. Only dirtier, and everybody is of a different ethnicity than me. We defenetly are a specticle, but not as much as I thought we would be (although Changsha is much more cosmopolitan than Zhuzhou, where I will be teaching). People squat on the street. Traffic is crazy. It's weird, someone said you can't see all the history just by looking at the place, and that's true. But I don't think of this in terms of the ancient history, but the recent. I look at them and think "this is China, a communist, facist nation....looks pretty normal to me....". Some dude is watching porn a few computers down from me. The food is very spicy. I met another volunteer who hichups when he eats spicy food. Now, I know this is a no-brainer but I had an epiphany while eating dinner tonight. I'm going to be eating Chinese food for every meal, for a year. That's weird.

Something for you all to ponder. Josh came over here to teach for a summer program after college, never having studied Chinese or Chinese history. Now he's going for his PhD in Chinese history and is more or less living here perminently.

I should go back to the hotel and get to sleep now. Next time I'll tell you about my fellow teachers in more detail.

-the Wandering Norseman-