Day 1: Flight/Arrival

Needless to say, before going to a different country halfway across the world from one's hometown, one must fly overseas.
It was my first time flying on December 27th, and needless to say, it was a pain being cramped for 14 hours on the flight from America to Beijing.

Why was I even going to China?

Well, for co-op. "What is co-op and why did it send you to China?", you might ask. Well, co-op is a mandatory program for all engineers at the University of Cincinnati (where I study mechanical engineering) and the search for a co-op landed me with this special program. Basically, 3 to 5 students from UC are sent over to UC's sister school, Chong Qing University, every semester.
CQU has an internal program called the Joint Co-op Institute where students in Mechanical Engineering and Electrical Engineering have the same coursework as UC students in those majors. This includes co-op, and all their classes are taught by UC faculty in English.

The UC TAs are supposed to help them with their English skills, and help them learn more about Americans as well. This is the most important part, because in the JCI students' 5th year, they come over to UC for their senior design.

Anyway, travel! We had to hop from Cincinnati to Detroit, flew from Detroit to Bejing, and then from Bejing to Chong Qing (with a stop at another Chinese city in the middle), for a total of over 36 hours of travel.

Our first flight was at 6 am at CVG, so we had to get up bright and early (I eventually got out of the house at 3:30). My mom got a rental car, since we don't own one, and she drove me to the airport.

At the airport, we met up at the Delta terminal. We said our goodbyes as our family waved to us from behind the waiting area. Going through security, Jessica was searched as her whole body lit up going through the scanner. But everything was quickly sorted out. She was jokingly labeled as a security threat by the rest of us, and we kept moving along.

All 6 of us... me, Prof Will Wong, Greg Brown, Dominic, Nick, and Jessica (left to right)

 Then we got on the connecting flight to Detroit, which was a bit cramped, and I had my first airplane food (not much to write home about....just pretzels and water). The sensation when taking off was akin to a roller coaster, which is appropriate considering the gravity changes are about the same at the beginning.

A couple hours later, we were in Detroit, and wandered around the airport for a few hours. We sat down at a great restaurant, and I had an omelet scrambler, which was my first real meal of the day.

Waiting at the Detroit Airport

Then, we got onto the plane, and settled in for the long haul. Once we got up into the clouds, the view was incredible. It inspired me to start writing some poetry as well. Some pictures are below.

Over the rest of the flight, I watched two movies (The Secret Life of Pets, and Erased, a Japanese movie about time travel), watched a few episodes of two TV shows (Adam Ruins Everything and Dr. Ken), read a little bit of my book, slept a couple hours (about 2 or 3 because I was very uncomfortable) and had a couple great long conversations with my future roommate, Jessica.

When we finally got to Beijing, everyone was relieved.

We had to go through customs, which was easier than I expected, just handing over the passport, getting a picture taken and going through. Jessica once again set off the heat sensors going through, and a Chinese lady ushered her into a side room, which freaked out everyone, but our boss, Greg, and Prof Will Wong, who was traveling with us, went in there and got her back. We figured out it was because she was slightly sick and her body temperature was elevated. The security threat jokes continued a bit, but it was all in good fun.

Gorgeous mural at Beijing Airport

Then we went to get some money out of the Bank of China ATM, which conveniently connects to most US banks, including my bank, PNC. We took out 500 quai, which is equivalent to about $75. But everything is cheaper in China than it is in America, so it will last for a long time.

There were two floors of restaurants, one above for tourists, and one below for the Chinese travelers. Needless to say, we went to the authentic restaurants downstairs.
I wasn't too hungry, because they gave us two meals and snacks on the flight, but I wanted to try something for my first meal in China, so I had some red bean soup and a bottle of green tea. I found the soup a bit bland, but putting some vinegar in it made it taste a lot better.

Then we went to go check in, and there was a Females Only line for going through security. The lady patting people down checked me several times for some reason (maybe I looked threatening?) but all was well quickly.


Then we got on the flight from Beijing to Chong Qing. I was sandwiched between two Chinese passengers for the first half of the flight, so I took the opportunity to rest. There was a short layover, and then when boarding the plane again, I was again between two Chinese passengers and rested.

Finally, we were at Chong Qing, and after grabbing our luggage, we went out of the airport to meet the driver. He immediately came up to me and grabbed my luggage cart away from me, which was discombobulating, but I let him push it for me, as long as he stayed within walking distance.

Arrival in Chong Qing

We drove to our apartment complex, and I noticed that the stoplights had numbers counting down for the amount of time left for the red or green light. I thought it was a really good idea, and was similar to some crosswalks in the US. (I didn't get a picture, but I will post one in a future blog).

When we finally got to our apartment complex, we were greeted by a lot of Christmas lights hanging from the tree (apparently Christmas is still a big thing here even though there are few Christians).

We got in, finding a few bikes for us, to my delight. We got in, finding each apartment had two bedrooms, a pretty comfy couch, a kitchen, a washing machine (no dryer, clothes have to hang to dry), and a TV. Additionally, the other TAs left some stuff that they didn't need behind in the apartment, like old umbrellas, laundry detergent, etc.

Organizing my stuff, I realized that I'd be pretty comfortable here for four months.

And that was my first day in China!
Until my next post, folks!
-Zoe