it was and 8 hour flight roughly. I flew out of the new international terminal at hartsfield. it was super nice and clean.
AND bringing up a past post. The designers of the airport must have hear my plea about taking all of my luggage to the bathroom and how cumbersome that was....BECAUSE they elongated the stalls. they aren't any wider but they are longer so you can open the door with your luggage and you inside. beautiful. now i can continue flying solo..well internationally at least.
oh. side note. the new terminal has a varsity. just fyi.
as i was boarding my flight to frankfurt , i was walking behind these really really really tall russians. and as long would have it one sat next to the seat i was supposed to be in. perfect. loud. crazy. 6'8 russian for 8 hrs. but then his friend began trying to seat in the row in front of where i would be sitting next to a smaller calmer looking guy. so i called an audible and asked if he wanted to switch so they could sit next to each other. they did. fantastic. then one said the other regretted switching because now he isn't next to me. case in point of why i wanted to switch.
the guy next to me was actually really nice. and was surprisingly russian too. but he also spoke english and german. he read through like 6 or 7 newspapers. a couple in each language. he also have me a ibuprofen for my headache that was mixed with motrin. that russian headache medicine was no joke. completely wiped out my headache. he also gave me his fruit cup in the 'morning.' which is pretty serious it had fresh pineapple, watermelon, and A blueberry. his name was Alex.
We landed and had to go through security. Then I waited for 4 hrs for my next flight to beijing.
the flight to beijing was less eventful. i sat next to some chinese people. who didn't talk to me. it is ok. i took a nyquil and slept.
my flight got in at 5 AM Beijing time. Beijing is 12 hrs ahead of atl. Then i had to go through security and customs which was actually pretty easy. I met a german guy around my age in the customs line. he started speaking to me in german. which i returned with a confused look and 'uhhh' to which he replied in awesome english..'oh, you don't speak any german?' no. no i don't. he then asked if i learned chinese. nope. he said he started learning on the plane. his name was Martin. we talked until i had to exit out of the airport and he had to switch to some connecting flight to some tiny city.
and when i walked out..there was CORI waiting for me. and looking about as tired as i was. we got money out of the atm. found the airport express train to the metro line. and sat. and breathed.
we got off on the metro line "close" to our hotel. we stayed in a more traditional area of beijing. which was interesting AND confusing. and had little to no english. LUCKILY we had our hotel address in chinese and be having no shame just went up to people and pointed. most people were really friendly. and also fluent in hand signals. once in the right direction. there were signs for our hotel. heavens bless.
we got to our hotel around 8:30 ish exhausted. we cleaned up slightly and gave our bags to the hotel.
we were off.
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