Beijing is a long way from Baltimore and by the time I got home, after two flights and 34 hours without sleep, I was exhausted. Too wired to go to bed, I had a drink and watched some of Saturday Night Live, a show I used to enjoy but has somehow gotten so bad that it’s no longer even funny. Or is that me? Or is it just not funny after 34 hours without sleep?
I got up early in Beijing and worked to bring this blog up to date. I know there are lots of errors in spelling, two entries are too small to read and only one or two entries are accompanied by a photograph, a feature that always makes reading more interesting. So I want to correct all that when I get the chance. But getting it down as a record, imperfect though it may be, seemed important so I worked away most of the morning, pushing beyond instructions in Chinese, where I needed the help of a very helpful Chinese lady. She knew about the internet but nothing about blogging so it took both of us to bring it up to date.
Angela picked me up right on schedule at the hotel at one o’clock and there was surprisingly little traffic so we got to the airport quickly and easily. Check-in was routine and I waited several hours in the Star Alliance lounge, trying to rest before a 13 hour flight to Chicago. That, too, was routine. Fortunately, I was traveling business class in a pod that actually permits lying flat. But I’m too long, from top to bottom, to do that without my feet hitting the wall at one end of the pod. So I was restless much of the time and really didn’t get any sleep. My companion in the pod next to mine was Chinese and a big drinker so the combination of alcohol and Chinese food on his breath spread a fragrance over our area that took some getting used to. To take my mind off the surroundings, I watched two movies, one about Ernest Hemingway and Martha Gelhorn – interesting but not great, but it starred Nicole Kidman and Clive Own so how bad can it be? – and the other called “People Like Us,” a real tear jerker.
I spent another several hours in the United Club at O’Hare before my ultimate flight to BWI where I was met by a very nice young man from the USSR and Freedom Service, who brought me home. My luggage didn’t make the plane from O’Hare to BWI so I’ve spent the morning (now Sunday) catching up on my mail and paying bills. When the luggage comes, I can devote all my attention to that.
I had a really great time but am happy to be home. International travel, though thoroughly educational about other cultures, has become increasingly difficult, partly because of my physical condition but also due to the sheer numbers of people traveling. Everything seems crowded, particularly in China, partly because of the national holiday. And traveling alone is somewhat more difficult than traveling with a friend. I had to make a real effort – not difficult, but effort none the less – to meet people, introducing myself and asking their names and where they were from. (That seems to help me remember the names more easily.) I was very fond of Bruce and Dede whom I met early in the trip and with whom I shared some experiences. And, as I’ve said before in this blog, you really can’t ask a couple to join you for dinner; it seems too pushy. You really have to wait for them to ask you. So I often had dinner alone. Julia, too, was a trip. At 93, she was so up and so spry, she made all the rest of us look like elders.
Silver Sea was everything I had expected…luxurious and service oriented; most of the staff called me by name. I wonder if they have a bulletin board in the crew’s quarters with our photographs on it so the crew can learn our names easily. Anyway, I was called “Mr. Cooper” regularly, a service that always makes one comfortable. And I met two crew members I’d traveled with before, always a pleasure.
My impressions: Japan is clean and extremely orderly, no trash on the street and you can set your watch by the times trains and buses arrive and leave. China is more difficult, less clean and extremely crowded. The Chinese who, without apology can push their way ahead of you, are also less polite than the Japanese who bow and scrape in their sense of personal grace. South Korea – at least that part of it I visited – left little impression on me. Seoul is just another big city. Jeju, a resort island, is much more interesting. But make no mistake about it: China has incredible energy, a glorious past and is determined to have a distinguished future.
This may have to be my last trip of this kind. Perhaps it was the trip itself; I’d been warned that it would be arduous. Or it may have been my own physical condition, with a fairly new knee and only recently healed (but still displaced) vertebrae in my lower back. But I grew weary often and a couple of times wondered if I could make it back to the ship from a particularly long shore excursion. People traveling with me were very helpful but needing someone to help me on and off a bus and help me stand from a seated position made me feel suddenly old. Still, I’m very happy I went. And the trip did accomplish what I had wanted: to get away from the recent noise in my life here and to be waited on by those devoted to my pleasure.
I hope you’ve enjoyed reading of my experiences and impression. Until the next trip, whenever, and wherever that might be,
Stay tuned.
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