The plane ride wasn’t that bad, and when we arrived at the airport, it was pretty nice. I didn’t know how sick of it I would be. I met my grandpa at the exit, where a girl and man handed us overly large bouquets of flowers. We headed over a large white arch in the airport, coming out only to be greeted by plit- plops of rain. Yay... What a nice start… You see, in China, they blocked most of the internet, Google, iCloud, stuff like that. I don’t know how I’ll live. Call me dramatic but that stuff is really important to me. My mom read me, “It’s fine! You have apps!” She exclaimed, trying to reassure me.
Anyways we headed towards a car, hands over our heads trying to block the rain. I leaped in. I regret that. The smell of a mix of medicine, barf and rotten fruit smacked me, and I found a little brown thing that looked extremely suspicious. I almost retched. Not only that but the ENTIRE SEAT was wet with rain, and it was DARK WATER from all the dirt and dust and who knows what.
I rode there for an hour.
We got to the hotel, and I shot out of the car. We went into the room, with the girl. We were great friends by now, and I offered her some candy. But the problem was, I could only speak a word of mandarin and she could only speak a word of English. “在学校你最喜欢的科目是什么？” (What’s your favorite subject in school?) She asked me. “Uhhh…” I muttered out. Then she tried English. “TV solar systems or walnuts?” We can clearly tell she doesn’t know English. “MOM translate!!!” I yelled and my mom came out and said “What’s your favorite subject in school?” She translated my answers and we went back and forth for a while. Soon she had to go and I had nothing to do.
We went out to dinner with our relatives . It was also my least favorite food in a place where I was basically mute. Smoky pots of chicken feet and snake ribs were given to us. Even the hotel people couldn’t speak English. It wasn’t fun at all. And it was the first day out of 10. Great. I picked up a piece of steaming duck. At least there’s one thing here that’s nice. We went back to the hotel and flopped on the bed. I opened up my iPad and tried to DO something. Nothing worked. I also brought the wrong book. How wonderful! I roll around in the old, rough bed trying to fall asleep.
Next morning was no good. I loved my grandpa but not the food. Sickly sweet dough balls in bean soup. My mom looks pretty happy though, to my joy. We get into the smelly car again, and I almost barf several times. We went to the place silk was invented!!! I got a silk scarf and wrapped it around me on the dirty bus. “Thanks for sticking around Kimmie,” my mom said with a smile. “It’s been really fun.”
After 7 days of terror, peeing all over myself trying to use a Chinese toilet, which was a hole in the ground where it was, “bring your own toilet paper,” We could go home. Right after today. I’ve never been so thankful. We went to an open mall when my mom says when I was little, I would ride some animal cart things. We wondered if it shut down, but when we entered another section, a little booth with many go-carts covered with stuffed animal “fur.”. I rode a little brown leopard, like when I was a toddler.
