September 1, 2025
This is our first post where mine starts the minute Kayleen’s ended, meaning first night we were all up doing things past midnight! We lined up to board our plane to Beijing and got our first question about having no visa from the person scanning tickets. We told him about the 240-hour transit visa and he asked to see proof of our ticket leaving China and let us go ahead. Our first success!
The kids messed around on the plane for a bit on their iPads. No one slept on the first short flight or in the Istanbul airport so they were clearly exhausted. Lenny went down first with his iPad still playing. I don’t recall Ollie or I falling asleep but I’m sure we did for some untold number of hours. When I woke up and saw Kayleen’s elaborate set up, I was jealous of her neck support as mine didn’t feel great.
Once off the plane we were in a daze but focused on getting the 240-hour transit visa. We stopped to fill out the immigration forms everyone was completing while sitting on the floor. After getting those done, we scanned our passport at a kiosk were Kayleen and I gave finger prints and a photo as well. Finally, we saw a sign for the 240-hour transit visa with a few immigration officers sitting there. Best of all, NO LINE.
As we approached a woman directing traffic, with very little English, yelled at us not to go toward the 240-hour transit visa area. She kept yelling “foreigner” and pointing to the massive queue everyone else was going to. We eventually asked someone else in the same uniform as her and they told us we were head to the correct line but needed to fill out a different form, the one we did earlier was useless for what we wanted. We filled out the new form, which was more or less the same as the original one we did, and headed back to the line. The same woman was there telling us not to go that way with her “foreigner” and pointing. We ignored her and went anyway and her colleague eventually told her it was OK.
The immigration officer checked our forms and onward flight before taking more facial photos and finger prints. He was pleasant enough and after about 20 minutes we all had our 10-day visa and were off to get our bags which all arrived without issue. WE DID IT!!!
Wilma from WildChina was there to meet us and help shepherd us to the hotel. Everyone was a bit loopy, especially the boys, who after saying hello started to quiz her on if she liked the Disney movie Red Panda.
Once we got to the hotel Wilma helped us check in and we said goodbye to her for a few hours. She helps us get back to the airport for our early morning flight to Guilin tomorrow.
After only a few hours in China I recalled how 15 years ago I thought there was little English if any spoken. It’s still the same, even in a city like Beijing. Though our friends tell us Shanghai is different.
I muddled through ordering some room service for dinner and getting someone to open the connecting doors between our room and the boys. While I was doing this Lenny bumped his nose during a wrestling match with Ollie on our bed and got a bloody nose. Each time it happens it seems to be less blood and to stop quicker so we are hopeful it’s nearly healed.
The room service came on a nice table that folded out so we could all eat. Ollie got pork pot stickers that he devoured and made him a fan of China. We watched another episode of our Japanese game show, Final Draft, and all went to bed waiting for an early wake up call.
