September 5, 2025
It was a very sad morning for Kayleen and I as we woke up to a message from my parents that Opie had passed away. We knew that he was having a hard last few days and the vet was going to come to the house to check on him. I hadn’t even considered that he would pass that night but Kayleen said she had a feeling it could happen. We are both extremely sad we didn’t get to see him and be with him but happy he was with my parents. I wanted to add a few pictures of him to the blog that were always some of my favorites.
Today was a travel day where we flew back to Beijing now that all the national festivities were over. The flight wasn’t till 3PM so we had the morning mostly to ourselves but had to be on the road to the airport just after noon. We had breakfast at the hotel where Ollie continued to get his fill of dumplings. Kayleen was openly weeping at breakfast but both boys didn’t notice for a while. Eventually Lenny did and asked if she was OK. After Kayleen said yes both boys just moved on without pressing any further. We have not decided when to tell them yet.
The drive to the airport and flight were mostly uneventful. The seats on the plane were two in each row and as we were boarding Lenny made an unpleasant backhanded comment about sitting with Kayleen. He would regret this rude remark as it cost him his iPad for the flight. A punishment I was impressed that Kayleen enforced until he eventually fell asleep.
Once we landed, he was rested and in a better mood but begging to ride one of the free car-luggage carts in the airport. It was meant for kids half his size but he squeezed into it with half his body hanging out the side.
The airport was an hour outside of the main city, different from the one we flew to from Istanbul. It was built in 2019 to relieve all the traffic at the one near the city. Our guide for our time in Beijing, Vivien, met us in the airport. We got to the van with our driver and began our drive. The boys were being loud in the backseat but luckily Vivien has two boys as well so can relate to the noise and bickering.
As we got close to our hotel Lenny said he had to urgently pee. Vivien suggested that he just pee in a water bottle and when the boys heard that they were all for it. Kayleen took the lead and somehow there was no mess. Ollie, who had not needed to pee before this moment, suddenly urgently needed to go. Missing out on a chance to pee into a water bottle would have been devastating…
We got to the hotel after our driver navigated some crazy roads in the Hutong area we are staying in. They rival Seville for narrowness. Vivien helped us check-in at the hotel as most of the staff don’t speak English. Unfortunately the two rooms we have don’t connect so I am bunking with Lenny for our time here and Kayleen with Ollie. Fine for a few days but a real inconvenience since we have things in all the suitcases and share toiletries.
We realized that the hotel restaurant was closed so Vivien ordered us McDonalds to be delivered to the hotel, another healthy travel day! There was a robot that brought deliveries from the front desk to the rooms which I encountered in the elevator. The luggage cart I had wedged into the elevator trapped the robot and we had a stand off over what floor we were going to first as I had the robot blocked in. Eventually I got off first and our McDonalds showed up 15 minutes later but not in the robot. Hope he is OK…
