The pictures above are from Victor Sailer, of PhotoRun, who arrived a day before I left for Beijing. It is near eleven in the morning on Friday, August 8, 2008 and my journey has begun for China.
With the deadlines for our Fall RN shoe review, plus several of the Shooting Star Media magazines, my plan was to stay up all night, get my work done, clear off my desk and head home to pack up my clothes, and then get a ride to Janesville, Wisconsin for the bus to Chicago.
I finished in the office about 1.30 in the morning and heading home with a computer bag and a gift bag from Julie Wells and Tom Mack as a housewarming gift for my newly dry house. Walking home at one thirty in the morning is not completely foreign to me, however, looking like one is moving, with two bags and every twenty feet, changing hands to the circulation is not cut off, did add some humor to the situation.
I have been planning my clothes and such for a week or so. My son, Adam, my normal traveling partner has a job and a new move in with some friends, so he was unable to join me in China, but he had picked up my dry cleaning.
About two in the morning, I felt exhausted, so I crashed til five in the morning, and packed up, checked the house and ran by the office at seven in the morning to check on some paperwork, say goodbye to Alex, our production associate and head to Janesville to make my bus.
The bus ride, two hours was sleeping between phone calls. I was thinking how travel has changed. My trip to Beijing will take thirteen hours by plane. Consider that when Marco Polo, all of fourteen, joined his father, Nicolo, on their first journey to visit the Kublai Khan in Khalaniq, now Beijing, it took the better part of a year! Things have changed a bit since 1266.
My visit will be much shorter than the Polo family ( they stayed for 24 years, as the guests of the Kublai Khan, the grand son of Ghengis Khan)–I will be in China for eighteen days.
My sister Kathy, always one to put things in perspective, sent me a note asking me if I had ever dreamt of going to China? Yes, I had, but it was behind working in a kibbutz, and a few other things. However, I am looking forward to the games, the feeling of Beijing, seeing a whole new part of the world and of course, trying very strange foodstuffs in order to annoy or intrigue friends.
I have no idea what this trip will bring, but I am looking forward to the journey and will write to you all soon, once I land in Beijing!
Oh, some track news, I heard that Tyson Gay has had a very good series of workouts, even some block work and is preparing well for the hundred meters! Should be a fantastic race!
