Just when I was starting to feel completely sick of being on an airplane — and coming to terms with the fact that I am not yet half done — the flight attendants appeared with the one redeeming factor for an eleven hour trans-Pacific flight: ice cream sandwiches. I saw them coming down the aisle and tried to communicate the fact to my neighbour, a middle-aged Chinese guy who I tried a little of my pitiful (so far!) Chinese on.

“Bing <ice>! Bing<ice>… bing<ice>… niunai<milk>… bing<ice>… tang<sweet>, bing<ice>.”

The crucial word I was missing (and have since looked up) was jiling – cream. Ice milk, sweet, probably all with the wrong tones, didn’t seem to get the point across, and I’m not sure he knew what I was trying to say even after they gave us the ice cream. I still, obviously, have a lot of learning to do, and pronunciation of tones to practice, too.

Things I did manage to communicate, though: I have studied Chinese for two months. I will be in Beijing for two months. I can answer affirmatively when asked if I will travel. Things I learned from him: He lives in Seattle, and has for three years — showed me his driver’s license and green card. He is a dim sum cook in Chinatown. He might even have told me what restaurant, but that I didn’t understand. With the addition of my visual dictionary (which is so awesome and I love it even though I’ve only owned it for three days) he indicated that he is going to Gongzhou for — lots of interpretation of sign language — something like the funeral for his parents, which will involve going to a temple and praying a bunch.

But in general, the flight is simply long, and uneventful and monotonous, the way eleven hours of wait for anything has to be. And next week, Alex, lucky soul plagued by government regulations regarding foreign workers that he is, will get the glorious opportunity to fly to San Francisco, get his work permit stamped in his passport, turn around, and fly right back to Beijing. So he will be doubly run through the wringer of international travel, and I will be quickly thrust, at least for a few days, into experiencing Beijing on my lonesome. Well, perhaps not entirely lonesome, as I have high hopes for language partners. We’ll see!

I’m big on using the power of the internet to learn Chinese. Actually, the power of the internet is the main reason I’m able to go in the first place — thanks, Al Gore!

The magic of the internet got me signed up for the Chinese class I was taking, provided me with podcast Chinese lessons, and with a great online dictionary, and looks to have helped me find a language partner (the catalytic power of Facebook!).

And then, there’s the power of Youtube. Not only does it provide Chinese lessons with Benny, but there is a crazy video-song of pinyin pronunciation. I’ll need that to counteract what I suspect may be a mish-mash of pronunciation in pop-song music videos. I found a bunch which are subtitled in both pinyin (not all with tone marks, unfortunately) and English, so I can listen and tell what vocab I know enough to hear and understand, and I can pick up some new words, like the fact that one of the words for ‘happy’ is the same as the word for ‘quick.’ Same character, even. And, of course, all those super important pop-song phrases, like ‘You and I’, ‘I love you’ and ‘open your heart’!

I’ve been working on packing today — I’m on round two. First I made a pile of all the clothes I wanted to take, and stuffed them in a suitcase to see how much it was. Then I went through it all again and considered what I really wanted to take with me, and added some books and toiletries and shoes and a coat.

The suitcase(s) I’ll be using are lent from a friend at work, and her cat is apparently fond of napping in them, which would explain Pippa-cat’s fascination with them. Either that, or she’s hoping to come with me. I could probably bring her along, I just wouldn’t be able to bring her back…

All told, I have slightly less than one full suitcase worth of things. And that’s excluding things like the cat, or my laptop, and camping gear. I will be bringing some hiking boots, and a rain jacket. With all my clothing in neat little piles around the living room, I took a moment to ask myself what outfit would I be able to pull together if we did manage to get somewhere mountainous and more chilly? And how many skirts do I think I’m going to wear in Beijing, given that I very, very rarely wear skirts in the States? More importantly, what sort of American am I, if so far I’m not planning on taking a pair of jeans with me?

I started out looking at posts at Global Voices on reactions to the protests tangling together Tibet and the Olympic torch. A vocal portion of Chinese are concerned that Western media shows only the anti-Chinese protests, and not pro-Chinese demonstrations. There are also various reactions to the Dalai Lama’s recent statement. The BBC prints reactions from Chinese individuals to the protests.

I can’t justify the violence on either side, but seeing as the historical Olympics in Greece were a time of truce, when all put down their weapons and thought of athletic competition, rather than violence, I think it is particularly sad for the two issues to have been linked this way.

I did find it interesting to compare the Xinhua [English-language PRC media] backgrounder with a somewhat longer history from friends-of-tibet.org.nz. Theoretically, wikipedia’s version is more balanced, and I’m not sure what to make of Lonely Planet’s story.

Also, we’ll see if this post is visible when I get to China. Alex’s office internet connect is reportedly outside the net, but certainly from the hotel I may not find much online about certain T- topics.

Bragging: I had a comment on a word included in the weekly compendium of comments on the week’s words from A Word A Day. I know they don’t include every comment sent in, because I have previously commented and not had it show up in the compendium message.

I’ve been running around with various errands this week, mostly related to getting as much grad school related paperwork in order as possible before I leave. I have the assumption that something due on May 1st will arrive shortly after I leave, and I won’t find out about it until mid-June, when I get back. I’m mailing them copies of my tax return for financial aid. Got blood drawn on Tuesday to be titered for measles immunity, as I have moved around enough to have no idea where my immunity records are. Still need to register for the online statistics course I hope to be taking from China, which, of course, I can’t simply register online for if I want to pay with my Americorps award.

With less than a week to go, I’m starting to have ‘last’s.

Yesterday was my last session with my Chinese teacher (who has a very thorough website). He gave me a hug and a list of a couple things he’d like me to look for in China, that he hasn’t been able to find here. One DVD or VCD of a particular opera or lecture on an opera, a book on dialects in China, and a book on rhododendrons. As far as I can tell, the selection encapsulizes his main interests in life.

Today is my last staff meeting, tomorrow my last class for kajukenbo. Tonight is a last girl’s night out with a bunch of us from work. I’m going to China, another woman is leaving to hike the Pacific Crest Trail.

Alex has arrived safely in Beijing, and is gearing up life there as I am gearing down here. I’m trying to use up all my food in the fridge, time my last load of laundry just right, finish projects at work. He is acquiring a new card for his cell phone, getting a gym membership, a bike. He is learning what places to go to hang out, I am saying goodbye to hangouts.

One week, and I’ll be on the ground, and worrying about readjusting my sleeping schedule. Beijing is fifteen hours ahead in the future. Alex always points that out when he calls — that he is in the future. The flying cars he describes failed to materialize last time I visited, but there’s a lot of technological innovation of there, so who knows. It would be an awesome thing to reveal for the Olympics!