Background
Trip Start
Aug 08, 2006
1
14
Trip End
Aug 23, 2006
Eugene,
Oregon,
United States
Friday, July 28, 2006
Well, this is the fist post of my new travelogue. I'm wanted to journal this trip in some way, and exactly how I was going to do that has been bouncing around inside my head for the past week or two. I was thinking I was going to need to write something, or pay for some service. But a simple search for "travel log" in Google brought up this site 1st thing on the list and I must say I'm quite impressed.
If you are reading this and haven't heard about my forthcoming trip yet, I apologize for not being in better touch. I've been completely buried at work for the past 2 months. The company I work for (Petersen-Arne) finally made their move to the new facility, which of course meant that all things network/phone/computer/etc related fell into my camp to organize, move and bring back online
After the formal
. The move went spectacularly well, there have been plenty of issues, but they have been the kind of issues that take time to work through, but they aren't particularly miserable to deal with. In my world, there are generally two kinds of problems: 1) the kind that you see the issue, mostly understand it from the get-go and can more-of-less see the path you need to take to get to the solution. Or 2) the kind that just hit you upside the head like a ton of bricks, it's massive crisis/drama with all people involved and you have no clue what to do next. Of those two types of problems, the first kind are the best to have.... sometimes even fun to work through. And the second kind just suck. Suck suck suck! I swear I've lost years off my live struggling with problem like that in the past. But luckily we didn't have any like that due to the move. They were all the first kind. So I was at work a lot... I mean ALOT. From the day of the move until 27 days later, I wasn't at work exactly once, and that was 4th of July. I remember sitting there staring at the blue sky (which I hadn't seen a lot of lately) and my brain kept churning on and on about all the things left to do at work.But a lot of that has settled down quite a bit. I actually take 2 day weekends now (sometimes) and when I am here, I usually leave before the 12-hour mark. There are still a couple of times I've seen the sunrise on the way home
Everyone's Favorite Picture
. But I just tell myself "Hey! I'm already on China time!" and hit the sack.The whole timing of this year has been something of a grand synchronicity the likes of which I've rarely seen before. Almost the exactly opposite of last year. Many friends and family who will be reading this don't even know about Rebecca yet. She and I met around the beginning of the year through dancing, but didn't really start hanging out until almost march. Then after a couple of months discovered that we kinda liked each other a lot and decided to give dating a try. But there was this crazy hitch: She was leaving the country in 6 weeks. "OMG" I thought "Not again!" :-)
Turns out she's a language fanatic. She loves languages and she's quite good at them. She was leaving for China on a summer language program. "When do you leave?" ... "Oh, that's only 4 days before the big move at work." So we spent a ton of time together before she left, then I took her to the airport, came back to Eugene and jumped into work hardcore. The timing was perfect.
But a person can only go so long before they need a break. I haven't taken a big vacation in a long time, and there have been like a dozen times I haven't been able to visit friends abroad and I've regretted it ever single time. But this time it actually looks like it's going to happen, Yay!
First was the actual plan tickets. Once those showed up it was like a misty dream suddenly jumping out into full technicolor. I forwarded my confirmation email to Rebecca and once she saw that, apparently she went ballistic with excitement
OMG! That's my baby!
. That's always a good feeling when somebody gets like that when they find out you're coming to visit them. (She's really pretty amazing)Next was the struggle to get "Zee Paypaz". Not really that much of a struggle, just more money. You see, you can't just show up in China and say "I'm here to visit". You have to get approved by the Chinese consulate beforehand. So I had to send off my passport, a couple of passport photos and a wad of cash to some place in Texas to get a Chinese Visa glued into my passport. I actually called Rebecca (Yay Skype!) when that showed up and I got to hear first-hand her level of excitement. I think I smiled for the next 24 hours.
Then there was the shopping. I'm going to take the "Accidental Tourist" approach to this trip. Enough clothes for 2, maybe 3 days, and cleaning them each night. I got a nice small day-pack at REI, and my goal is to have it under-stuffed when all is said and done. All of my previous trips I've been pretty bad at over-packing, so this time I'm not letting myself. I'm pretty sure I'll survive just fine. Of course, we'll see as these travelogue's continue over the course of the trip.
