I'm baaaaaack!

Did you miss me?

So, from here on in - along with any regular posts - I shall be amusing/annoying/inspiring jealousy in you with my stories and adventures of my first ever (and certainly not last) backpacking trip. And I'll even add pictures! Of which I have many.

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Tuesday January 22, 2008

T = takeoff

T - 60 minutes: wake up. At the ungodly hour of 5:45am. The time of day reserved for chirper morning folk who must seriously have some kind of chemical imbalance to be able to function at such a ridiculous time of day. I'm not a morning person, can ya tell?

T - 45 minutes: find out the fourth person scheduled to join us on the trip is violently ill and in no way prepared to spend eleventy billion hours sitting on the toilet of a train. He's the only one of us that can speak relatively decent Chinese.

T - 10 minutes: I discover that my phone has been stolen. This is unbelievable. I haven't even left yet!

Crap.

I am approximately 86.3% certain I know who stole the phone. There was a boy eyeing me and who even followed me for a short while. I'm pretty sure he pinched it when I took my hand out of my purse for about 15 seconds to hold my pants up out of the mud. It was very crowded and I was distracted so it would have been quite easy.

The only satisfaction I get from this is that he probably expected me to have a really nice, high-tech phone. The stereotype of foreigners is that we're all filthy rich and spend money like we breathe air. Ha! I showed him...

So kids, the lesson learned from this? Wear belts that actually hold your pants up.

The scenery on the way up to Qingdao was actually quite desolate and grey.