The arrival back into the U.S was a completely different experience! This time, I had my mom and my boyfriend waiting for me with a PB and J sandwich, apples, and some chips! I had put in this request weeks ago! I was so excited to be home to see my family! No more late night talks on Skype, no more missed emails, and no more asking to borrow someones international phone! I could actually talk to these people and touch them! When I finally made it through customs, my family was no where to be seen! This was their first time picking someone up from an international flight, so they were waiting close to the gate where the plane actually arrived. When I saw them, I ran to give them each a hug and a kiss! I finally felt a sense of being home! I really appreciate getting to talk to my family members, touch them, and having that ability to get in the car and go and visit them whenever I want!

What I miss the most about China… Everything but the frog! I especially miss the friends that I had made! Staying up late and having girls night, laughing, and playing games! Learning about England from our new friends! Paul, who I really bonded with taught us about pressure points on our bodies to help us remember things, get rid of headaches, and to help with foot pains (we had lots of those)! I also miss all the adventures we had! We would wake up and would hit the ground running! We wouldn’t stop until it was time for our heads to hit the pillow! With this, we got to see so much and do so much! I don’t regret a single thing we did while we were there!

If the opportunity ever arises again, I will jump on it so fast! I had so much fun learning new things, seeing so many sights that I never thought I would, and creating memories that will last forever!

I have mixed feelings about going home. I’m ready to head home to see my family and friends again, but I’m not ready to leave the amazing group I’ve been apart of! We have all become so close in such a short time! It’s going to be sad to leave these wonderful people!

I took the train a day earlier than the rest of the group. I was all alone and was scared to see who I was going to be sharing a room with and were things going to okay? How was I going to know when to get off the train and what am I going to do when someone asks me a question? I was slowly freaking out! I got on the train with no problem. got all comfortable in my bed, and was ready for a 18 hour long train ride of silence. Boy was I wrong! A couple got into the same car as me, got all settled and started talking to each other in Chineses. I knew this was going to a long trip.

What started out as a quiet train ride, turned into a loud and adventurous one! It turned out that the woman from the couple knew how to speak English! She offered me food– have you ever peeled a Pomegranate?, helped me buy dinner, and even let me join in and play a game that resembled Monopoly! Even though I had never met these people in my life, they were so helpful and wanted to please me at any moment, even though I felt like I should have been the one to please them! Once we got back in Beijing, we exchanged emails and I told her to find me on Facebook!

Sara was waiting for me at the train station platform and I have never been so excited to see someone I barely even knew! I invited her out for lunch before I had to say my final goodbye. I knew it was going to be hard to see her leave;  when you put so much trust and have a sense of security with a person, it makes it hard to see them leave. Over lunch we shared pictures of our animals and talked about each others culture. She then promised that she would come and visit us in America within the next year or so! She has always wanted to visit, but never has had the time to, even with her family living in Canada! It was then time to say goodbye… she helped me buy some snacks for dinner, got the bus to the airport situated, and then we said goodbye.

After Sara left, I felt so alone. I had no one to talk to, no place to go, and was left there to cry. So that’s what I did! All these emotions came fluttering in from nowhere! The stress of getting to China, being tired from all the activities had finally caught up with me, I was alone for the first time on this trip, and I was ready to leave, but I also felt like I wanted more. So, I cried. I cried a lot! It was pathetic, but I was going to miss this culture that I had grown to love in just three short weeks!

I’m really going to miss the friends that I have made who helped enrich my cultural experience! Like Victor, Liming, Brian, and Michael! They helped us get everywhere and helped us get out of a few sticky situations. I can’t express how grateful for all these men who made me appreciate their culture! Thank you guys for everything you did for us!

I’m looking forward to waking up and getting on the plane to go home, but I just don’t think I’m ready to leave. I just want to say thank you to those who made the trip so enjoyable! I never could have had this experience without everyone that was apart of this trip, so thank you!

Almost all of our group!

Before leaving for China I knew a little bit about TCM, but that was only because I had asked Patty about it. I was curious about the use of origins and what they actually meant. I was also a little hesitant– sticking needles into a person will provide relief? How is that even possible? I just had to see it before I could believe it!

TCM Hospital

My suspicions disintegrated once I had TCM done on me! When Teri and Simon were placing needles in my back and then they twisted them– my world was twisted! The needles Simon had placed earlier in my arm started to twitch from the energy that was moving! It was crazy! I then became a believer, but man my back was sore after the needles came out!

Needles in my back!

Even before I became a human push-pin, I had the most amazing experience I’ve had thus far in my life! While in a nearby village, the TCM students were practicing and offering up the skills they have learned. This was composed of one TCM doctor prescribing herbs for teas while the students practiced acupuncture, cupping, and moxibustion. Sitting next to the doctor, TCM students were practicing taking blood pressure. One of the students then asked us Americans if any of us knew how to take blood pressure… (this is my favorite part)… that is when I opened up my mouth to say, “I do!” I had taken a Certified Nursing Assistant class back in high school and that’s where I learned how to take blood pressure. Once they found out, I was strapped in with a stethoscope and a blood pressure cuff and I hit the ground running!

Taking Blood Pressure

Getting to help people who have no access to health care and not knowing the last time they received care; you could see how excited they were and that someone was taking care of them. The experience was so moving– I had an overwhelming sense of joy and I couldn’t get over the fact at how privileged we are as Americans with health care. I loved helping provide people with such small care!

I’ve been to a lot of historical places in America, went to Anne Franks house while I was in Amsterdam, visited Nurnberg while in Germany, and I went to Paris, but you can’t compare them to how massive the Great Wall really is! The wall stretches on for miles and miles! When the rest of the group was flying into China they could see the Wall from the plane! How amazing is that? You can even see it from SPACE!! But the most amazing thing is getting to walk, okay so more like climb stairs that are about a foot tall, on this breathtaking wall!

So many people walking the wall!

A little background about The Wall; it is the most recognizable symbol of China due to it’s long and vivid history. The Wall was constructed by  Emperor Qin Shi Huang in the third century B.C as hopeful deterrent from barbarians getting into the Chinese Empire. The most well know section of the Great Wall was built in the 14th through the 17th centuries. Even though the Great Wall never effectively prevented invaders from entering China, it became a psychological barrier for those outside of Chinese civilization, and today, it remains as the most powerful symbol of the country’s strength.

Group photo before we start the climb!

When we reached the third and final tier of The Wall; through a small little peep hole, we could see sections of The Old Wall. That itself was just unreal! That was a section that could have been thousands or millions of years old! It was then time to walk back down to the beginning of The Wall. Courtney and I saw a group of men lining up to have their pictures taken in front of a stone statue with writing etched into it. We then asked Pluto what it meant and instantly got in line! Pluto told us that it translated to, “It takes a great man to climb a great wall”. We figured that we had just climbed this amazing monument, why couldn’t we have our picture taken with this statue?!

It Takes A Great Man To Climb A Great Wall!

Showing how steep the wall is!

I took this picture while up in the air… I was leaving Seattle!

While waiting in the wonderful airport in Seattle, I frantically ate my last “American” meal, called all my loved ones about 200 more times… What can I say? I’m really going to miss these people! Then waited until I got to get on the plane to do one of my biggest fears… I was going to do this all alone, besides having my Pooh Bear with me! He’s like my little security blanket/ a little piece of home. He’s been all around the US, but this was his first time out of the country (when I went to Europe he was replaced by a much smaller one… I didn’t want to lose the special one!)

Anyway, now that I have embarrassed myself, lets talk about what I saw at the airport! Imagine a backwards “L” shape, I’m sitting in the corner and a 40 something year old Chinese woman is sitting in the long part of the backwards “L” shape, but really there are two seats in between us, which is just enough room for a little Indian girl. This little girl was so adorable! She would point out the window and would just say, “Plane! Plane! We ride on that plane!” she would then smile and giggle a little. This went on until the Chinese woman started asking her all sorts of questions; which entailed of, questions that any three year old should know. The Chinese woman then went on to touch her hair! I was expecting the girls parents to RUN over and take their daughter away! So, did they? Of course not! They saw nothing wrong with this at all! It was so strange, being in America still and having a stranger touch your daughters hair, interact with her, and tell her how beautiful she is I couldn’t believe that this was happening right in front of me and the parents were fine with it! That’s when I started talking to the little girl. Before we got on the plane, she ended up snatching up my phone, almost sitting on my lap, watching “rhymes” on YouTube and playing Angry Birds.

The plane ride wasn’t bad at all! I upgraded myself to sitting in a seat that reclined 25% more and had two more inches of legroom, that happened to be the best idea I’ve ever had! The flight was a total of 10 hours long, I slept for 6 of it, and then the other 4 I spent watching movies and I tried talking to the guy who was sitting next to me. This was the my first encounter of a language barrier. When I got off the plane, I immediately began to sweat; what I don’t know is if it was from being glad I just got out of a metal box, that it was HOT EVEN WHEN THE SUN WAS DOWN!!!!, or if I was nervous about my suitcase making it and how was I going to find Sara?

I made it through customs, got my bag, and found Sara all under an hour! We got into the Taxi, that’s what should have made me the most scared, but really I was too busy looking out the window and asking WAY more questions than I should have! The sky wasn’t anything I’ve ever seen before, but because of the “wonderful” layer of smog in the air and all the light pollution, the night sky looked like it was a brown color. Sara then said that it was going to rain later that night; being from Oregon, I wasn’t really looking forward to MORE rain, but I knew how to be in the rain and not melt! The thing that shocked me the most; besides all the skyscrapers, on every city block (there’s are like 4 of ours… no joke!) you could go without seeing a fast food restaurant!

Once we made it to the hotel, traffic made the trip longer than it should have and it was 11:30 PM! I got to meet Master Liming Yue in the lobby, say goodbye to Sara for now, and meet my roommate Courtney, oh and I guess finally go to sleep! I wish I could say that when my head hit the pillow I got a restful eight hours, but sadly I only got about three. I wasn’t used to the boards they call a mattress or the overly fluffy pillows. I then turned my trusty friend Mr.Kindle. I was in the process of reading, “Pretty Woman Spitting”, it’s about a woman who spends a year teaching English at a University in a rural area of China. She talks about the squatty potty and how it’s almost best to wait until you get back to the hotel, how not to eat anything off the street– the venders, learn some of the language, and to just enjoy all the sites China has to offer.

The book that gave be insight to China before arriving.

Well, I guess I should get some sleep before we start our adventures! Good Night!