It all started with an official training to be conducted in Shanghai for hubby. He told me there is one such highly recommended training, that he has applied to attend and teased me with the idea of joining him there. Truth be told, I didn't jump at the offer, given my daughter's limited vocabulary in Mandarin and my non existent one:). Anyway he hadn't been accepted for the training yet and so I just postponed decision making to a later date. Suddenly, six weeks to go from his proposed training date, he gets approved for the training. As luck would have it, the training ends on the day the school mid-term holidays begin! There's nothing to do but prepare for our very first trip to China! It's almost as if China chose us!
Some of my earliest memories of China come from Bollywood and Hollywood films like
1) The words "Shanghai ki Angdai" from the Bollywood song "Mera Naam Chin Chin Choo"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVKEMOenP-o
2) The "Great Wall of China" from numerous movies
3) The Forbidden city in the movie "The last emperor"
Some of my earliest memories of China come from Bollywood and Hollywood films like
1) The words "Shanghai ki Angdai" from the Bollywood song "Mera Naam Chin Chin Choo"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVKEMOenP-o
2) The "Great Wall of China" from numerous movies
3) The Forbidden city in the movie "The last emperor"
China on our minds
So I head to the local library to brush up on my knowledge of China and have a better idea of what was waiting for us. I get my hands on a copy of Lonely Planet (Best of China) which I must say that's a darn good book for new travelers to China!k
Meanwhile, hubby dear, being the one to check about the passports, visa situation etc, just reminded me that our daughter's passport was due for renewal. I checked and we were 3 days short of 6 months on our proposed return date of a 8-day holiday to China! So I go online to see if we could get by with that and to my horror read stories of people being turned back from the airport even though they had 7 months left on expiry! Google has a long history of scaring me, so I take all the jail and deporting stories with a pinch of salt. I then turn to my trusted, wise and well-traveled Facebook friends network. Their advice was equally grim and urgent - you MUST renew your child's passport! It looked like Chinese immigration officers did not have a soft side to them, and if they did, they definitely left that side at home before going to work!
So, here we were, with 5 weeks to go for our planned vacation and a cool list of things to do:
1. Renew daughter's passport
2. Apply for Chinese Visa
3. Plan itinerary
4. Make bookings
Now step 2 had an interesting corollary in itself (Make cancel-able flight and hotel bookings to provide proof of visit for visa).
As you can guess, everything needed to be done double quick. Thankfully, my daughter's passport was easily renewed. Our friend who worked at the visa office also helped us tremendously by delivering the new passport himself. So we booked our flight tickets so that dear husband would fly early for his training, and me and beloved daughter would join him on the weekend. We booked our return flights together as family from Shanghai. Only later did we realize our mistake in this! We also booked a hotel for a week in Shanghai as part of our itinerary proof for China Visa, making sure the hotel booking was cancel-able. We were taking a risk on the flight bookings though.
Thankfully the China Visa was equally quick and efficient! I could take both my daughter and my passport to the office and it took me a whole of 5 minutes to get in, apply for visa and return with a date, of four days later, for collecting our passports. Now, that we had settled the visa and passport hurdles, I turned my attention to itinerary.
As I talk to my mom about our upcoming trip, she informs me that my cousin has visited China with family very recently and in the typical Mummy-way urges me to reach out to my long cut off relative to get tips and tricks.🙄 At her persistence, I awkwardly reach out to my cousin's wife, who, bless her soul, quickly overcomes any annoyance at being contacted only for information. Its been eight years since they visited Beijing and she jogs her memory to give me some good information.
She also mentions that a downloaded google translate or any other translate app can be a life-saver in China where most people can't say anything beyond Hello and Thank You in English.
My cousin said they had got a very good driver cum guide in China, who drove them around most of Beijing and who they communicated with using a translate app. She mentioned that this was a cheaper option as compared to booking a tour. In light of this new information, I started to look for tours, guide services and traveler tips in Trip Advisor and independent travel blogs. I also contacted a recommended tour guide from my Facebook friends network. The tour company came back with an extensive, touring and shopping itinerary. While the itinerary looked awesome, we could only cover costs by selling our kidney and liver! 😞Then what would we shop with?!
So I was back to lonely planet and the maps for us! And am I glad we did! Because as I went back I got more excited about the trip! Finally I was warming up to China. Lets face it, we didn't choose China, China chose us!!
