A Rough Start

OK! I'm skipping the blog about my family's visit to Tianjin and Beijing...until a later date.
Now, I'm on to bigger and better things!!!

Per and I just arrived in Singapore!! Tropical and nice from what I can tell, around 75 degrees F at 10 o'clock at night. But it was a ROUGH start.

I woke up at 9AM to Per's phone ringing...the taxi cab driver had called to say that we needed to leave an hour earlier than planned, 10AM instead of 11AM, because of the heavy fog. The major highways were probably closed...because its better to cause traffic chaos on smaller roads than let people drive carefully on a foggy highway....I digress

SO, fine, I can get ready in an hour no problem, at least we packed the night before.

We were on our way, and despite the fog, things seemed to be moving well.

That is when my intense migraine set in. Its been awhile since I had a full blown one like this. I got a little shiny blind spot and my face went tingly...all signs that a mega headache are on the way.
So, I laid down on Per's lap and tried to sleep it off. When I woke up, not much later, we are stuck in a ginormous traffic jam. Barely moving. Great. So, I remain postive, while Per gets irritated with the traffic. "We are gonna make it Per, don't worry." Our flight was at 3:30 and we were SUPPOSED to get to the airport at 1:30, but the clock was approaching 1 o'clock and it didn't look like we were too close to Beijing airport. Don't panic yet...

To be on the safe side, I decided to call the airline to see what time we had to check in by. I thought they closed check in maybe half an hour before departure...wrong. You must check in an hour before departure...oh and by the way, our tickets were non refundable and non changeable...so if we missed it, we were giantly screwed.

At around 1:40, Per and I really started to panic. So, Per called the receptionist at Vestas, Sarah, to see if she could ask the taxi driver about how long he thought it would be. AN HOUR!!!! WHAT! So...at this point, I could have started crying, Per too, but we didn't. Next thing we know, our taxi driver is pulling over on the side of the road, getting out of the cab, and talking to some Beijing cab driver. Then before I could even say "what the heck", we were being escorted to the Beijing taxi.....OK?

So we called Sarah again to see what the heck was going on, and she assured us that our lady Beijing taxi cab driver could get us there by 2:30 no problem. Time on the clock at this point is 2:00 and it is rare you can get ANYWHERE in Beijing in 30 minutes.

All Per and I could do was hold on for the ride! This lady taxi cab driver was DETERMINED to get us there on time...even if it meant running red lights, speeding, passing like a mad woman, and taking crazy secret backroads.

At 2:20 we were pulling up to Terminal 3 at Beijing airport. I SPRINTED out of the cab and into the airport frantically searching for our check in area. "Where do I check in for the Singapore flight!!!" I interuppted some guy in the middle of checking someone in. Meanwhile, Per wobbled into the airport as quickly as he could with both of our suitcases in tow.

BUT WE MADE IT! With maybe 5 minutes to spare.

A crazy start to what will hopefully be a GREAT vacation. Singpore till Monday, then off to Malaysia :)