Well – how fitting that my first real blog post on my new travelling blog is a whirlwind world tour. Unfortunately, I’m not travelling for pleasure but for work. And when it’s for work, as glamorous as it sounds – travelling kind of sucks. It basically a lot of talking to people I don’t know about accounting (how much more boring of a topic could you find).
Ho hum – I guess it’s not all bad. I do get to fly business class! So that’s kind of exciting! I can say when I travel on my own dime it’s generally by the cheapest means possible staying in some of the cheapest places (with the necessary splurge here and there). So as I sit here in my crappy Ramada hotel at the Shanghai Pudong Airport – I need to remember that at least someone else is paying for this and it could be a hostel. Although, I don’t mind staying in hostels because at least I generally get to meet some interesting people...
So anyways – business class! It makes me feel really posh and important! From sitting in the BA lounge before the flight drinking free wine and eating free snacks to getting to board in front of all the lowly economy fliers and setting up in my big seat with my foot-rest and my complimentary glass of champagne before take-off. And then pulling out my slightly larger than miniature TV screen to watch a larger selection of movies! I can say I am all caught up on my new releases! Then when I get sleepy – I can fully recline my slightly larger than normal business class seat and sleep (although I must admit I never had any trouble sleeping in coach – luckily I am a world-class sleeper no matter what I am sleeping on)! I even make sure I wake up for the flight meals. Which probably isn’t the best idea. Normally in coach I just sleep through the meals because they are such shit – but because they give me a table cloth and let me pick my main course from a selection of 3 – I feel somehow that these meals taste better. I’m going to have to stop that now though because they aren’t better than normal and they really mess up my stomach, which is already a bit sensitive from all the travelling – anyways – I also get to drink all my free wine and champagne J
Then it’s nice to have a taxi waiting for me upon landing – well, at least it worked that way in Belgium. That was the best organized session we’ve had so far. The organizer out-did anything I’ve seen on a business trip of this size. The transport, hotel, food, meeting room all were fabulous. We were in Spa, Belgium (which apparently is the home of some Formula 1 racetrack....luckily our evening excursion was planned by a woman so it didn’t include a tour of the racetrack). We had a gorgeous hotel, but in true travelling for work style we didn’t have time to really soak up the amenities. There was a funicular that went up a big hill to a spa. Alas – the closest I got to the spa was watching people ride up and down the funicular in their bathrobes all day as I sat by the window turning slides for the training course we were presenting. Apparently Spa was a hot spot in Europe for the rich and fashionable back in the day. It has 3 different kinds of natural mineral waters and was a must stop location on any grand European Tour! I learned this on the evening excursion we did have, which was a nature walk in the surrounding “highlands” area. The highlands of Belgium are about 500-600 meters about sea level (from what I remember from the walking tour). So we had a gentle stroll through there (I’ll try to upload some pictures from my mobile) as a guide told us about the scenery and history of the place. But the best part of the walk was the end (although it is always really nice to get outside after being cooped up inside all day) – but at the end of the walk we stopped at the picnic area. Which, unlike any picnic I’ve ever been to was inside a lovely round cabin with a massive open fire in the center on which all the food was being grilled. We were met at this building by waitresses with glasses of champagne and some small snacks! Champagne is a lovely end to a long day! Then as we gathered for dinner we were told out starters were grilled shrimp and some amazing Red Something Fish (sorry I can’t remember the type...but it was AMAZING). Definitely nothing I’ve ever prepared for a BBQ. So after the starter the chef introduced himself (in French of course) and described the main course. Through the translator we thought the main was described as SEVEN different meats. After a discussion around the table we agreed he must have said SEVERAL – because SEVEN would be a bit extreme. When our table went to get served it turned out it was SEVEN (7) different kinds of meat. Amazing!! Again, no BBQ I have ever been to was like this, we had a beautiful roast (1), there were ribs (2), and duck (3), and 3 different kinds of sausages (4, 5, 6) and finally some lamb (7). This was all accompanied by multiple types of salads, breads, and other sides. Once we had stuffed ourselves with all of this (along with all the wine we could drink) the wait-staff came out with a giant cake with massive sparkling candles on it! After doing a tour around the room with the glowing cake – they handed out a piece to each of us and it was a lovely vanilla ice-cream. I LOVE vanilla ice-cream so it was the perfect end to an amazing meal. I slept well that night J
So that about sums up the Belgium experience. Of course we didn’t fly business class there. We flew normal economy because the flight was only about an hour. Of course we did have to leave at the crack of dawn. My colleague and I were on the 6:55 flight while my boss took the 8:55 flight.
The following Monday (the Belgium trip was Weds – Fri, after a hectic training session in Oxford to practice on Mon – Tues). So the following Monday I was on a flight to the US – to Detroit of all exciting places to go. Blah – boring!! It might have been a bit more exciting if I would have had time to spend the weekend there and visit some friends, but as luck would have it, I had chosen this time to move out of my apartment in London. So I could only spend the minimum amount of time necessary in the US so that I could pack up my flat in London and move before heading to China!! Anyways – after my lovely business class flight to Chicago (we decided to not take the direct flights to Detroit since they left earlier in the morning, and I would rather spend the time relaxing at home than sitting in a hotel in the suburbs of Detroit) I had a quick hop over to Detroit. I forgot how crap the Chicago airport is. I love the Detroit airport (the McNamara Terminal of course) because there are lovely restaurants and a spa that I can get a nice massage or facial at. And I was dying for a facial in Chicago. I saw on the information board that there was a spa – but of course I couldn’t find it and in its place seemed to be a place that did the chair massages. So I queued up for one of those, which I suppose was better than nothing, before my little puddle-hopper plane left for Detroit. Upon disembarking in Detroit, I was surprised to find myself in unfamiliar territory. Now I have spend A LOT of time in the Detroit airport (lots and lots and lots of time) but since I was always flying NWA – I was always at the McNamara terminal. Now, since I was flying American – it turns out I was at the North Terminal. Horror of horrors, that meant I would be flying out of the North Terminal. Again, my dreams of a facial were dashed to pieces. And then – I had to get to the rental car place. I was determined to have a rental car in Detroit so that I would have my own wheels to be able to get to the mall! Now, picking up a rental car after a long flight and when you are tired turns out to be not a very good idea. I was told to make sure I got insurance on the car (work was paying) so I basically agreed to all the options the lady gave me when I picked up the car. Turns out all those options cost a premium. My rental car for 4 days was $660!!!!!! OMG!!!!
So blah blah blah – time goes on – we have our training course in Auburn Hills. Have a lovely dinner at a Bocce restaurant. The group in the US was good fun (of course Americans always are!) There were some good people there so that was a lot of fun. And we were a bit better at the training session by then (presenting it to almost all native English speakers really helped too). So when we finished on Thursday we had a quick run around the mall (and it really was a run! So many shops in so the hour we had before we had to be back at the airport) but it was well worth it. I love cheap American shopping!!!! Of course – I also went to Wal-Mart and Target in the morning before the last training session and shopped my heart out J
Blah blah blah – again time passes and I am back in London. Pack up more stuff on Friday and then drive back to Oxford on the Friday evening (after landing in London from the US at 7:00am). Bright and early Saturday morning I am up and ready to drive back to London in the big moving van (thank you Glenn for driving!!!) so I can pack up all my remaining possessions as quickly as possible and move out of my flat to drive back to Oxford to unload everything in my storage unit. Oh – by the way – I also had a whole load of travel vaccinations on Friday so my arms were nearly dead – good times! But luckily we did all the packing and driving in the perfect amount of time and had the van returned with 10 minutes to spare.
So on Sunday I was busy packing up my bags so that I could fly out again on Monday morning. This time on the longest flight of the bunch – to my 3rd continent - Asia. Luckily we had a direct flight into Shanghai from London. Unluckily, we arrived at 8:00am and the training started at 13:00!! And of course we missed the airport shuttle by 5 minutes – so we had to jump in a taxi for the 5 minute drive to the Airport Ramada where I am writing this blog as we speak. Of course there were no rooms ready for us (the woman that organized the China training wasn’t quite as good / well-prepared as the woman who organized the Belgium session) so I was super grumpy and tired and dirty after an 11+ hour flight with no room to get into . It only took about 45 minutes before a room was ready and I was able to shower and make myself presentable. I can say I don’t remember much of the training session from Tuesday!! It’s all a very very sleepy blur!! I was in bed by about 8:30 that night! Today was much the same. And sadly – the Pudong Airport is quite a distance from the city centre – so I don’t even feel like I’m in China. We spend all our time indoors in a windowless room – and from my hotel window I could be at any airport hotel watching planes go back and forth outside over a standard array of industrial type buildings. But – this weekend I’ll be free to look around to my heart’s desire! We finish the course on Thursday and I don’t fly back until Sunday! So I’ll have at least 2 days of sight-seeing (not much but better than nothing). Thursday and Friday nights I’ll spend at the Ramada (the company is paying – so might as well take my freebie) but Saturday I am splurging and moving to the top rated Trip Advisor Hotel – right in the heart of the Bund area. So hence- I am staying in my room tonight. I ordered room service and had a nice warm bath to relax – so that tomorrow night I’ll be ready to go out on the town. Hopefully we’ll head in for a nice dinner and then Friday we’ll have a lot of sight-seeing.
So there is the boring boring story of my 3 continent tour. Hopefully more exciting stuff is coming this weekend and I’ll have some good pictures to go with a great story about Shanghai. Otherwise – I am busy planning the next training session in Brazil – where again I’ll take some time out after to do some sight-seeing! Very exciting about that J
Sadly – for such an exciting topic (3 countries in 3 weeks) this was an awfully boring blog entry because I haven’t actually done anything. But that should change soon and my next post should be much better. And hopefully this one will be spiced up a bit when I am able to add some pictures!
Of course – being in China, blogger is blocked. So I won’t be able to post anything until I get back to the UK on Sunday. I was very unprepared and didn’t bring the email address for email posting to my blog. Ooops!
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