Made it to Hohhot

We made it to Hohhot!  I will blog as long as possible.  However, I didn't check to see if Macbook Airs have ethernet connection...and they don't!  Argh!  Didn't even think of that being a possibility.  I'm concerned about charging here even with a converter but hopefully it'll hold out til Guangzhou and I feel better charging there.
Our flight to Beijing was a huge blessing!  We had been wait listed for Business Class based on our miles, and at the very last minute we were upgraded!  Needless to say we were doing "the Happy Dance" down the sky bridge on the way to the plane!  We got virtually no sleep the night before leaving because we left at 4:30 AM We didn't arrive Hohhot till 11:30 PM Hohhot time.  That's 30 hours from house to hotel.

(Already looking tired and this pic was taken in Tulsa!  LOL!)

After a 4 hour layover, we loaded in Hohhot onto a bus that took us out to our plane.  At that point it was drizzling...but that didn't last long because a big storm was right on us.  We sat on the runway for an hour and a half with NO clue what was going on!  We get upset in the US when that happens, but strangely none of the Chinese people seemed even slightly phased by it.  It reminded me of the sense of entitlement we have and are used to.  When we pay for something our culture tells us we have a right to get what we pay for, and that includes an explantation if the service we ordered is not to be delivered as expected for some reason.  They don't seem to have that in their culture.
I did discover that there is one word that is exactly the same in Chinese as it is in English!  As we waited on the runway, a bolt of lighting hit so close that it felt like it hit the plane.  In unison you could here, "WHOA!"   From us (the lone Americans) as well as from the Chinese!  Would have been really funny if the situation hadn't been so frightening!  That was the big clue to us though that our takeoff was delayed due to WEATHER!  No confusion there!
The real disturbing part came when we were literally almost wheels on the ground and suddenly the pilot shot the nose of the plane in the air and took back off!  Of course we had NO idea what was going on and our poor flight attendant clearly hadn't learned to translate whatever it was.  We didn't know if there was an issue with landing gear, the runway was iced over, we had a near miss with another plane, or what.  They later told us in broken English that it was weather, but frankly that didn't make sense to us when we landed and it was about 60 degrees and dry here.  We were wobbling a great deal on the first approach, so I don't know what the deal was, but I'll tell you this, we were praying some heavy duty prayers and it's not something I want to experience again!
BUT, now we are safely on the ground and at 3:30 tomorrow (2:30 in the morning Central US time) I will have my little Inner Mongolian Princess in my arms!  I'd appreciate prayers for this process for little Kaylee as it will be very hard for her to understand.  She'll be leaving everything familiar.  Sounds, smells, residence, her nannies, her routine, and her typical diet.  Bless her little heart.  Someday she likely won't even remember this, but for right now, it can be very terrifying.
This afternoon we are due to go to the Mongolian Museum which should be very interesting.  I want to learn as much about the culture Kaylee Yumei came from as I can so I can share it with her later.
We'll have pictures to come!  Stay tuned!  I can hardly believe we're halfway around the world from all that is familiar.  Oh, and for those of you who know the extremely picky eater I am, I'm glad to report we found a Burger King in Beijing!  Yeppie!  I will definitely be going through all of the food I brought though!
God bless you all for your prayers through this process.
Love from Inner Mongolia,
Missy