11th August: Day one

I woke up and we were an hour from Hong Kong. We transfered to the Beijing flight with great ease as the airport is very well layed out, with plenty of English signs.

In Beijing we got the bus into the city. The bus passed Tianamen Square where literally hundreds of thousands of people had gathered to watch the lowering of the flag at sunset. We jumped off the bus and hopped on the 52, in the wrong direction! We jumped off again and got on the right bus. We then had to get on bus no. 2 to get to the hostel. We showed the driver the name and he seemed to know. He dropped us off in the middle of no where! Since we didn't have the name written down in English no taxi driver could help us.

By some stroke of luck, two french girls passed and we asked them if they knew where the hostel was. They had been there a day ago and had a card. So, they put us in a taxi and showed the driver the card and in a matter of minutes we were at the hostel.

Club sandwich + Beer + Day of travelling = BED

10th August:China at last

I looked out the window and saw Dave Murray getting on to a bus, he has arrived in Dubai and is staying in my old apartment. I ran down and met all the Newbie's heading off for their orientation day. None of them have stepped outside for more than a few seconds because of the heat.

For the rest of the day I lay by the pool hoping that today would go smoothy compared to yesterday.

They did and we got on the plane after a few pints in the Irish village. The flight was excellent, huge seats, good food. I took some travel advice and took a pillow from the plane which would prove invaluable in later days!

9th August: The trip begins.

Not that hungover I went down to the Embassy to collect by new shiny Vietnam visa while leaving Rich to sleep off the Bullfrogs. Did some last minute shopping before heading to the airport at 10pm. We arrived a bit early so our flight number had no gate yet but we went through security checks anyway. An hour later we were told that the flight was cancelled. At first we were disappointed but then we realized that they would have to put us up in a hotel for the night.

We went down to the China Southern office but it was closed and there was no staff to be found. No one in the whole airport could tell us why the plane was cancelled and when we rang the head office of China Southern no one would answer. Since tomorrow is a holy day the office would not be open tomorrow either. We made a quick decision and booked a flight to Beijing the following day. We lost out on 100 euro but our other option was to stay in Dubai for the next China Southern flight which was a week away. We went back to the apartment.

A bad start.

8th August: Back in Dubai

Woke up early and headed down to the Vietnam embassy to get our visa's sorted. We were told that at 7.00 it would be dry because of Mohammed's assention into heaven (or something) so we headed to Fiber's for a liquid lunch. At 5 we found out that the dates had been mixed up so it wasn't dry at all. We headed to Mall of Emirates to watch the new Simpsons movie which for me, as not the greatest fan, did not live up to expectation. Although saying this, you can never judge a film in Dubai since you don't know how much they censor out. Heading back to the apartment we convinced Liz and Natasha to come out with us, so we had a few drinks before heading to Rock Bottom. The bouncers told me the next time I come I should dress more appropriately. Of all places to hear that! We introduced Rich to Bullfrogs and he drank 5 of them. The record! We met some Emirates crowd and they came back to the apartment for a bit of a party. Tame enough. One of the girls introduced herself like this:

Emirates girl: Hi, I work for Emirates, what's your name?
Me: I am not going to buy you a drink.
Emirates girl: Well, I'll find someone who will! Emirates girls never have to buy a drink!
Me: ..........ok........

In fairness to the girl, she was right. Someone did buy her a drink. A bit sad though that you have to introduce yourself as your job to get someone to talk to you.

Hi, I'm a Mechanical Engineer.......want to talk.....

Foot and Mouth

Day one saw an early riser as I had to be in Shannon for a 7am flight. When I got there I ended up going on a different flight as my flight was delayed somewhere over the atlantic in a traffic jam or something, I won't go into details. So I arrived in Dublin early and half way down an escalator I spotted that they're were mats put down for the foot and mouth thing and a big sign telling everyone about the outbreak in England. The guy in front of me was shuffling around a bit before he leaped clean over the mats. I asked him what he was doing and he said that he didn't want to get his new shoes dirty! Deadly serious! He then made a remark I will not forget. ''Sure, humans can't get foot and mouth anyway.''

I met up with Fi and Rich in Dublin airport and we boarded the 12.15 flight to Dubai. The flight was alright, the usual Aerlingus shite. The hostesses looked like they didn't want to be there. It was a scorching 47 degrees when we landed at 10.30pm. Met Liz and Natasha going through customs and headed back to their apartment for the night.