Mongolia Chapter 1: I explain to you why China will never actually be a world power.

Ah, yes. Travel blog entries. You love them. I love them. I probably love them more than you love them because, well, I did the traveling.

Mongolia was amazing, but I'll save my cooing for the end.

I arrive in Pittsburgh a day before our flight so that Pook and I can check our packs, and what we discover is that, essentially, we are missing nothing. This is a rare and wonderful thing. It means that aside from one last run to target for some last minute bungee cords and an extra camera battery, we get to enjoy the day in the company of HoneyDunce and relax at meals and get our internet fixes before we go. All is good.

Leah is nice enough to drive us to the airport at the crack of dawn. After we check our baggage, Pook looks at me and says, "So, those backpacks are check ALL THE WAY to Ulaan Bataar?"

"Uh, yes." I say.

"That doesn't worry you?" he says.

It didn't, mind you, until that moment. That moment when I was faced with a look ahead at the possibility that if our luggage didn't make it into this vaguely third world city we were flying into, we would be horseback riding and camping with ... no gear. And so, then, for the rest of the day, a minor ulcer grew in my stomach at the prospect of not having luggage.

The flight to JFK is fine. The flight to Beijing is looooong. Ironically, the in-flight film that United Airlines has chosen to show is "Stop-Loss." Perhaps you are familiar. It's a film starring playboy Ryan Phillippe as Staff Sergeant Brandon King, and it basically portrays the U.S. military establishment as the left hand of Satan. Now, think what you will about the U.S. military establishment, but one has to wonder if the best possible in-flight entertainment for a plan for of foreigners is necessarily a movie crucifying the U.S. military. I'm just saying.

And then we get to the Beijing airport.

Ah, the Beijing airport.

May I remind you that, as I write this, we are but weeks away from that airport being overwhelmed with tourists and such for the summer Olympics?

We begin by going to the International Transfers desk, which is where you go if you have an international transfer. At which point we are informed that (now mind you, China hasn't necessarily admitted yet that Mongolia is not China) we need to just go through customs and then head to "Terminal 2."

So we head to the customs line marked "International Transfers." Because we are logical siblings.

This is not correct either.

What IS correct, and I have no idea how one would figure this out, is that you need to go through the DIPLOMATS line if you are currently and international transfer in the Beijing airport and you need to change terminals. There are no signs to this effect, and the ability to communicate this information if you don't speak Cantonese (or is it Mandarin?) is limited.

After that, you're on your own to find terminal two - WHICH IS A TWENTY MINUTE SHUTTLE BUS RIDE AWAY ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE STREET. I'm serious. I hope you have serious layover time if you need to make that change. Fortunately, we have serious layover time because WE HAVE A FOUR HOUR LAYOVER.

If you have ever wondered what discomfort is, it's having to spend four hours in the crappy, crappy lame terminal of an airport, with one bathroom with an attendant who hovers over you at all times, for four hours after a 15 hour flight. This is how you kill that time:

- You go to a tea house and have some tea and dumplings. Blissfully ignorant as to the current yen to dollar conversion, you spend about $100 on this activity.



- You sleep in the main lobby, where it smells and the chairs feel sweaty.

- You then switch to the international check in area and sleep there. On the floor. With a hoodie pulled over your face. You are thankful that your little brother is too tired to take a picture of that moment. Nick the British Lawyer is not thankful that Pook overlooked that photo opportunity.

Finally, people start to arrive to check in for the flight. MIAT is not known for its timeliness. In fact, the locals refer to it as "Maybe It Arrives Today". Ha! I didn't know that when we booked the flight. The check in area for our flight to Ulaan Bataar includes of the "regulars" you would expect to see in international travel, by which I mean:

1. The obligatory white French guy WITH DREADLOCKS SO YOU KNOW HE'S LIBERAL
2. The obligatory white woman IN A SARI SO YOU KNOW SHE'S INTERNATIONAL
3. The obligatory unmanaged children running all over with their soccer ball

We finally make it through check in, through customs and into security. The security line is taking FOREVER, and so finally I peek around.

"Joel," I say, "Look up there. There's no x-ray, right? They're MANUALLY checking bags, aren't they?"

Joel cranes his neck ...

"Yes, yes they are."

At which point, before I can think to stop it, the followings comes out of my mouth.

"Oh my GOD. This is why China will never actually be a real world power."

Insert the view of all heads turning in and Pook looking at the floor.

And this doesn't even touch the story about the same airport on the way back! But we'll save that.

All things end well. We land. Our guide, Mandaa, whom you will learn to love as we did, meets us and takes us to the airport. Our baggage is there and I rule supreme for deciding we wouldn't lug them on as carry-ons. We get a good look at the communist monument known as Ulaan Bataar before we head off to bed.

And then, in the morning ...

Adventure begins! Hope you're ready to read!