I made it! The flights were smooth but long. I got a prop plane from SEA to YVR, which was cool. Those puppies are slow! But it was fun dropping down on Vancouver from the sky. I was in YVR for a good long while. I ate some rice and veggies and bought a fat magazine, a newspaper, and some chocolate.

I'm going to bed soon. I'm pretty beat. I watched all three movies on the way over, slept some, worked on a crossword puzzle. Used up 11 hours that way. The flight was longer than I thought.

I can't really tell I'm in China. For one, the shock factor is gone for me, oddly. The differences don't always register. Also, the airport is totally new! The last time I was here, the airport looked like an artifact of the fifties. I kept imagining the Communists liberating it from the Japanese it was so old looking. All gone now. Y lives in a very nice neighborhood in the suburbs which looks a lot like an American suburb, only a little off somehow.

Well, I'm going to bathe and hit the hay. Just wanted to let you know that I'm here. You can reply if you wish; Internet access is readily available, as you can see.

It's a starved morning—for food, for quiet, for light. I went downstairs in the waning dark for cereal. The baby was crying and the sound of the horns from commercial trucks already on the highway bellowed across the compound. I've slept about 12 hours and I'm still tired, but hungry.

Y says that she finds flying out of here an easier time, suggesting that I'll have an easier time adjusting upon the return leg. But my experience has always been that it's easier to adjust when I'm headed the direction I want to be going. I'm in no hurry to go home.

I flew in a prop plane between Seattle and Vancouver, my first time in a commercial one. Something about the smaller planes flying low feels safer. I don't know why. It reminded me of the time that I flew with Dave's dad in a Cessna and the chop was real bad. He was practicing go-arounds. He let me pilot, but the turbulence was so powerful that I couldn't keep altitude on my own. He was a teacher of Air Force pilots; he was kind and patient with me then.

The prop of today's plane made a V in slender shadow outside my window. We seemed to twist around Mt. Baker and slingshot right into Vancouver. The Vancouver airport is beautiful and simple. I hate SeaTac—everything about it. YVR pumps out the international flights, but it doesn't feel chaotic and crowded. The whole country is not as crowded. The international wing had the requisite duty-free shopping and the voluminous stores bustled with people flying to Tokyo, Hong Kong, Beijing.

On the long leg, I slept some. The flight attendents kept waking me to feed me, which I hated. That has never happened before. I also sat next to a man who seemed nice enough at first but eventually become totally annoying. He was Spanish and a citizen of Toronto. He'd married a Chinese women he met when he was in China playing rugby three years ago. They married quickly, and she has been living with her folks in Beijing since. He visits frequently. He said that she likes to shop and that she doesn't appreciate everything he does for her. He said that this trip he is bringing her home to Canada. He doesn't speak Chinese. To me he talked as if I knew nothing of anything, like I was stupid. I feel sorry for his wife. I know she married him to get something better for herself. It will be at a great cost.

The Beijing airport is entirely new from the last time. It has this ultramodern look, and yet, if you peer closely, you can see how poorly constructed it is. But again, no customs check, no real border control, no inspection of any kind except for the stamp on the passport. For as closed as the country has been, this is always a surprise to me. But maybe I am underestimating things. In Vancouver, all American passengers were tagged by the Chinese system before boarding the flight. I asked about it, and the Canada Air guy said that it'd be their butt if they didn't do this before the plane departed. Just Americans? Just Americans.

Y met me in the Customs line. She tapped me on the shoulder and when I turned, the man that had been standing too close behind me cut in line. Y said, "Hey, he just cut in front of you!" He and I had been having a bit of stare-down. I felt him too close to me, so I'd turn and glare and then turn away. When Y distracted me, he took what he wanted. It was a laughable assertion of his male dominance.

Y's driver took the bike/bus lane to bypass a back-up at an intersection. He honked and pushed his way through a throng of peasants departing from a bus and carrying large canvas sacks. They scattered. Y said he was only doing that because he had the diplomatic plates. It was shameful to me.

Y asked me if her driver wasn't stylish. And he was. She said he used to be a hairdresser, but perhaps he wasn't very good at it because now he's a driver. But he has the style. New Levis, a polo shirt with the collar turned up tucked in at the waist. His shoes shined, his hair styled whimsically. She said he was a good driver because he was comfortable asserting himself.