James Chan

What a journey yesterday!!!

Getting up at 6:30am, I packed everything, then I hurried up to get a taxi to the Wenzhou airport, I ate nothing. At the reception desk in the airport, I took my air ticket, then security check and went to the waiting room. I bought a bottle of milk which was my breakfast. I was hungry but I did not have more food.

In the airplane, after seated, I started talking to the lady beside me. It was short conversation but it was good to know it was her first time flight, she will be going to Beijing for an exposition. After that, I started to catch my missing sleep until landing.

By the way, my schedule was very tight. So I got off the plane, by the time it was 10:00am, so I rushed to the bus station to buy a ticket to Suzhou, however, the earliest bus I could catch was at 11:00. I ran to the KFC nearby to get a quick lunch.

I thought the bus would take only 1 hour to arrive in Suzhou according to the estimation on the board at the bus station. However, to my surprise, it took 1 hour 45 minutes, it was 12:45pm. I ran a little behind the schedule now. I took a taxi to the Expo Center, it was around 1:10pm. I took some photos, searched places where I could access the internet to make a call to the customer. At last I found out the customer had already left the Expo Center and got back to his hotel, it was 1:35pm. I was running out of the hall, called a taxi and went straight to the hotel. By the time I got to the hotel, it was 1:50pm. We talked a little bit, discussed something about cooperation etc., it was 2:30pm. Now it was really urgent, I took a taxi and went straight to the Bullet Train Station, trying to catch an early train. It was 2:50pm when I got there, unfortunately the early ticket was sold out. Then I went to North Bus Station which was near but took me a few minutes. It was 3:00pm, but I was engaged by a call from my customer, it cost me about 10-15 minutes even when I tried to hang up the phone.

Ok now, I went to the ticket office at 3:15pm. When I heard the answer that the earliest bus was at 3:45pm and it would take 1 hour 30 minutes to Shanghai, I told myself: it was really screwed up. I called up and took a taxi, although it was expensive, I prayed it could take me to Shanghai on time, otherwise….

It was very tight, the taxi could have arrived at the Egyptian Consulate in time, unfortunately the traffic was very busy at that time. By the way, I must get to the Consulate office before 5:00pm to fetch the passports. The traffic jammed really bad. It took ages but with no luck. 5:00 already passed. Shit!!

God did not help me out. I could not get the passports from Egyptian Consulate yet I am not able to go the American Consulate for the visa application interview. The appointment date was changed once already, now it was the second time. It could affect my application. Now everything is in vain and I have had spent a lot of money in this trip. I felt very bad about it. Hope it will not happen ever again.