Bad sleep the night before (what’s new?). Long long day of packing, cooking baby food, sorting clothes. Baba helping with Lushkin. Katya “why can’t we ever do anything on time?”. Finally out the door, almost 7pm. Night drive to LA. “Munis” in the back — Monsters Inc. — red bulls in the center column. In & Out on Inglewood Ave. — Katya wanted cheeseburger, didn’t realize. Ordered cheeseburger for myself, fries for her. Drop off Katya, Lucian, and Iryna at the LAX Terminal 2 for Air China — drive to Long Term Parking. Change clothes under bridge. Wait for shuttle — realize I forgot belt. Ran back to Highlander — missed shuttle. Got belt. Waiting for shuttle — Katya calls for water. Raced to Highlander, this time make it back to shuttle. Shuttle travels for incredibly long time through the largest parking lot on earth — only to dump us off 100 yards from where I got on, to catch an actual bus to LAX :(

Get to Air China, no wait, up to desk — reservations are cancelled and no one knows why. Call Natashka in China — she’s busy working magic over phone, last minute tickets… Katya some tears “why can’t we do anything right?”. Last minute before the ticketing closes, confirmation comes through — we have tickets. Race through 1st security, then out to the gate security. Send Katya through first to intercept bags on the other side — realizing we have way too many bags for comfort. Family becomes divided — Iryna with black backpack getting manually screened, me with the baby food which must be manually tested … katya scrambling to gather up all the bags, shoes, belts, etc.

Family reconvenes after security — Iryna sends Katya to buy water… young ciunter person from Air China comes to us — “we’re looking for you because you haven’t checked in at the gate yet.” She helps us to the gate — everyone’s already on board. we basically collapse in cordoned off area before the gate –all our stuff is overflowing, blankets trailing, and Iryna wants food for the flight. They try to assure her there’s food on the plane and she uncharacteristically agrees (she’s over-freaked at this point). We trundle on the plane with so much stuff in tow — car seat hanging, bags off shoulder, blankets flowing, etc. — I am over-irritated with the amount of stuff, the jamming in the overheads, the stumbling over people.….….

spent long time getting car seat secured — finally able to tighten belt (but in a way that made it so so hard to open later). get baby in, baby freaking out more than a little, everyone finally shoved into their seats, take off.

baby doesn’t last too too long — though baby in seat behind strikes up a conversation with him, they bond over the single finger “1” … he gets very tired and cries — iryna tries to put him to sleep — arm rests don’t raise up in the front/bulkhead seats. Iryna lies Lucian on ground — stewardess says “you can’t do that — against regulations” iryna says — “only for a little bit” stewardess says “ok”.

they bring bassinet out — doens’t work. Iryna finally gets crew to switch her with others — so she can lay Lucian down on seats. two young chinese men come up and sit next to katya and i — iryna and lucian go back to 3 seats in a row. Iryna puts baby to sleep.

Katya musci and dozing. Me, can’t sleep. check on iryna & baby. watch weird desert city kung fu movie. mummy bandage fight. incredible tea. Liked sesame cookie — told stewardess — she sayd “really? maybe u just really hungry”. Air China the mosst helpful ever experienced.

long night. no real sleep. iryna handles baby poop and food with usual expertise. she is amzing.

Arrive early morning, beijing. amazing airport– shiny, lights, curved space. empty, walk thru entry/passports. gather luggage, stand in tranfer line a few minutes then realize… then go out thru customs no problem.

Nataliya & Shu shu waiting with coffee (later learned this was bought night before, and reheated in AM). blue gumby-like mascot for Shanghai … lucian likes … high fives.

hugs, laughter, walk to car. car seat jammed in. drive from airport to beijing downtown — first looks like Upstate NY, with some curved roofs every so often– same trees, brown colors, small snow, old industrial buildings. Many nests in tree-top. License plates have english letters, surprised.