So first off, let me tell you something; this trip was miraculously sparked by a phone call with my friend Hope back in October. We had been planning to do something incredible and different during our gap year before university and go somewhere where our hearts would smile and we could just be free. We chatted about possible gypsy road trips, where we would just drive down as far south as we could and come back when we ran out of cash. Another suggestion was a road trip to Oregon (which may still be in the works for the future), but we decided we wanted something a little more wild and diverse. Days before our call, I had been seeing pictures of South-East Asia all over the internet and I felt drawn to their incredible limestone cliffs, tempting turquoise seas and beautiful lush rain forests. Months passed and at some point between "I kind of want to go to Thailand," and now, we traveled to Asia for a metamorphic adventure.
We began the first leg of our wondrous journey on a thirteen hour plane ride from Vancouver to Guangzhou, China. It surprisingly went quickly as we kept ourselves occupied with movies, airplane food, and conversations. Hours passed and time began to change as we drifted over the international date line, and I distinctly remember the moment I saw Guangzhou as we neared our descent; nothing too different, but still amazing as it was a new place for my eyes to feast on.
After a three hour layover, consisting of first experiences with holes in the ground, a looong line through immigration, and Chinese iced tea fashioned with Avril Lavigne on the bottle, people began forming a line to take a shuttle to our plane. Between sleeping and half watching the weird Nicolas Cage movie on the shared screens, I looked out and admired the copious amounts of lightning striking below us, which to be honest, did make me a little nervous. but at the end I remember watching a woman on the t.v. demonstrating some stretches and calming exercises to help ease your mind and body, and thus begins my love for Asia.
Once we had gone through immigration yet again (and this time, no line!!!), we filmed a quick vlog, grabbed our backpacks from the baggage claim, and headed for a taxi to take us to our hotel. The drive there was honestly the most terrifying thing I had ever experienced in my short eighteen years. At first drivers seemed insane as they rushed through the streets passing many vehicles and motorcycles on the other side of the road, but by the end of our adventure, this became as normal as driving back home to us. We finally arrived around one in the morning and were a bit unsure if we had given our driver the proper address, but luckily a block down the road was our hotel, After all of this, we still weren't too sure of how we felt about it all and we still couldn't believe we had actually made it, but that was soon to change.
