I made it...

Landing at the Jinan airport gave me the impression that Jinan is a very rural community out in the sticks, with fields and animals grazing right up to the edge of the runway. The interior of the airport reminded me of the airport in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It might have once been new and shiny, but those days are long gone. The difference is, the façade on the front of the airport is brand new and very grand. If you are flying out, the first impression will be good.

Stephanie met me at the airport and she found an unlicensed taxi to take us to my dormitory. Unlicensed taxis are much cheaper and they look like it. One of the passenger doors didn’t quite close and the interior was pretty gutted, but it cost about half of what it would have with a “real” taxi, and the driver took a much more scenic route.

For almost an hour, he drove like a maniac into the city. I will probably comment on the traffic a lot, because it is just so insane. The lines on the road are mere suggestions and are mostly ignored, and even the yellow line in the middle seems to hold no special meaning. At home, it would look like a game of chicken, but here it is completely normal. Pedestrians and bikes and motorbikes and donkey carts are all passed within inches, and at times it seems like even less, but no one bats an eye. They even drive on the sidewalk.

After crawling the last ten minutes through wild traffic, the driver found the street leading to the dormitory and dropped us off into the tussle. The school is in a very congested older part of the city. There are about 35,000 students that attend my university, and it seemed like all of them were in the street at the same time. However, I quickly realized that it wasn’t crowded at that hour, not even close.