CHINA From assignment to first days

A few months into the summer i got an email from the ILP office telling me that they had a head teacher spot open up and i was next in line to fill it. I jumped on the opportunity and accepted. I had a crazy couple weeks trying to get all my paper work in at such short notice. I attended a training and found out my group had the opportunity to open a new school! I was both nervous and excited. The weeks flew by before it came time to depart. Three days before we were scheduled to leave the Chinese government decided they wanted to reevaluate some of the volunteer's visas and the pulled them. Suddenly 39 of the volunteers couldn't travel with us and had to wait for the government to decide if they could come. It was a bit of a disaster... The director called me and told me i was still going, but out of the visas pulled five were head teachers so I might have to travel around and help other schools get started. I told him i would go wherever they needed me (and I have).
            So we set off! the airport was 100x less stressful having traveled out of the country once before. I am very grateful for that, seeing how i was also responsible for the girls traveling with me. We had a few adventures trying to find the right gate and having gates change on us right before the flight, but it all worked out. Once we arrived at our first stop in China we realized we had less then one hour to get our luggage, get through customs, and navigate a foreign airport to catch our last flight. It was a little stressful getting all six of us where we needed to be. Once we found our airline desk it was way past the time we were supposed to take off, but luckily our flight was delayed due to weather. Thank goodness! Once at our gate they delayed the flight another two hours.. but they gave us free food! Since we were waiting so long they gave us food to eat. It was the first Chinese snacks we received. We finally made it to or last destination and found all of our luggage. It was there i got the text saying I was going with one group to Guzhen while my volunteers were heading to another school for the first week or so. I loaded up my things and got in a bus full of people i didn't know going to a school of which I had no information on. Not to mention the fact that it was now 4 in the morning. We made it to our apartment, well temporary apartment for me, and got settled in a bit. After a few hours to nap we set out to get to know our surroundings.