From Dunhuang to Pitts | Hideyuki Tokuda (Dean of the Faculty of Environment and Information Studies)

2009.07.21

Since the theme for this entry is open, I'd like to share a little mishap that occurred during my travels. I hope it will be helpful for those planning to travel to China or the United States.

In mid-June, I attended a research presentation event in Dunhuang, China, hosted by Microsoft Research Asia (MSRA). In fact, due to the novel influenza outbreak, there was a possibility the conference might be held in Japan instead of China. However, the Chinese side responded flexibly, and it was decided to proceed as planned in Dunhuang, a city famous as a stop on the Silk Road. I had been told it was a direct flight from Beijing to Dunhuang, so after the plane landed, I headed to Baggage Claim while chatting with Professor Yonezawa from the University of Tokyo. After talking for a while, we realized that neither of our bags had appeared. As we continued to wait, an airport staff member came and told us, "Please return to the plane!" I immediately understood as we walked back to the gate; this was not a non-stop flight from Beijing to Dunhuang, but one that made a stop in another city. Human assumptions can be a scary thing; since the name of that city was not mentioned at all on the e-ticket, I was completely convinced we were in Dunhuang. We got back on the plane and finally arrived safely in Dunhuang.

The city of Dunhuang was more developed than I had expected. I was told that infrastructure such as tourist roads and hotels had been rapidly developed in time for last year's Beijing Olympics. The main street was quite modern and well-maintained, even when compared to regional tourist cities in Japan. In the evening, I strolled through a local street market with other conference attendees. They were selling various local specialties, but what particularly caught my eye were dried fruits, watermelons, wood-carved pictures, luminous cups, and reproductions of ancient murals.

What surprised me was that the prices were not fixed at all. When Director Hon of MSRA, who was with me, started bargaining, the prices kept dropping. A 30% discount seemed to be the norm. I bought a wood carving depicting a desert and camels, but since the artist's name wasn't on any of the works, I asked if he could sign the one I purchased. He immediately wrote the name "Qian Jian" in pencil on the back and then carved it for me. For his usual pieces, he would carve much more complex pictures directly without a sketch, so carving his own name must have been a very rare occurrence. Dunhuang is famous as a city on the Silk Road, and it probably brings to mind images of the desert oasis Crescent Lake (Yueyaquan).

Now, the biggest mishap occurred on the day I was traveling from Dunhuang to Pitts. I departed from Dunhuang Airport on schedule and arrived in Xi'an around 12:35. The plan was to take flight MU2107 to Beijing at 14:10, then from Beijing take flight UA898 at 18:25 to arrive at Washington Dulles Airport at 19:56 the same day, and finally take flight UA7685 at 21:55 to arrive in Pitts at 23:01. However, upon arriving in Xi'an, I found that all the morning flights to Beijing had been canceled! Apparently, due to thunderstorms, no planes could take off or land at Beijing Airport. Our flight, MU2107, was also messily written on a whiteboard as "Delayed (Indefinitely)." When I went to the counter to check, they said they had no idea when flights would resume. When I asked what the maximum delay had been in past cases, I got no response. I only had a 2-hour and 20-minute layover in Beijing. I had a bad feeling about this.

In the end, we waited at the gate in Xi'an Airport for over six hours. We finally managed to take off from Xi'an after 18:30, and by the time we arrived in Beijing, it was already past 20:30. What followed was another ordeal. A dozen or so people who had missed their connecting flights were lined up at the China Eastern Airlines counter. A hotel was somehow arranged for us, but we were simply told to get on a van without being informed of the hotel's name or location. In a state of complete blind trust, we got in the vehicle and were taken to what seemed to be a hotel for domestic travelers, whose name we didn't even know. At the front desk, there was only one woman who could barely speak English. We had to confirm the next day's departure time by writing it down. The room I was given had an air conditioner, but no remote control; it had to be turned on by plugging the power cable directly into the outlet. What surprised me even more was the toilet. The door to the toilet seemed to be broken. It was clearly detached, and the step leading to it was chipped and white. I somehow managed to get a few hours of sleep in the bed.

The next morning, we headed to the airport at 7:30. As expected, people who had missed their flights the day before, just like us, were forming a line. Fortunately, we had had the presence of mind to call our travel agent in Tokyo from Xi'an to request a flight change, so we were able to check in very smoothly. We took a different flight, UA888, and finally arrived in Pittsburgh a day late, via San Francisco and Chicago. I was supposed to give the opening remarks as a general chair for IEEE INSS 2009 along with my former colleague from CMU, Professor Rajkumar, but unfortunately, I missed the opportunity. The students' paper presentations and poster demos also finished without a hitch, and we all returned home safely.

In fact, there was one last thunderstorm-related mishap. Our reserved flight, UA7685, was scheduled to depart for Chicago at 10:37, but several professors who had come from Japan were trying to take a flight to Chicago in the 8 o'clock hour. It turned out that due to a severe thunderstorm in Chicago the previous day, the plane for their morning flight had not arrived in Pitts. The professors I thought had already left for Chicago were still at the gate. Furthermore, I learned that a professor who was scheduled to return home from Chicago on an All Nippon Airways flight couldn't get an alternative UA flight because it was fully booked. Instead, he had to take another UA flight from Chicago to Hong Kong, and then an ANA flight to Haneda, arriving at 5:45 the next day—a grueling journey.

Please be very careful of thunderstorms when traveling during the rainy season.

Although, there might not be much you can do about it.

(Date of publication: 2009/07/21)