"Hey, do you have stuff for washing clothes?"
"Yeah, I got this detergent concentrate from camping ... here."
"Cool. I've got one of those travel clotheslines for hanging stuff."
"Oh? yeah, usually I just use the shower line. I've got clothes pins that I could bring."
"Nah, the clothesline's braided rubber, so you can just thread clothes in the braids."
"cool."
Last Saturday night, our phones were out, iPad sitting on the coffee table, fingers swiping across packing lists and web clippings, comparing notes and figuring out where we overlap and where we don't.
ayun and I were prepping for a two week trip to China and while we're both old hands at the independent travel thing, we've never done it together. It made me think of superhero crossovers and teamups.
Planning the trip has been this sort of back and forth: "hey, you want to go China? yeah, I was thinking of starting in Hong Kong to see some friends. That works. How about around Labor Day? oooh, yeah, if we go a week before, then it'll be my birthday and we can get high tea at the Peninsula Hotel."
In May, we sat on the back porch with a stack of travel guides from the library and sketched out our itinerary: Hong Kong to Chengdu to Beijing. She booked internal flights. I picked hotels. We've been copy and pasting ideas into a Google Doc; and it's all got this nice organic feel to it. Like, this is what I'd do normally for myself when researching a trip, except I'd open the Google doc after four days and find someone besides myself has just copy and pasted a bunch of awesome into it.
This is all to say: yeah, China. Two weeks and we're keeping our plans a bit loose. We've got a bunch of ideas for stuff to do, and will do what comes to mind each day. High tea and tailored suits are on the agenda, as are The Great Wall and Forbidden City and Sichuan Opera. There's
also this place that is, like, the cheapest Michelin one-star in the world and their entire reputation is built on the quality of their char siu buns for which I am getting
a wee bit obsessive.
We wrapped our planning a bit early, and just hung out and caught up and watched
internet videos of cleverly designed bicycle helmets. Then she grabbed her bag and I saw her to the door to say our goodbyes.
"So, hey, send me your Google Voice number, and I can text you when I'm checked in to the AirBNB place."
"Sure thing. It was good hanging out."
"Yeah. I'll ... I guess I'll see you in Hong Kong."
God, it's fun to say that.