This is a post I wrote a few days ago….writing the next one now..we

I am now sitting in the South Korea airport after a very successful 15 hour flight . The only problem we had was trying to fit my manual chair into the Isles of the plane , so I had to transfer into this tiny tiny little chair, obviously made for small Chinese people, and held up the plane for about 20 minutes. Clearly a rough start to the journey but once we got me set

tled in the seats, I  reclined al most flat and I alternated between listening to music and sleeping like a baby. I know, I cannot believe I did not watch any movies on the plane.

You know what’s even more crazy is a funny looks I’m getting in the Airport with my bright colors. I have to say I was so pleasantly surprised with the first part of the journey, although we did make a ton of preparations for this trip to move smoothly.  As I sit here dictating this blog from the South Korea airport from my phone with wireless, what an amazing technological world we live in.

Okay, now for the funny part. As a quadriplegic many of us wear catheter leg bags…. Now try to picture this, since I cannot move, how I go pee in the plane when I cant get up to the bathroom… And try to be discreet about it too? Well my mother had 2 little water bottles every few hours and then put the water bottles in my fluffy socks so nobody would see that she was walking up the aisle with a bottle of urine. It was really quite a sight and quite hilarious.

Now, I realize my trip was probably more comfortable because we’re in business class, my 30th birthday present, but there’s something about Asians service would help like they are, how common dating and always smiling. Even when I was practically flat out on the aisle floor from falling off the islechair they were still smiling.

I am now waiting for my final flight to kunming where I will be received by the top surgeon of the hospital, my dad, my sister and whole bunch of other people I do not know yet.

So far, Murphy’s nowhere to be seen and he hopefully stay there.

Plane is boarding. ..talk to you in kunming

This is a post I wrote a few days ago….writing the next one now..we

I am now sitting in the South Korea airport after a very successful 15 hour flight . The only problem we had was trying to fit my manual chair into the Isles of the plane , so I had to transfer into this tiny tiny little chair, obviously made for small Chinese people, and held up the plane for about 20 minutes. Clearly a rough start to the journey but once we got me set

tled in the seats, I  reclined al most flat and I alternated between listening to music and sleeping like a baby. I know, I cannot believe I did not watch any movies on the plane.

You know what’s even more crazy is a funny looks I’m getting in the Airport with my bright colors. I have to say I was so pleasantly surprised with the first part of the journey, although we did make a ton of preparations for this trip to move smoothly.  As I sit here dictating this blog from the South Korea airport from my phone with wireless, what an amazing technological world we live in.

Okay, now for the funny part. As a quadriplegic many of us wear catheter leg bags…. Now try to picture this, since I cannot move, how I go pee in the plane when I cant get up to the bathroom… And try to be discreet about it too? Well my mother had 2 little water bottles every few hours and then put the water bottles in my fluffy socks so nobody would see that she was walking up the aisle with a bottle of urine. It was really quite a sight and quite hilarious.

Now, I realize my trip was probably more comfortable because we’re in business class, my 30th birthday present, but there’s something about Asians service would help like they are, how common dating and always smiling. Even when I was practically flat out on the aisle floor from falling off the islechair they were still smiling.

I am now waiting for my final flight to kunming where I will be received by the top surgeon of the hospital, my dad, my sister and whole bunch of other people I do not know yet.

So far, Murphy’s nowhere to be seen and he hopefully stay there.

Plane is boarding. ..talk to you in kunming

A quick blog post from my phone in Atlanta:

After a 12 and a half hour drive from Miami to Atlanta we arrived safely around 8 p.m. last night. My brothers  set up an air mattress hospital bed for me, which I use to sleep on in the early days off when I broke my neck. As I’m heading to bed last night the air mattress stopped working and I found myself laying on a very hard surface . Faced with what to do, we got creative.

We used a sling I have to pick me up in a lift. I’m swinging mid air in my brothers bedroom trying to figure out what to do. We decided to swing me over into my brothers California king bed for a sibling sleepover.

Picture this, it’s 11 p.m. at night I’m half undressed swinging around mid air like a monkey. We are all laughing our asses off and, yes, I do have a picture, but probably not appropriate for this blog. I cannot even begin to imagine the adventures I’m going to have in the airport or on the plane in the next 24 hours. I just hope Murphy does not strike a second time 40,000 feet up in the air 🙂

I hear the airplane has internet, so I’m going to try really hard to write a blog post mid air over the Pacific. I decided that if I’m going to go to move to China I might as well go all out. So, I have decided to dress in complete neon colors when I head over. I figured if I’m going to be made fun of for being
a blonde, white and probably quadriplegic foreigner I might

as well have some fun with it 🙂 And, yes, I will definitely take a picture of this on the plane.

T-minus 24 hours before I leave Miami to head for Atlanta to hang out with my brothers for a day… then on Sunday on to Kunming, China.  I fly from Atlanta to South Korea for a 15 hour flight and then directly on to Kunming for another five hour flight. I woke up this morning and, finally, the nerves have set in that I am leaving this country for a very long time. I’ve always been kind of a global mutt moving from country to country, but this time feels a little different since I have to do it in an entirely different language.

I think I have everything prepared, but if I forgot anything I’m sure they make it in China! My sister and my dad are already over there preparing for my arrival. I just found out that the surgeon, Dr. Zhu Hui, would like to perform spinal surgery within a week of my arrival in order to get me moving into the walking program as quickly as possible. I suppose I should be more nervous for the surgery, but I’m not. I think I’m more nervous for how to explain a sterile catheter procedure to my new Chinese caregivers in Chinese. That’s right, they don’t speak English… This should be fun.   I have been practicing these conversations with my online tutor and I have so many scenarios for how this could go wrong, but in the end I’m just going to have to go with the flow and laugh about it.

On a completely separate note, I’m sure many of you have heard about this viral phenomenon that has gone global called the Harlem shake. I was so amused by these videos and did not see any handicap Harlem shake videos so to speak. So, when I get to Kunming I’m going to try my damnedest to try to explain this concept to the Chinese at the rehabilitation center so that we make our own Chinese Harlem paralyzed shake video. Oh yes, and I can just see quads hanging from lift’s swinging in the air trying to shake anything that will move 🙂 Hell, I might even try and see if we can do in international Harlem shake on the plane over to South Korea.

This will be my last post until I get to China and even then it may take me a few days because I’m sure I will have a bunch of censorship issues when getting on a certain website until I set up a VPN, kind of like a virtual wormhole to give me access to most websites.  I remember the first time I went to China in 2000 when a dial-up modem was considered a luxury.

I want to take a moment before I out to thank each and every one of you that have supported me over the last two and half years, and extend an invitation to you if you ever travel in Southeast Asia to come hang out in Kunming for a bit. I most likely will be living in Asia for the foreseeable future.

Talk to you in China!

Ali

After an awesome night out on my 30th birthday with close friends I was then surprised by all my dearest friends in Miami for a surprise party/going away party this past Saturday at the Ritz. I must say it was the first time I have EVER been completely surprised.  What an incredible way to leave the country. I’m now working on everyone to try and come visit me over the next few years, so the constant stream of visitors.

Ali 30th B-day at Doraku Sushi

When I land in China after a long flight around midnight I am supposed to go apply for a permanent residency visa. With that said, I am writing this blog during my break from studying a Chinese lesson on applying for a visa. I’m just trying to picture the Chinese officials look on their faces when they see this blonde white chick in a wheelchair volunteering to live in Kunming, a place where most foreigners have never heard of. It should be a very interesting conversation and one where I bet it would be fun to be a fly on the wall.

As many of you know I have spent much time in China over the last decade. The first time I went to China I was 17 years old and had just graduated high school, and decided to defer school for a year. I bought a plane ticket to Beijing, barely could speak any Chinese and had no real plan. I had told my parents I was in this very structured program and people would meet me at the airport. In reality, I landed in the airport with no clue of where to go. I had only signed up for some Chinese classes at this University and that was pretty much it. I purchased a map and pointed to some school symbols to a Chinese taxi driver.  When I arrived I met this really cute French guy who did not speak much English, but was pretty proficient in Chinese. He set me up with a place to stay, helped me enroll in my classes and he worked out as a pretty fun boyfriend for about two weeks.  I ended up quitting classes after about a month and decided the best way to learn Chinese was to go shopping  and bargain in the streets, and play a lot of Chinese drinking games with grain alcohol. Oh yes, the Chinese love their drinking games.

I tell you this story because I’m thinking how I’m going to regain my fluency in Chinese this time around. I’ve been practicing like crazy, but I have a feeling that on the weekends I might have to revert back to drinking games with my fellow rehab patients. However, most Chinese drinking games involve using your hands… So, I’ve actually been working out in my head how to play quadriplegic Chinese drinking games! I will keep you posted on this one. I’m also trying to get a visual picture of a bunch of quads in wheelchairs – in China – in a bar – drinking… Oh, and of course karaoke will be involved. When the time comes, I promise you there will be a video on this blog of that night.

Finally, at least this time when I enter the country, I will have my sister, my dad and an entourage of new Chinese friends, surgeons and doctors meeting me there.  I have no idea what I’m in for during my travels, so I’m just going to have to keep a sense a humor over the next seven days.

Back to studying!

30th Surprise B-day

30th Surprise B-day

Today I launch the “China Quad Diaries” on my 30th birthday and a week before I move to China. I plan to update this blog several times a week to keep everyone updated on how the program is working and share all the crazy experiences I have over the next several years.

The last several months have been absolutely nuts trying to pack and get ready for China. It’s hard to move an able-bodied person to a foreign country, but a quad, well forget it.  Over the last few weeks while I was packing up boxes and getting them ready to ship over to China I could not help but laugh at myself thinking “I bought all of this stuff to ship over to a country where they probably manufacture it themselves. So, basically I’m just shipping everything I bought back to its country of origin.”

There are so many things to get ready when moving to another country especially as a quadriplegic.  For instance, the 20 hour plane ride. I have to sit on a special cushion so my skin will break down and I have to take a  blood thinner to prevent blood clots on the plane because of past pulmonary embolism’s that I have had. The list literally can go on and on, but because I am a borderline psychotic organizer I think I have everything under control.  I would say the only thing I probably do not have control over is if the airline decides to break my wheelchair. I cannot tell you the countless stories I have read over the past few months with regard to airlines literally breaking chairs in half, taking out the batteries, dropping them off the side of the conveyor belt into the airplane, etc.  My wonderful uncle Ian, who builds unbelievably beautiful furniture for a living, built this incredible thick cardboard design to protect my wheelchair.

My family literally has been working flat out for the last few months in preparation for the move. I definitely would not have this opportunity today if it was not for them.

I leave for China from Atlanta on March 10 and get into Kunming China very late on the night of the 12th. There is about a 12 to 13 hour time difference from Miami to Kunming. I imagine I’ll probably spend a few days getting acclimated to the city, but I’m actually headed straight for surgery- before I start walking program. As many of you know, I suffer from severe neuropathic pain ( think of pins and needles when your arm falls asleep all over your body), which we have discovered is due to a tethered spinal cord and a buildup of scar tissue in my spinal cord. So, I’m going to have Dr. Zhu Hui, my surgeon and pioneer of the walking program, open me up within the first few weeks of getting to Kunming to hopefully alleviate some of the pain, so I can focus on the walking program itself.

Strangely, I think I am more nervous about getting run over by a Chinese taxi cab than I am for  surgery of the spinal cord. I used to live in China in my late teens and early 20s, so I’m very familiar with China,. the customs and the hazards of trying to cross the street in Chinese traffic.  I’ll tell you more about my China adventures in another post in a few days.

I encourage you to e-mail me if their particular topics that you want me to cover or stories you want me to tell. I promise to keep them short and sweet.

Cheers For now,

皑 丽 (Ali in Chinese.. Pronounced “Ai” “Li”)