New Airport Friends

After waking up way to early (without my alarm), I left the ship. I didn't just leave the ship, I left the country. I'm no longer in Republic of the Congo, I'm sitting in Rwanda as I write this.

It's already been an adventure. I left Pointe-Noire without any problems and flew an hour away to the capital of Brazaville. While I was there, I needed to collect my luggage and recheck-in, during my 3 hour stay. No rush, I get my backpack and the. Head upstairs to departures. 

While, it's to early so I can't even get into the check in counter so I walk around looking for a seat...needless to say, there are none. As I'm setting my stuff down by the window I hear someone trying to get my attention. I look over and there was one person in the group of Chinese guy's sitting on the chairs that was offering me his seat. 

Initial, quick assessment told me he was the youngest of the group, and all the older guys appeared to be laughing and giving him a hard time in good fun...so after trying to refuse and he was still offering, I walked over and sat down in the middle of this group of Chinese men. Well, they of course were speaking in Chinese, which I don't know much of, or they also spoke French...also a language in which I don't have a large vocabulary. It is truly unfortunate that I really only know English, but luckily this young guy knew some basic English and so he acted as translator for the group. 

In the end, here is what I know, his name is Shi Long Nain, and he is 27 and has an older sister. English is his fifth language, and he is more proficient with it than any other languages I know. I did find it humorous, that he knew how to ask if I was married, when I told him the truth that I wasn't, he shook his head and said 'come to china, and you can be married in one month.' 

I passed on his offer, to continue on my way to Uganda. So then we started having an english/Chinese lesson, and I didn't make the best student, but we were laughing at my mistakes. Once it came time to part ways, the one guy offered me a 1.5L bottle of water, which again I ended up taking. I really enjoyed my time with them. That's the most interesting and fun part of my trip so far, and its only day one!