Few days ago my mother in law arrived for her three-month visit. Usually there shouldn’t be much to write about yet as it takes few days until her crazy stuff begins but this time she outdid herself. It already started at the airport here in Finland. I believe she just can’t wait to give me material to write about.
The day started pretty normal except that her flight was suddenly one hour early but this didn’t cause us any sweat as we live only 15-20min away from the airport. We managed to arrive just few minutes after the plane landed so we were in no hurry as it takes some time for the passengers to leave the plane and get their luggage. So we waited in the arrival hall, waited a bit more and waited even longer until we stayed there for over one hour. All the time we saw other Chinese passengers from the same flight passing us by but no sign of mother in law. We called some friends who are working at the airport to check the gate and the luggage claim but they could only tell us that there were no Chinese people left in those places and that the sign for the flight from Chongqing was gone as well from the luggage claim.
What had happened to my beloved mother in law? We knew she boarded the flight as she had sent a message before shutting off her phone in the plane and the Helsinki airport is pretty tiny so there are not really many places for her to hide from us and our friends. We went to the information center and made some calls but still nothing. On the way back to the arrival hall we saw a group of people, a very emotional mother in law in company with a not so happy looking border guard and a smiling translator.
The border guard and the translator told us then what all went from after she had left the plane. Apparently she did not go through the passport control but through the transfer area where she ended up in the middle of the airport again. After she got some advice from other people she found her way finally back to the passport control but there a new dilemma started. Sure she had her passport and flight tickets but they also wanted to see her invitation letter which she received from us so she could even get the visa. After much discussion in some special room for passport and visa problems the border guard told her “If we don’t find your daughter in the arrival hall we have to send you back”, wow, very nice, I wonder how he would feel if his mother is in a foreign country and is suddenly forced to show some papers no one even knew before to have with them at the airport…
All ended well, they found us/ we found them and mother in law was allowed to pick up her luggage and leave the airport to come with us. Now we have a full apartment, the noise level is constantly high that I don’t even dare to concentrate on any kind of task which requires my head and hopefully our baby will be born in one of these days.
Now I hope that the next posting will be about our baby to be born or it will be about further adventures of my mom in law.
Crazy Chinese Family 
Your poor mother-in-law. I’ll bet she was upset by the time you found her.
I’m looking forward to your next post, especially if it has a baby in it.
Oh dear. What a mess at the airport but thankfully it all turned out okay in the end. Your mother-in-law might have missed reading directions in Chinese leading her to the immigration part of the airport, maybe that’s why she got lost. At least there was a translator to help her out. It must have been a scary experience for her.
I definitely symphatise with you on the increased noise levels in your house. When my parents are over in my flat, it gets really noisy here. To give you an idea, I can hear my dad’s voice in every room of the flat whenever he speaks. When they leave, I am left with silence and it’s usually quite unnerving 🙂 Have fun with the mother-in-law!
Our apartment is so small that we hear mother-in-law snoring also in each room so at night we both have now some earplugs. Even after she leaves we wont have any real peace anymore due to the baby so I better get used to it now 🙂
Oh, no! I am glad everything ended well and that your mother-in-law’s ordeal had a happy ending!! Plus, she is now there for the arrival of your baby!!
Luckily everything turned out well! It must be scary for anyone to come to a foreign country and be demanded extra papers you had no idea you needed. And with no way to contact your family at the same time.
Waiting forward for the next post already!
I remember my parents few years back at Beijing airport getting lost and they don’t speak any Chinese nor English either. But somehow they managed, even after the gate for the transit flight changed and I am still wondering how on earth they were able to do so