Taipei-Los Angeles by Malaysia Airline MX65

After teaching my mom how to use web cam and messengers to communicate with me, I had a farewell dinner with my mom. I could feel the anxiety between Mom and me. It was a silent and bitter dinner. Each one of us had our own concerns for the coming 7 months but didn’t want them to be the other’s burden. 7 months is not a short period of time, after all. So controversy was what I felt at this moment. On the one hand, I was very excited about the unknown journey ahead. On the other hand, my parents had to be alone by themselves for the past several months coz I’m the only son here. I knew it gonna be tough for them.
Anyhow, I left my house in a summer night with a sincere Good-bye. Thanks to Moorna, my aboriginal friend, I arrived C.K.S. airport for just 1.5 hour from Keelung. Checking-in my baggage at MX counter is like checking-in my coming adventure. I was getting excited. However, I didn’t remember much on the airplane. I suppose it should be peaceful and calm. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be wake up and had L.A. skyline right outside of my window.
It was about 7PM in L.A. At this summertime, it was still clear in the sky. The sky looked like 3PM in Taipei. This was my first time in U.S.A. I was quite upset by the view of L.A. The city looked really brow and located in the middle of desert. Only few skyscrapers caught my eyes. It was totally not what I expected!
U.S.A. immigration officer has long been notorious by its attitude toward East Asians because of the illegal immigrant problems. This happened to me this time as well. No matter how detailed I explained to him that I didn’t need a visa to entry Costa Rica, This immigration officer still questioned about my ability to enter into Costa Rica with on-site visa. Problem solved by asking for a Chinese-look officer’s help. He confirmed to the original officer that people with Taiwan Passport don’t need visa to visit Costa Rica. Well…which was exactly what I said to him!
Past through several baggage and security checking, which lasted for more than 1 hour, we were in front of TACA counter in the super busy LAX. I had no idea of how Latino looks like until I saw the TACA counter. He has a sparkling curl hair and mustache. Very friendly, too. Our flight to San Jose, Costa Rica was at 1:30AM, quite plenty of time for us to explore this airport. We went upstairs looking for dinner, or breakfast if we had been in Taiwan. I had a Woo-long noodle. I remembered it was astonishingly pricy and had nothing but noodles! Mm….L.A. has ugly skyline and pricy bad food.