Monday to Wednesday of this week I went on a trip to Sanya, stayed at the Hilton. It was a nice trip, but on the way back I experienced the downside of Chinese hospitality – China Southern Airlines decided to cancel my flight from Sanya to Guangzhou (the first leg of a two-part flight, which was Sanya-Guangzhou, Guangzhou-Singapore) without informing me or putting me on a flight that would allow me to catch my connecting flight. I went to the check-in counter and the girl there didn’t know how to help me. Of course she couldn’t speak English, but at least I could talk to her in Chinese. I didn’t really understand what was going on, and I asked her why the flight was cancelled, she could only say “company policy”, as if that made everything all right. She told me that I’d arrive in time to catch my flight, that my luggage would go through to the connecting flight, and that someone would be meeting me at the airport to show me to my connecting flight, and that I should be okay. I had my doubts, but at that point I couldn’t force China Southern Airlines to conjure up a flight for me. So I had three hours to kill in Sanya Airport, where there is nothing of interest to do and where the shops don’t sell any beer, so I ate some food and I watched an AC/DC DVD on my laptop. After a long wait, I got on my flight, which was late taking off of course. The guy sitting next to me was a real weirdo, often brushing me with his elbows, crowding me with his newspaper, making loud yawning sounds, and at one point singing along to the music that the airline was playing. What a weirdo. When I got to Guangzhou airport, there was a guy to meet me, but he only took me 40 metres along a corridor to a transfer counter where he gave me a boarding pass to a flight at 7:55 the next morning. Oh… great. There was a Norwegian family of five there with me, they were in the same predicament as I was (I had seen them at the check-in counter in Sanya) and they had long-since missed their connecting flight to Cambodia. The six of us were given new boarding passes and told that we would be put up in a hotel for free, as if that made everything all right. We collected our luggage and found our transfer to the Tian Hong Hotel. Passing the luxurious China Southern Airways Hotel on the way, we arrived at Tian Hong and found it to be a dump. The girl who checked us in was totally unsympathetic and was going to split the six of us into three rooms with two in each room. I explained that I was not part of the Norwegian group, but a solitary traveller, and I wanted a room of my own. The girl told me that I’d have to pay an additional 100 Renminbi (about $12) if I wanted my own room, or I’d have to share with another male guest. I told her that this was unacceptable, that I was stuck in Guangzhou because of a mistake of China Southern Airlines and there was no way I’d share a room with anyone. She considered this for a while, and then gave the Norwegians two rooms (three in one, two in the other) and I got my own room. What a predicament.
The room was spare and basic, the walls discoloured, the wallpaper peeling, the bathroom ill-lit and the air conditioner was stuck at 29 degrees. Oh well. I got a call that said that I could come down for dinner, and I was shown their restaurant. I was the only person there except for two staff who were eating. A girl came over and put a plate of food in front of me and walked off. No menu, of course, no choice of food, nothing. It came with a plastic cup of water. I went and complained to the girl and asked her in Chinese what it was. She told me that it was pork with rice. I asked her if there were any options, she said no, that’s all that they could do for me. I said that normally in a restaurant you’re offered a choice of food. Â The staff, after all, were eating fish. I asked her “what if I were Muslim?” I wonder how this would have all gone down if I didn’t speak Chinese? You’d think that some of these people would be happy to deal with a foreigner in Chinese, so that there would be fewer communication problems, but they didn’t bat an eye. Even when people can communicate, they can’t communicate. I went to the front desk to complain about the situation, but no help there either. In the restaurant, I pushed the situation and finally they conceded that they could offer chicken, pork, or eggs with the rice. Great. In the end I still had the pork. It was barfy, but it filled me up. I walked up and down the streets, but they were jammed with random people hanging around, many people selling stuff. A weird scene. I watched a DVD on the computer, drank some beer from the convenience store, and then went to sleep.
Thursday morning they woke me up at 4:42 for my 5:30 transfer to the airport. At 4:52 they brought me breakfast to my room – three buns and a drinking box (see picture below) served from big bins on a trolley. I packed and went downstairs and got my transfer. I got to the airport one hour before the check-in opened, so I watched more DVD. At least the day proceeded smoothly (except for the fact that they serve beer warm – oh, no, it’s all right, because they offer ice cubes for those who like their beer cold… yeah, that’s the ticket) and I got to Singapore okay. All together I’d spent 1.5 days at Sanli and 2 days travelling. It wasn’t worth it.
Breakfast, courtesy of China Southern Airlines
The packaging of the two buns on the right describes the contents as “French style fragrant milk bun”, but it was just flavourless bread. Any French person should be insulted, I’d say.