Pingguo via Chengdu and Nanning

Bloody trip.com were a complete arse regarding the original cancelled flight from Chengdu to Nanning, and I'd spent several hours on the phone to them refusing to accept alternative flights with Air China that included stupid eight hour layovers and the such. I'd told them there were alternative non-Air China flights that evening but they insisted it was against policy to put us on them. I did say that they would only cost about £153 and that the time they had already spent on my case was worth more than that but it didn't seem to resonate. So finally I'd called Air China myself, to be told that they should be able to put me on a China Southern flight, but to call back after 2am in Chinese business hours. So I'd spent the best part of an hour on the phone to China and they had no issue putting us on the slightly later China Southern flight at 20:05. Why trip.com couldn't just have done that in the first place is beyond me but I'm certainly going to follow up with a complaint.

But hey, we were in China, past immigration, and had got to T2 and were just doing security after having checked our bags in again (and yes putting on the tag and getting it removed again). I mentioned that we had four bottles of duty-free and we found ourselves immediately in a China moment. No, we couldn't take them past security even though I'd done this not five months previously in Shanghai. Luckily I'd insisted that we take a bit more hand luggage than Xixi was happy with, but it came in very handy as we were able to rearrange our stuff so the four bottles fitted in the hard pink case that hitherto had Leilei's stuff in. I had to leave the kids who had already done security, and left with a security guard to go back to the luggage place where I could go straight to point 15 where the same bloke was there. He'd been very complimentary about my Mandarin and seemed happy to see me again. I explained the situation and he understood, but said he'd need Xixi's boarding pass as she was the only one who hadn't checked in any luggage. Wow, so it was pretty lucky we'd only had two pieces on hold luggage between the three of us. But I didn't have her boarding pass. Luckily I'd managed to get my phone online, and so had she, so I explained what we needed and luckily some bloke at security had spoken to her and handed me both the kids' passports and boarding passes, and a few minutes later the third suitcase was checked in. It was the easiest security in the world after that as I only had three passports and a mobile phone to scan, and finally we were in the lounge that I'd booked at 6pm. Blimey with all that palaver we'd probably have missed the original flight at 6.30pm. Well we'd certainly have missed the lounge. And for a change, for a domestic terminal it was very good.

Thanks to my "status" with trip.com we got two of us free access to the lounge with Xixi only £8.60 extra...well worth it for the changed flight

Well the food and drink were good (you had to ask for wine from behind a counter but they were more than willing to serve me two glasses at a time). The only problem was that Leilei's and my SIM cards refused to work. That was really annoying as Li Kun had assured me they would, and indeed mine had worked the last three times in China. But somehow Xixi's from last summer was fine, so I was able to send a code to her mobile to get my laptop online. But Leilei's phone wasn't playing ball and he was really pissed off about it and decided to pull up another chair and went for a nap.

After six glasses or so 7.30pm rolled around and we saw that we were boarding so sauntered towards the gate only to see the signs say it was now final boarding. In Europe this means you have plenty of time but from experience in China it can really mean that. I was no longer sauntering but the kids were, and a bloke came running up to me asking "Nanning? Nanning?". I answered in the positive and he said to rush to the plane. I explained that the kids were coming (but were nowhere to be seen) then told him a little white lie that my daughter had "women's issues", which was why she had to spend time in the toilet. Than bought me some sympathy if not time, and I hurried on to show my boarding pass and used the same excuse again, waiting on the bridge as the kids finally emerged.

Yes we were the last on of course. But we didn't leave late and it was another uneventful flight, thankfully. And at Nanning we got all three pieces of luggage without ado and went up to the departure floor to find our driver. Two hours and 300 kuai lighter we were back again. 12 months for Leilei, 11 for Xixi, four for me. I hadn't even changed from my jeans to my light trousers in Chengdu but did once home.

I pinged A Wu as it was about midnight and I had enough energy for a quick one, and he said to go to Boss Zhou's, so I bagged a bottle of Smirnoff Blue label and no more than a minute outside our place it pinged into a bollard and bloody smashed in its bag. I should have dumped it there and then but I wanted to justify having bought it so brought a dripping bag to his place where he was with a load of bosses eating. Well I'd rather meet some people I knew better and I found A Wu might not be coming so when Li Kun pinged me to go to Xiao Bai de Tian I made my excuses and said there would be plenty of time to come back and have a drink with Boss Zhou.

I walked over to Xiao Bai de Tian, as of course no-one had charged the dian dong che, and 10 minutes later I was greeted, well hardly like someone who hasn't been there for a year as it had only been four months, but like a good friend no less. Both Xiao Bai and her husband were there and drinking, as was Li Kun and a couple of others. It must have been gone 1am but somehow I managed to converse, and at gone 3am left with Li Kun. I only know that as at 3.55am I confirmed to him that I'd got home ok.

Ok as in one piece, but the A/C didn't seem to work but at bloody 4am I wasn't going to do anything about it. After a bit of faff the three of us had managed to get to Pingguo successfully, having a bit of fun and lounge on the way, and we have the prospect of two months of it ahead of us.