What does this 24 mean?!

Hurrah, I am back in Guangzhou.  

As I hesitate my way to the international transfers desk a lady asks me where I’m headed-Amsterdam.  ‘Because you have more than 8 hours you can get hotel’.  Sweet!

I park myself behind the French family in front of me.  I hear them exchange conversation, asking the same questions on my mind.  Do I need to get a visa?  How much extra faff is this realistically going to be?

I chose to do the same as them, slog it out at the airport.  After hearing L’s horror stories of trying to get a hotel in Beijing and then trying to get back in again I figured, it might just be the path of least resistance to hang tight.

The man behind the desk seemed disappointed.  ‘You cannot change your mind after this point’.  Yeah, I don’t really tend to do that much anyway…

So I’m here, randomly sat at Gate A102 simply because there appear to be no people here and that suits me just fine.

The couple I sat next to on the plane (I am guessing, Chinese?) somehow managed to rile me up a bit.  Personal space is not a thing in Asia.  L and I have commented on this before, the Brits definitely don’t like touching.

At one point just as we were landing and I was reading my book, she skilfully managed to poke me right on the pointy bit of my shoulder with her thumb (how?!) to tell me to look outside as we landed into a rather boring looking airport.  Yes very nice I nodded.

I have spotted two things of interest.  1) A book shop.  Whether anything is in English I do not know, but I’ll explore later.  And 2) a Premium Lounge.  $50 for 3 hours.  That doesn’t sound so bad actually.  Maybe I will make my way there later, a bit closer to dinner.  Or when I get bored sitting around here.

I do not know what the green 24 sticker means, but I sort of feel like I have to keep it on.  Like some sort of wandering sheep, branded for identification.

Plus it makes me feel special.  Anything to get me through these ticking hours.

Maybe I will scope out the general food situation.  That should waste another half an hour or so.

More later.

Tiny