I had taken the cheapest flight available to get from Siem Reap to New York City which involved an overnight layover in Hanoi followed by a transfer in Beijing to get on the China Air flight to JFK. The flight from Hanoi to Beijing was delayed and due to this unexpected turn of events, I missed my flight to New York despite my mad rush to get to the check-in counter on time.
What followed was a shameless barrage of anger and F-bombs hurled at the Chinese woman behind the check-in counter and the entire establishment as a whole. “Listen lady! I have no money. I have nothing to eat. How am I going to eat? You want me to sleep in the airport? Am I supposed to wander the streets till dawn?! YOU WANT ME TO FREEZE TO DEATH?! IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT?!”
I felt ashamed when the manager was called over and forced to calm me down with quiet reassuring promises of a hotel near the hotel, a shuttle-bus, and a comped dinner courtesy of the airline. It all seemed taken care of, and I walked onto that shuttle-bus in my thong-sandals (I had left my sneakers on a bus in Cambodia) and we drove in the snow to the hotel which was run in cooperation with the airline. I was even able to take a hot shower, which was nice considering I hadn’t taken one hot or cold for at least a week.
After feeling refreshed and watching the snowfall from the hotel window for a while, I left the room and walked down to the empty dining room and sat around white linen table by myself. I ordered the Beijing duck and some hot and sour soup and a few other items which I can no longer recall. I figured it had been nearly a day since I had eaten and longer than that since I had had a proper meal and so I was going to make the Chinese airline and hotel pay for it out of Retribution.
I ate like a king and despite my best efforts was unable to really put a proper dent in all the platters that surrounded me. After washing down the last of the Coca-Cola and patting my stomach with a sleepy and gluttonous glaze in my eye, I was presented with the bill.
I informed the waitress that the hotel and the airline was prepared to comp me and so not to worry about the bill. She gave me a look of utter confusion knowing absolutely zero English, but also by this odd flood of reasoning which followed the bill and no money being handed over at the end.
This garble of confidence and reassurance must’ve seemed very strange to her indeed, particularly after I attempted to leave the room without paying. To my surprise, my exit was blocked by a hostess who spoke English and informed me that I must pay.
I smiled and threw my head back in laughter, burped, and then informed her that it was not I who would be paying, but the hotel and the airline. This brought about more confusion and more English phrases demanding that I pay. At this point, I began to get flustered and told them with finality that the hotel and the airline would pay for my lavish meal, that it was Retribution for making me miss my flight to New York, and that I would be returning to my room.
At this, they seemed to cower, and inside I laughed over my victory, thinking I would now take a nap and sleep off this emperor’s meal until morning. The hotel goons had other plans, however, and would try their hardest to get me to cough up the money I owed them.
Maybe five minutes in my room had passed when one of the front desk staff came up to my room, knocked on my door and showed me the bill. She was young and was probably the most fluent in English of the staff and so was sent as an errand-girl by the grocers to deliver the bill.
I explained the airline had promised that I would be compensated for dinner as a result of the flight-delay, but my words meant nothing to her. She told me then that the hotel would only compensate 30 yuan which was enough to cover a very basic meal and that also included a free breakfast, probably some tea and crackers and a slice of fruit. I decided that I’d had enough of these games and told her then in plain and slowly-pronounced American that she could stand at my door and argue with me all she wanted but that I had no money. To prove my point, I reached into my pocket and pulled out a handful of some wrinkled Laotian kip and Cambodian riels which amounted to probably less than a dollar.
She was unimpressed and said again with her small white, oval bespectacled face that I would have to come downstairs and settle the bill. I told her I didn’t have any money and laughed in her face and asked her if they wanted me to do the dishes. She left at that point, and I closed my door feeling as though I had won.
Five minutes later, I heard a knock at my door. When I opened it this time, the girl was standing there again, exactly as she had been before, only this time she had brought two hotel goons with her. The two flunkies she brought with her were none other than the bellhops who I had seen picking their fingernails when I walked in, looking ridiculous as they did in their pastel purple uniforms. I tried not to laugh. But I could see that it would only get ugly if I resisted so I told her that I would go downstairs in a few moments. This seemed to satisfy her and was enough to convince her and the goons to go downstairs and wait for me in my own sweet time. What I did at that point was gather the souvenirs I had picked up on the road on my journey, the presents I was planning to give to my brother and sisters and mother and cousins once I returned home to America. Taking these items downstairs, some of them being handwoven scarves, another being an old Chinese opium pipe, I went to the front desk and told them I didn’t have any money. The girl was now back in her central domain of power, the front desk, equipped with all she would need to get that money out of my pockets.
RETRIBUTION! I cried, but my cry fell on deaf ears. I again tried to convince them that I would be forced to sell my Christmas presents. “This is handmade. You know how much this cost? A lot more than that duck, that’s how much! Do you want me to sell this in the street? In my sandals? In the snow? Is that what you want? Because I’ll do it!”
At that point I stuffed the wrinkled bills which were less than toilet paper to the Chinese into their hands and told them that with this, plus breakfast, I only owed them roughly 30 yuan, hardly an amount of money worth hounding me for.
Anyway, that’s why I can never return to China. It’s not political.