Xi'an International Airport, China (Execution of the Curse)

We left downtown Xi'an at around 11am for the airport to catch our flight to Guilin. The weather remained what it had been all day, cloudy and very cold. We arrived at the airport and it was a mad scene. The check-in area was completely packed with no where for a group of 14 to stand. Our national guide, George, headed for the check-in booth while we stood around. George came back 15 minutes later and told us that there were flight delays due to weather in Beijing and our flight was delayed an hour. Since we couldn't check in and get our boarding passes we were stuck in the check-in area until then. We moved around the airport like a wagon train. We would occassionaly move around the airport to somewhere less smokey or warmer and then circle our carts like covered wagons.

We spent 5 hours waiting around the check-in area. Finally, the villagers became restless and demanded food from our guide. We were taken to the the lovely airport restaurant for dinner. At the end of dinner George came to us with a big smile and said our plane had left Beijing and was on its way to Xi'an. We quickly left our comfortable seats in the restaurant to go check-in. It took us over an hour to finally check-in due to one delay after another. Eventually, we checked in and headed through security. When we got to our gate it was a mad house. The terminal was very small, 5 gates, and was filled with angry people who had been stranded in Xi'an from anywhere to a couple hours to all day. At about the same time we got to our gate the skies opened up and it started snowing big time. We all knew that our flight might get delayed so we found a nice corner of the terminal to lay down and get comfortable. We listened to the PA system over the next few hours go from announcing delays of flights, to cancellations of flights, to the closure of the airport due to weather. We were now in the airport terminal with our luggage somewhere on the tarmac and no prospect of leaving. About an hour into this George told us we could pick up our bags at the belt and head back to the hotel. Again, we all left our somewhat comfortable seats to wait at the luggage courasal for our luggage. This took another 1/2 hour. At 12:40am we had our luggage and boarded our bus to go back to the hotel we had spent the previous two nights in. On the way back to the hotel our bus never drove in a straight line as it was fishtailing for 30 miles. We didn't go to bed until 1:45am.

The following morning we got up at 8am and headed for the airport. Since we had no idea when our flight would leave, we needed to be at the airport if a flight became available. The airport was the same as we left it, packed, cold, loud and very smokey. We did the same thing as before, made a circle with our carts and waited. And wait we did. We had the same crappy meal for the third time at the hotel's only restaurant. We tried to pass the time by making a betting pool on when the plane would actually leave, Superbowl Square style. At 1pm we were told that our plane was on its way and we could check our bags. We then waited for another 3 hours until we boarded.

The moment of triumph finally arrived at 4:30:34pm when we took off. We ended up being delayed for over a day and spent close to 16 hours in the Xi'an airport. The moral of the story is don't mess with the hallo people. They're pushy, smelly, and capable of putting 24 hour curses on you.