Saturday 5th December, 2015                    0200

Why is it that religious people believe there is a heaven and a hell? As an agnostic of course I believe none of that rot but if I did then surely hell is simply being born - it is the here and now?

As I posted on Face book (apparently Suckerberg is giving me 99% of his shares), I have faced adversity all my life but the reality is that for everyone LIFE is adversity. Silver spoons cushion it a little but still come with their own problems - upkeep of the castle and the like. So why complain, anyone?

I’m not. Much.

The death threats I was in a perverse way enjoying because I was either going to get to meet the arsehole or ruin his life forever. That minor enjoyment was plucked away by Anthony and I resigned myself to it. Oh yes, the free bus pass is five and a half years away (unless they have upped that along with the pension age!) and I don’t fancy my chances at all any more even though the brain still says I am twenty-two, the body says otherwise. However, elderly people still kill people.

But hot on the heels was my attempt to shift the ice city trip by just one week. After hours and hours of getting dibuchi I had a brainwave - call  them on the international number on Skype!

Bingo!!

My joy was short-lived though. I had already been informed by email that the Shenyang - Nanjing flights would cost over 500y extra to alter even using the same airline. So far so bad but manageable. Tonight I was told that to cancel the Hefei to Harbin flights the penalty was over 800y - I only paid 1200y to buy the bloody tickets! And the intention was to purchase flights from Hefei to Dalian, then spend more on a sleeper train so as to get to Harbin. The travel company were getting more in any case.

Well, over 1300y as a penalty is a weeks wages and it was never going to happen because that was simply the penalty - buying new flights and train tickets were on top of that and would have involved a sleeper (anathema to me with strangers in the cabin) and arriving at 0600 in Harbin with eight hours to kill before check in. At maybe -40C?

To say it has all gone tits up would not be an understatement. I don’t have the money to chuck at it if I want to have spending money and why in the hell SHOULD I when I have spent fortunes over the past five years with the travel company and airlines? I could understand if I was changing everything a few days before but this is five weeks and so I just know they will be able to resell the seats with no problem.

You know what, if we end up not going I would rather lose the third of the price I may have been refunded and pray the seats went empty. I would say that I will never use the travel company again but sadly they are the best option in China - and believe it or not I am a gold member. You wouldn’t think it though.

So for now it is a wait for the exam schedules to come out. Far too early in China when they start in four weeks time, I mean, come on????

As it stands, and I really don’t want to do it because I will feel guilty the entire time, I have little option but to claim the limited refunds and go alone. I don’t want to. I really don’t know what I am to do - I would rather square up to Mr Death Threats, that would give me great pleasure, this on the other hand is, believe it or not, damned painful.

On the bright side, I need to be up in seven hours for a German sausage burger in McD with Kevin. Sorry Andrei and Juliette but I miss my old friends (even Ollivier!!!) and I miss arguing vehemently with him. But he always fixed my computer.