Tuesday 7^th July, 2020 1230

Gordon Bennett! Travelling? It's now become a nightmare.

Jody and I had a bit of a contretemps on Sunday. Having badgered her all last week to sort out the phone to get a green whatnot, she finally decided to do it on Sunday. Except she couldn't do it. She opened a Wechat account for me but got no further than that and said she would need to get colleagues at work to assist. Given that I wanted to go to the airport on the 1157 train the following day it seemed unlikely to happen and so I pointed out that had she tried last week there would have been time to take it to work for help. She went batty. Do it yourself was the comment thrown at me, of course were I capable I'd never have needed to ask her.

Fair play to her though, she went to campus early, enlisted aid and brought the phone back at 0930 complete with a green screen.

Buying my ticket at the station I wasn't asked for the phone so I wondered whether perhaps it had been unnecessary.

But no, once in the station there is an ID check prior to the security scanners. There I was asked to scan the QR code. Er? Can you do it for me? I have no idea how! No they wouldn't, apart from pulling up the green for me – I had to do the scan. I asked which button I needed to press and received no reply. However, apparently there is no button involved, you simply point the camera at the square. I did so, confident in the knowledge that I was green.

It went RED!!!!

I was then “invited” to come through and take a seat and was then surrounded by three police officers. I was grilled on my life history, what I was doing in China, why I was going to the airport etc. I played the thick but sincere old fart – not particularly hard to do seeing as with both phone and procedure I was completely clueless anyway!

Of course, while all this was going on in the full view of other “innocent” passengers who, being Chinese simply used automatic gates with their ID cards and phones, many I am sure were wondering if I had the virus, was a criminal or perhaps was an illegal. I called Jody on my dumbphone and she spoke to the policewoman. There then followed a barrage of further questions, some sort of checking out of my old phone number and I don't know what else. However, very kindly, they managed to get me a green thing again and allowed me to go through.

On the train in first class I settled back for the 45 minute ride and the delight of scenery consisting almost entirely of parched earth. Then the ticket inspector arrived. I handed her my passport and ticket as usual and she photographed the main page and my residence permit, then promptly went to grass me up to her superior.

Said superior then came and grilled me! It is incomprehensible how they are suspicious of a foreigner when the country closed to them entering on 23^rd March so I am no more at risk of spreading the disease than the Chinese are. Then I decided to show her my little card they gave me at our security gate, the first time I have ever used it. Her eyes lit up, she asked if she could photograph it and finally went away happy. And people wonder why I don't want a smartphone!

Once back at home, Alice set to work trying to set up an Alipay account to use instead. After an age, during which we had to wait for my bank to verify me and various other hoops to be jumped through, she started adding greens for all the other cities I need. I now have Shanghai, Chongqing and Nanning plus Lanzhou. Yichang is a worry as no foreigners can currently get green for there – although she can, again am I more likely to spread the virus? Xining also is a problem simply because so far she can't even get a decision, not for herself either but that's hardly urgent seeing as any trip there will probably be in October.

I would though say that I am thoroughly fed up with this whole situation, as I am sure are many others. And the troubling thing is, even when the virus abates I think they will probably retain the system as the norm.