It started with an early-morning flight out of Shanghai. I was headed back to Beijing after a few days of work, and while the departure time of 7:30 am was excruciatingly early, I was comforted by the fact that I had scored an economy-priced first-class seat.

Everything went smoothly at the start – more than smoothly, in fact, since I luxuriated in a huge seat while wearing slippers, sipped freshly brewed Americano from fine china, and snacked from a bowl of warm nuts, all before take-off. I settled in, ready to fully enjoy the two-hour journey.

After we had reached altitude and the flight attendants brought me my breakfast, complete with a white tray-table cloth and freshly squeezed OJ, the captain got on the mic to make an announcement.

“Ladies and gentlemen, may I have your attention please. One of our passengers is in need of emergency medical assistance. If there are any doctors onboard, please make yourselves known to the flight attendants. Thank you.”

It was the kind of announcement I had only heard in the movies. “Was this really how airlines dealt with medical emergencies?” I thought. Not being a doctor myself, I continued to enjoy my herb omelet.

My meal was soon put on permanent hold, however, when I saw a man being carried up the aisle by two male passengers and two flight attendants, the latter shuffling and struggling in their heels in the tight space. They placed the clearly unconscious man on the seat diagonally behind me, so that I had a perfect view of the situation.

Another man in a plaid shirt and sweater vest, presumably a doctor who had offered his services, was now lifting the limp hand of the unconscious man to check his pulse, listening for his breath, and looking in his eyes. One of the flight attendants arrived with a blood pressure meter. Whatever reading it registered, it couldn’t have been good, as the doctor suddenly stood up and began giving the man strong and rhythmic chest pumps. The doctor wasn’t a small man, and every time he pumped, pushing his weight onto his palms, the unconscious man let out a sickening groan like he might puke up his lungs. This went on for nearly 20 minutes.

At one point, a flight attendant came over and asked me, “Are you finished with your meal? Can I get you anything else?” She clearly tried to maintain the illusion of the first-class experience in spite of the man dying behind me.

“No, I’m fine,” I replied. Then, because I wasn’t sure how else to phrase it, I asked, “Will he be okay?”

“I don’t know,” she confided, her face suddenly betraying the seriousness of the situation.

Soon after the captain got on the PA once again: “Ladies and gentlemen, one of our passengers is having a medical emergency and we must return to Shanghai to ensure he gets proper treatment. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.”

As the plane turned, I looked back to see what was happening. The doctor was now trying to affix a mask connected to an oxygen tank around the man’s face. He was having some difficulty as the man lay heavy and unresponsive on the seat, his eyes closed and his skin a sickly gray-purple. The flight attendants stood slightly off to the side, looking tense and worried.

Less than an hour later we made it back to Shanghai and, miraculously, the man seemed to still be alive – maybe even better, as he responded to the doctor’s questions with a slight nod of the head. After the plane stopped, a team of EMS workers ran onboard and got to work checking the man’s vitals and talking to the passenger-doctor. A few Air China staff also came onboard to investigate, standing around looking important.

We all waited for a special emergency vehicle with a gurney to position itself alongside the plane door to carry the man to a waiting ambulance. Meanwhile, other passengers became curious, and snuck up to the first/economy-class divider to check things out. At the same time, more Air China staff began peering over the shoulders of the EMS workers.

Of course, this being 2014, people couldn’t just look — they had to record it. Pics or it didn’t happen, as they say. Some passengers in economy thrust their phones through the divider, making sure they were high enough to avoid shoulders or heads to get a good shot of the barely conscious man, who had probably just had a heart attack. To my relief, the flight attendants politely sent them back to their seats and closed the curtains.

But now the Air China staff were also holding up phones and taking pictures, checking to make sure they had gotten a good shot, then going in for another. I watched, uncomprehending, as everyone around me (except the EMS staff, who were busy saving a man’s life) began taking pictures, including but not limited to other first-class passengers, flight attendants, Air China staff, the men working on the emergency vehicle, and, out on the tarmac, the airport staff who were overseeing the arrival of the ambulance and safe passage of the suffering passenger.

Has it really become socially acceptable to record others in their most tragic, most vulnerable, weakest point of their existence? As a man suffered, potentially near death, everyone around him tried capturing the moment for eternity, not to mention social media.

Once the man was safely transferred to an ambulance, our plane turned around and ready for a second takeoff. This time there were no offers of freshly squeezed juice or brewed coffee. The flight attendants stayed huddled near the exit, perhaps recovering from what they had witnessed. Either that or placing filters on their photos and creating collages to post online.

Victoria Cook works in public relations in Beijing. Follow her @TorECook.

A 13-year-old girl managed to convince everyone, for at least a few days, that she was a flight attendant at Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport despite the fact that she’s 13 and definitely not a flight attendant, reports Global Times.

Why anyone would want to work in the air industry in China, where physical and verbal abuse against airport employees are common, is beyond me. But Luo Siqi (above, left) apparently loved it:

“I love the blue sky and I always dreamt of flying. I wanted to stay at the airport so I could be close to my dream,” Luo told authorities between sobs.

China Southern Airlines was Luo’s airline of choice. She reportedly bought four sets of uniforms online.

SCMP reports that on Taobao, a China Southern Airlines flight attendant’s uniform can be purchased for as little as 280 yuan, though they can run up to 3,000.

One last tidbit, from GT:

According to a social worker handling the case, Luo was raised in an orphanage before she was placed in the care of an elderly couple. After her foster parents were sent to a nursing home, Luo was left with a relative in eastern Guangdong Province. Unhappy with her new living arrangement, Luo traveled to Guangzhou in July on her own.

She has a dream, and now a goal. Best of luck to the kid.

UPDATE: China Southern responds via Twitter:

@ken0624700 @beijingcream Let's wait till she grows up and see if she still wants to be a flight attendant provided she meets cc requirement

— ChinaSouthernAirline (@CSAIR_GLOBAL) September 17, 2013

An hour after takeoff of China Eastern flight MU738 last Wednesday, a two-year-old boy got his finger stuck under a TV screen. His mom, not noticing, then almost ripped the poor child’s finger off.

“The bone did not fracture but the skin was pulled apart and the bone could be seen,” said Jason Lu of China Eastern’s Australia office, as reported by Shanghai Daily.

The plane was 10 hours from its destination of Pudong International Airport, so the pilot turned back.

Probably since no one wanted to hear a bleeding toddler scream for 10 straight hours, “The 300-plus passengers were all calm and supportive of the decision,” said passenger Xu Yangdong.

Lu said the decision to turn the plane around had cost the airline some 3 million yuan (US$490,200).

The plane had to release some 60 tons of fuel before landing in Melbourne to avoid damage to the undercarriage as the fully fuelled aircraft would have been too heavy to land.

As wasteful as that seems, we actually have to commend China Eastern on its decision. We’ve seen flights turned around due to fights from belligerent drunks, which is stupid. A boy with a severe injury? Understandable. And we suppose, all things considered, China Eastern is due for a bit of good publicity.

China Eastern flight heads back to Melbourne after boy injures finger (Shanghai Daily, h/t Alicia)

Once again, Chinese tourists shame their countrymen.

In the latest controversy involving Chinese tourists – a group of mainland travellers have upset Singapore Airlines staff by refusing to hand over 30 sets of stainless steel tableware during a recent flight, Chinese media reported.

That’s from SCMP, which continues:

The Chinese passengers were on a tour of Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand. While onboard the Singapore Airlines flight,  they had intended to keep the stainless steel knives and forks provided during a meal, the Qianjiang Evening News reported on Tuesday.

The utensils were apparently stainless steel and reusable, so naturally, airline staff weren’t happy. Neither were the tour guides in charge of these wonderful travelers.

The affair finally ended when the guide told the tourists they were hurting China’s image abroad. “Stop hurting the reputation of Chinese people,’’ he said.

Better or worse than getting drunk on a flight and trying to take away a bottle of wine?

For reasons that will not surprise anyone, the behavior of Chinese tourists has been in the news lately. No, it’s not good.

“Why Do Chinese Tourists Have Such a Bad Rep?” goes this Andrew Sullivan blog post (and here’s part two!). Basically, just a bunch of anecdotes of Chinese tourists behaving poorly. Maybe you’ll want to only skim a few lines, lest you get the impression that all Chinese travelers are like this.

Bad apples abound though, as they statistically would when a country sends so many tourists outside their borders every year. In this case, the travelers’ mistake was thinking they could steal in bulk. One or two sets of cutleries wouldn’t have raised any eyebrows. Thirty? Yeah, they’ll stop you then, probably just to make you understand your own stupidity more than anything else.

Chinese passengers anger airline staff by refusing to hand over in-flight tableware (SCMP, h/t Alicia)

If you’re going to throw a hissy fit during a delay at a Chinese airport, do it like this woman: without violence, in front of an audience, with just the right dash of the dramatics. The Nanfang has a transcript of this young lady’s soliloquy:

I’m from Shandong I tell you! From Shandong!

INTERLUDE: Actually, that’s a bad start. Don’t begin with Shandong.

You people are so disgusting!

INTERLUDE: Eeeech, you know what… don’t say that, either.

If you want to think I’m mentally ill then go ahead. My father’s name is (too muffled to hear). My mother’s name is Chen. My father is a national-level government official.

INTERLUDE: Oh, uh. On second thought, don’t do it like this woman. Have you thought about smashing some equipment?

He was a provincial-level cadre before. So if you people want to play I’ll play with you.

(Let us note here that she eventually begins shedding clothes, and she wasn’t even wearing all that much to begin with.)

If anything happens to me, you Guangdong people will have to change your mayor (sic). We Shandong people have so many superstars among us. I’m a minor celebrity myself.

She’s not completely wrong about the “superstars” bit, if by superstars she means total whack jobs. The man who stabbed and killed two people outside a Beijing mall last Wednesday? Shandong man. The fireworks bomber at Beijing airport on Saturday? Born in Shandong. The 11 members of a fishing boat who were convicted of murdering 22 people on the high seas? The vessel left from Shandong, was named Shandong No. 2683 trawler. It might still be early to say, but Shandong might be the new Hainan (which was, of course, the new Henan).

She eventually said:

If anybody tries to mess with me, I could have the entire internet shut down.

Officers on the scene were willing to take that chance. But as one of them approached, barely laying a hand on her, she collapsed in a heap like a soccer player. Good job, lady. Good effort.

Airport Meltdown: Woman insults locals, says she can shut down the Internet (The Nanfang)

Boarding an airplane can put you through the rawest five minutes of judgement you’ll ever face, especially if you’re a foreigner. Like a slow, awkward fashion show, you amble down the aisle in fits and starts while everyone already seated simply stare.

On my recent Guilin-bound Chengdu plane, I was generally spared of any finger-pointing or comments before I slid into my middle seat, wedged between A and C.

But then the 20-year-old boys came.

A hoard of these young men, jostling down the aisle in search for their seats, froze when they arrived at my row. I don’t speak Sichuanese, but by now I have a keen enough sense of when people are talking about me that I understood what was so funny.

“Oh, I have to sit with a foreigner!” one boy guffawed, and his friends pushed him toward his seat (Seat A, next to the window). “Switch with me!” he begged his friends. “No, no, you have to sit there!” they replied, and he edged in and buckled up.

I’ve never been one to 忍 (suffer silently, something the Chinese consider to be a virtue), so I turned to him and asked, “What’s wrong? Don’t like foreigners?”

“Huh?”

“I said, what’s your problem with foreigners?”

“Oh, you speak Chinese?”

“Yes…” By now the surrounding seats were silent. Those in the row in front practically had their ears pressed to the gap between the cushions. “So why don’t you want to sit next to a foreigner?”

“It’s not that, it’s just that… do you mind switching with my friend?”

His friend had been standing and watching, so I took the ticket out of his hand. Getting my baggage out of the overhead bin, I said sharply, “Don’t talk about foreigners like that.” Then I moved to the back of the plane.

~

I first came to China on a CET program in 2008. Teachers regarded my initial disgust with everything as culture shock. Within a month I got over — and even came to appreciate and enjoy — China’s dirtiness, its chaos, its underlying freestyle beat. One thing I could never come to terms with, however, was being made to feel like an outsider: the staring, the pointing, locals wanting to take pictures with you, and the never-ending line of inquiry, “You foreigners all like ___, right?”

“It’s just different,” my classmates would say, implying that I was simply intolerant.

“They don’t know any better,” they would add, absolving the finger-pointers and gawkers of responsibility.

“You have to understand their point of view.”

I was confused about how racism should be forgivable once you’re the target of it. But when you’re in love with China, as I increasingly was in those salad days of underground music and hutong prowling, what can you do? You take the good with the bad. I learned to shut my mouth and let the fingers point. I smiled in the tourist photos. I wrote a study abroad essay about how I learned to get along with Chinese people, and won $100.

Two years in Chinese grad school and two Chinese boyfriends later, I wised up. In tolerating ostracization, I had allowed Chinese friends and acquaintances to walk all over me, assign an identity to me, basically overlook everything about me to satisfy their expectations as someone they could understand. As the only person from my study abroad class to have become fluent in Chinese and still be here, I decided to rethink the mantra, “It’s just different.”

There is certainly value in recognizing that cultures have different standards, and to evaluate other people’s actions in respect to their intent. But to look the other way when racism is happening and write it off as a “cultural difference” is putting on a muzzle, a form of self-censorship.

For sure, I have real Chinese friends, as I’ve previously written about. They have the self-awareness to not make me feel like an outsider, and don’t care that we’re different. They are not like my many other Chinese acquaintances who speak to me slowly and applaud my ability to use chopsticks. While I recognize they think they’re being helpful, these aren’t the people I choose to spend time with.

Two summers ago in Beijing, I prowled down a Gulou hutong with two Chinese friends and an American classmate — a posse that had been forged over Tsingtao beers and shaokao and open mic nights. “It’s American Independence Day,” said Haozi, “so I have a question for you. When are you going to free China?”

I paused a second and then burst out laughing. Irony and humor are easily lost across cultures and languages. Unfazed, Haozi gave his two American friends a chance to join in the joke. He’ll never know how much I appreciated that.

~

Ten minutes later, sitting near the back of Flight CA 3241 from Chengdu to Guilin, a stewardess brought me a handwritten note.

Dear Lincoln,

Sorry for our behaviors just now. Our English is a little poor. We didn’t mean to trouble you. Hope you can understand us.

Nice trip!          <3

Thank you.

It looks like the boys got my last name off the ticket, but apparently over-thought the first name/last name thing.

I admit, I hadn’t really been angry with them — the questioning was partly for show. They were, after all, just boys horsing around, maybe on their first vacation without their parents. But hopefully, because I spoke up, they came away with an understanding that foreigners are not so foreign.

And I found myself endeared by their follow-up act, and affirmed in my belief that living in this country long-term is worth the effort. I am constantly still learning – among other things, about how you must recognize when to draw the line between being culturally sensitive and sticking to your principles. Stick with it long enough and this country has a way of rewarding you with surprises that you didn’t realize or had forgotten were possible. You’ll absorb lessons that you just can’t pick up from a semester abroad. Hope you can understand.

More from Hannah Lincoln: a tour of the world’s largest building.

Ji Zhongxin, a 34-year-old petitioner born in Heze, Shandong province, blew himself up on Saturday in Terminal 3 of Beijing Capital International Airport. Watch how he did it, above, in a video that’s been viewed 2.6 million times on Tencent.

Ji was reportedly in Beijing to petition decade-long grievances from his time working in Guangdong province, suffering the abuse of authorities and chengguan. Shanghaiist managed to grab Ji’s Sina blog before it was deleted on Sunday (preserved on James Griffiths’s Pastebin), in which Ji wrote:

Because we are farmers, and are poor, no matter who we turn to, nobody wants to help us. And what’s more, when the chengguan found us, they turned around and called us tramps and beat us. If it weren’t for them taking us to hospital on time, I wouldn’t have survived…

We looked to the sky, and the sky looked away; we called to the earth, and the earth did not respond. We have been forsaken but have nobody to turn to, so all I could do was to hold back tears and go back to Shandong. And now I am festering away, paralysed and over 100,000 yuan in debt. Our family have suffered an unimaginable fate. My uncle died when he was young, and soon after so did my mother and grandmother. The only thing that’s keeping me going is the thought of seeking justice.

Justice in the form of a homemade bomb, apparently, detonated in the international arrivals hall of a major airport.

Ji, who is recovering in a hospital as we speak, may find solace in at least this bit of news: officials have reopened Ji’s case in Dongguan, Guangdong province, reports SCMP:

The Public Security Bureau in Guangdong asked the Dongguan branch to carry out a thorough investigation into mistreatment claimed by Ji Zhongxing, the bomber, and his ensuing petitions, the national broadcaster CCTV reported yesterday, adding that the probe was already under way.

(H/T Derrick Sobodash)

A man in a wheelchair detonated a homemade explosion this evening at Beijing Capital International Airport’s Terminal 3. It happened in the international arrivals hall at 6:24 pm, according to Xinhua, with no one else getting injured.

CCTV identified the man as Ji Zhongxing from Shandong province. The explosive was reportedly made using gunpowder from fireworks, and probably should be hashtagged “fail.”

Reuters reports that the area was cleaned up fairly quickly, with authorities basically shrugging: “A Reuters witness said things had returned to normal about 90 minutes after the explosion and there were no signs of extra security.”

Updates as they become available.

UPDATE, 7/22, 4:20 pm: Check out video of the explosion:

UPDATE, 7/21, 2:36 am: The man may have been a petitioner whose appeals fell on deaf ears. The Telegraph reports:

According to his older brother, Ji Zhongji, Mr Ji had been working as a rickshaw driver in the southern Chinese city of Xintang when he was beaten by local police with a steel tube, leaving him disabled.

“We filed two legal cases against the police in Xintang but we never received any official compensation,” he said.

In 2008, Mr Ji went to Beijing to put his case before the central government, his brother said, but had been asked to return home and had not ventured to the capital since.

Two days ago, however, their father, who lived with Mr Ji and cared for him, reported that he had gone missing.

(H/T Valentina Luo)

UPDATE, 7/30, 2:47 pm: He has been arrested.

Ji Zhongxing, who was suspected of setting off a home-made explosive at the Beijing Capital International Airport, has been arrested, police said Tuesday.

UPDATE, 9/18, 1:51 am: He asked for forgiveness in court.

The Wall Street Journal revealed on Friday that China’s airports are the world’s worst for flight delays. “According to FlightStats, which tracks airport statistics, Beijing’s airport ranks dead last among the world’s top 35, with fully 82% of flights failing to leave on time,” WSJ reported. “Second worst was Shanghai, at 71%.” Numbers, numbers. We could link to a string of posts from our archives with picture and video evidence, but none of it will feel as real as our memories — after all, we’ve all experienced the particular nightmare of flying in China. Below, some of our stories.

Mark Dreyer, founder of The Li-Ning Tower:

July 4, flew into HKG from SFO at 6 pm, was then booked on the 8 pm Air China flight 112 to PEK. 8 pm was cancelled, so was switched to flight 114, previously delayed, now due to leave 8.30 pm. That was also cancelled, so I was switched to flight 110, previously delayed, now due to leave at 9 pm. We boarded at 9.30 pm, doors closed, told we had no take-off slot – could be 10 minutes, could be 3 or 4 hours. Right at midnight we left the gate and took off. Once we were in the air, captain told us that he got the call at midnight from Air China to cancel the flight and while he was on the phone, air traffic control gave him permission to take off. So he had to promise to Air China that he would taxi at double speed and then fly as quickly as possible to arrive on time. Issue was that if we had landed at PEK past a certain time, they would be given a hefty fine so that it would no longer have made economic sense to fly the plane.

This was all to get up to Ordos for work. Leaving Ordos was eventful: Group 1 left Sunday night, flight Ordos-PEK cancelled, so they drove to Baotou for another flight to PEK. Sat on the runway for many hours, finally left at 5 am, diverted to Shijiazhuang, then bus to PEK, arrived about noon Monday (missed all onward onnections to rest of Asia).

Group 2 (me) left on the 8.30 am Monday morning flight, half an hour delayed but back to PEK no problem, easily beating Group 1 back to PEK.

Groups 3 and 4 left on the Monday afternoon flight back to PEK, told all flights were cancelled and/or no time slots yet assigned. Group 3 chartered a bus for a 17-hour journey back to Beijing. Two hours later, Group 4 boarded and flew back to PEK.

What I’m getting out of this is cancellations happen sometimes.

Alicia, founder Prep! Beijing: 

As a former management consultant, I used to travel between Beijing and Shanghai every week for close to five months, leaving for Shanghai on Sunday evening or Monday morning and coming back to Beijing on Friday evenings. I’ve encountered my fair share of delays and flight cancellations (and, consequently, fights), for various reasons: snowstorms, rainstorms, and, mostly, “air traffic control,” especially on a Friday when all business travelers rush to go home. On top of these “normal” reasons, Expo 2010 strained the aviation industry, and Shanghai’s Hongqiao Terminal 2 didn’t open until March 16, 2010. There were no high-speed G trains yet, either.

I still remember once flying back from Shanghai to Beijing — guess on which airline? — and being told to go to my gate to wait for the new departure time. After changing gates, the plane finally arrived from Beijing, one and a half hours late. One and a half hours later, we boarded. An hour later, we were still on the tarmac, and then, finally, eventually, mercifully, told to get off the plane. Mechanical failure. By that point, travelers were so angry that they had to give us food, drinks and RMB 200 each (score! cash!). I don’t remember what time we eventually took off, but it was well over midnight, and I wasn’t back in Beijing till 2 or 3 am.

Avoid night flights between Beijing and Shanghai. Got it.

Sarah Hansen:

The recent downpours in Beijing have been affecting planes. No, not because the acid is burning through the wings. Rain creates flight delays that bring to mind the snaking lines at the bus stop, the bank, and the bathroom. However, none of those can compete with a day at the Beijing Capital Airport when rain is afoot.

During a heavy rain the night before my trip, I learn that my flight to Erlian is delayed two hours.

In the morning, I find that the crusty vestige of the original Beijing airport called Terminal 1 is not my favorite place.

From the grand hall of Terminal 2 to the squished space of Terminal 1, problems abound. The damn voice broadcasting over the P.A. keeps saying so. Self check-in is an elbow to the rib waiting to happen so I make my way to the counter, and the process is quicker than expected, and my departure time is still set for 9:30 AM [laugh track].

The information screens, steps from the wand-wielding security personnel, are lacking in helpful numbers. Passengers build into a thick human clog and look upon the screens as though they might soon reveal the meaning of life. Craned necks, and shuffling feet – can’t be much longer. Now it can’t be much longer. Okay, now? I judge it time to venture off to the restroom with the knowledge that a watched pot never provides gate information.

The women’s bathroom and the expected line.

Back to the screens. No go. Stranded passengers are having a looped conversation along the lines of: “Where’s my gate? They haven’t shown them yet. Where’s my gate? They haven’t shown them yet. Where’s…”

Passing security and airline representatives are not only unhelpful but downright disdainful towards those who dare to ask for more information.

Bathroom round two. Longer line, more smells and sounds.

Screens part three. Why can’t they just tell us to go to a made-up gate?

I head off to find the poor soul who drew the short straw at the info desk, but as I approach him – FINALLY a gate number appears! Leaving… several hours from now. Fine.

Being a vegetarian in this terminal means that I am reduced to some packaged faux peanut butter faux chocolate cookies and banana milk to appease my gurgling stomach. And the waiting continues.

I contemplate the strange five-minute trip across to Mongolia that I still have ahead of me, and then – HOORAH, another line forms, this time to board the plane!

My day is starting to look up when I find myself alone in my row, and I drift off. I wake up almost an hour later and find my ass still planted firmly on the tarmac. Apparently, we are in yet another line, this one consisting of planes.

The engines do finally rev, and the flight attendant announces our happy departure. Less than an hour after that we touch down and emerge into a scorching hot, sunny day. Irony flies Hainan Airlines apparently.

NO ONE KNOWS ANYTHING.

And finally, the most nightmarish story of them all, via Andray Abrahamian, Korean scholar, Choson Exchange writer:

Me: have any horror stories from chinese flights?

Andray: Sitting on a plane in the tarmac while Murray was winning wimbledon…my country’s seminal sporting event of probably this century

I mean, they knew the storm was coming. Let us sit and watch sports history unfold in the terminal instead of spending almost three hours on the tarmac with only Yanjing beer for comfort as howling winds and rain lash the plane.

Air China loves to cancel their flight to PY [Pyongyang] without warning. You’ll get there and then they say, sorry, there is two much wind in PY, we can fly. Or there is a blizzard. You get there the next day and there is no snow.

Me: Did you get the game any way? Following on iPhone? Radio?

Andray: I followed the game via texts and calls to Tori, who was watching with a pack of expat Brits.

Boarded after the first set, took off after he’d won.

Chinese airports are the worst.

Flight delays are frustrating, and if you, in the midst of a four-hour delay, have never allowed yourself to think barbarous, shamefully uncivilized and cruel thoughts, it doesn’t make you a better person: you’re just that smug asshole everyone always wants to punch.

But no one actually does punch you, and have you ever wondered why? Because we have inhibitors in our brain that operate with information from the Office of Rational Thinking, which tells us violence in our society is often met with disdain, sometimes with legal repercussions in the form of jail time or fines. This bit of awareness is what keeps us from flipping out at the airport, no matter how angry we get at airline employees, how disappointed we are in ourselves that we could, again, make the mistake of booking a goddamn flight in China, thinking, “Maybe this is the one time that things run smoothly.”

We’ll let CCTV News, in its YouTube description, tell you what’s happening above:

On July 2nd, a Tianjin airline was supposed to depart from Nanchang (capital of Jiangxi province) to Haikou (capital of Hainan province) at 11 am. But due to the delay of the previous flight, the passengers were not able to board the plane until 5:30 pm. The airline offered meals, accommodation and 200 yuan compensation for each of the passengers as a goodwill gesture. But a tourist guide named Yu leading a 50-person tour group was not satisfied with the offer.

She demanded 600 yuan for each person, and when the airline said, “Eh, no,” she began smashing airport equipment and ripping paper. “You’ll be responsible for the damage,” officers told her point-blank. She continued smashing and ripping. Ring, ring. Office of Rational Thinking calling. Why do you even bother employing us?

Miss Yu was arrested five days later, and now might have to pay for the equipment she broke. How much? The phone itself exceeds 5,000 yuan.

Thunderstorms in Shanghai on Friday caused massive flight delays and more than 100 cancellations in the city’s two major airports, Hongqiao and Pudong, and as you might expect, tempers boiled over. We don’t know how many dozens of arguments broke out in terminals around the city, and how many of those turned into fights, but at least one was caught on camera. It involved — yes, once again — China Eastern Airlines.

Shanghai Daily has this report:

Two men, surnamed Zhang, 45, and Yu, 62, and a woman surnamed Zhang, 44, assaulted two China Eastern Airlines employees at Hongqiao International Airport after their flight to Linyi, in east China’s Shandong Province, was delayed, airport police said.

Both employees sustained bruises in the attack.

The men will be detained for 10 days and were also fined 500 yuan (US$81.47) each while the woman was fined 200 yuan, police said.

Another man, Luo, 26, was detained for 10 days for grabbing a policeman’s badge “and hiding it because he was angry about a flight delay.” We know delays are frustrating, particularly when they seem to happen all the time, but one should definitely never mess with police officers’ badges.

The delays continued into Saturday, with outbound flights held up one to four hours. (At least it wasn’t a three-day delay, which Shanghai has seen before.) There is a lesson here, which I hope we all take to heart: when at all possible, take the train in China.

(H/T Alicia)

“My name is Daniel Morgan Perry, born March 12, 1978.”

On United Airlines Flight 116 from Hong Kong to Newark on Monday, Daniel Morgan Perry, born March 12, 1978, demanded the plane be diverted to Canada, according to passengers, claiming his life was in danger. Also, something about poison and the CIA.

“Your life is in jeopardy!” he shouted, according to CBS New York. “Your life is in jeopardy if you work for the NSA, you work for the CIA, you work for the National Reconnaissance Office, your life is in jeopardy!”

The man was departing from the city where Edward Snowden — who did actually work for the NSA — is believed to be currently staying.

New York Daily News has more information:

Jacques Roizen, 44, a restructuring consultant from New York who tackled the crazed passenger in the aisle, said the man screamed that his life was in danger and claimed he’d been poisoned.

“He asked the plane be diverted to Canada. He was clearly not stable,” Roizen told The Daily News. “He said he was being shot with darts during the flight. He said he was the one poisoned.”

You can listen to audio of the raving on the CBS New York website. Finally, we found something more annoying in an airplane than a crying baby.

The man is currently in custody.

(H/T Alicia)

This is first-class: on a plane stuck on the Beijing airport tarmac for three hours yesterday, a quartet of musicians from the Philadelphia Orchestras took out their instruments, gathered in the aisle, and serenaded passengers. The music starts at the 1:11 mark in the above.

The quartet performed here on Thursday evening, and will be playing in Macau tonight and tomorrow to wrap up its China tour — a somewhat historic one, it turns out. As New York Times notes:

If Ping-Pong diplomacy is what paved the way for President Richard M. Nixon’s visit to Beijing in 1972 to re-establish the United States’ official relationship with China, then one could say it was the visit by the Philadelphia Orchestra the following year that truly cemented it. Personally chosen by President Nixon himself, the Philadelphia Orchestra was one of the first cultural delegations to be sent to China that followed Nixon’s visit. The orchestra’s performance in 1973 in front of a packed audience at the Cultural Palace of Nationalities in the heart of Beijing was the first-ever given by an American orchestra in Communist-led China.

Now, 40 years later, the Philadelphia Orchestra is commemorating the anniversary of its visit with a two-week, multicity tour of China, consisting of multiple concerts, small pop-up performances at important cultural sites, master classes, lectures and community outreach visits. The tour concludes on Sunday night with a concert in Macau.

Flight delays in China are routine, causing flayed nerves and flaring tempers, but a live classical performance can go a long way to making things right. “Magical,” says NPR. “Beautiful,” says Shanghaiist. All of the above.

The musicians:

Juliette Kang, violin
Daniel Han, violin
Che-Hung Chen, viola
Yumi Kendall, cello

Fun fact: three of the stories we’ve posted in the past two days have been from Shenzhen. It’s where Alicia and I happened to be this weekend (for Ultimate Frisbee), and on Sunday we attempted to fly back.

Attempted and succeeded — but barely. A separate Shenzhen-to-Beijing airline ended up being delayed until 2 am, while our flight was only set back two hours, to 11 pm. (To the best of my knowledge, it wasn’t because of bomb threats.)

We were all more fortunate than the people in this video, however, who were delayed for so long that they began storming the doors of other deparature gates and blocking them. If we can’t leave, neither can you.

Needless to say, passengers already lined up at those gates — who saw the doors slammed shut by airport personnel to prevent rabid travelers from running onto the tarmac — were not happy. At the front of the line, a middle-aged man tried to physically remove one of the women blocking the way, beseeching, “Don’t take it out on us!” She sealed her lips and wouldn’t budge — and was apparently quite strong. Another woman carried in her arms a very young, surprisingly quiet child, the sight of which was enough to make me momentarily forget my own swelling annoyance.

Of course, when you’re travel weary and spiritually drained from dealing with airport attendants — who, it should be noted, have one hell of a tough job — it’s difficult to spare sympathy. Empathy, actually, since we’re all in the same boat — until, all of a sudden, we’re not, because our flight is set to depart and you’re blocking the way.

Eventually the women conceded, perhaps realizing there was nothing to be gained from holding up everyone else. “Where are the cops?” I wondered out loud.

“Why would there be cops in a Chinese airport?” Alicia retorted.

On the bright side, unlike our friend Matt Sheehan, at least we didn’t have to deal with China Eastern’s lying signboard.

“Hello, today’s flight ____ to ____ has been delayed because of ____.”

It’s 8:40 pm on a Friday. We’re lined up at the China Eastern Airlines counter a full ninety minutes before takeoff, and I have everything I need for a great, just-quit-work weekend: passport, check; cleats, check; Frisbee, check; baijiu-Fanta mix, check. But just then, China decides to remind me where I am. Ahead of us in line, an argument begins to stew, froth, and bubble. The verbal combatants are an elderly couple, possibly from the countryside, and two overdressed, overly made-up, and apparently overconfident young women.

The initial dispute is over whether a luggage cart bumped into an ankle, but it gets ugly fast: one of the girls taunts the old man’s ability to speak standard Mandarin Chinese. Airline employees break up the verbal sparring as quickly as they can, but the tone for the evening has been set. At the counter, a friendly but frazzled attendant tells me my flight doesn’t yet have a gate, and I already have an idea of what I’m in for.

“Does that mean the flight is going to be delayed?”

“There’s no way to know right now. Just head through security, take a seat and wait.”

“Okay…”

~

By 10 pm I’ve slumped into chairs around the corner from the China Eastern counter along with 30-plus fellow travelers to Ningbo. There’s a collective nervousness about the total lack of information, but a sense of safety in the knowledge that they wouldn’t leave without all of us. As the minutes tick by, most people have their eyes on the flight monitor, but mine keep wandering to the company whiteboard that sits upside down and untouched in the corner:

“Hello, today’s flight ____ to ____ has been delayed because of ____. We are very sorry for all inconveniences. This sign will be updated every five minutes.”

At 10:50 the television monitor makes its opening play: 32登机口. Gate 32. The news travels via murmur through our group, and we show detectable optimism as we head down the causeway. What greets us on arrival at Gate 32, however, kills that flicker of hope. The expansive gate is populated by a few men in cheap suits who are slumped creatively around the arms of airport benches.

Our group hasn’t sat for more than ten minutes when the flight monitor makes its second play: Gate 19. The number flashes for a minute before settling into a steady neon blue. Our fellow travelers, with their luggage and their discontent, now make their way back down to the far end of the terminal. Gate 19 forms a cul de sac at this end, and the geography matches the mood. As we sink into our seats, people begin fearing the worst and getting ready for the long haul. Instant noodles are purchased, playing cards come out, pillows are unpacked, and you get a moment to appreciate how good Chinese travelers are at settling in wherever they find themselves.

My frame doesn’t fit well on airport benches, so I abandon any expectation of rest and concentrate on worrying. A delayed flight is expected in China, but there’s something eerie about the ever-changing gates and the fact that they’re still advertising a 10:40 pm take-off at 11:45. The airport is fast emptying of staff, and our group hasn’t had contact with China Eastern employees since they were last seen two hours ago.

A few members of the group are dialing airport help lines when the television monitor makes another bold change. At 12:15 am, the monitor informs us that our flight will be departing from Gate 32… at 10:40 pm. Several passengers rise to the bait, but while we’re gathering bags, our collective angst turns into action. The group quickly coalesces behind some very vocal middle-aged women who have had enough. As they spout off, the loose gaggle of passengers transforms into a posse out for blood.

With the China Eastern desk long-since abandoned, the mob rounds a corner to find a break room where employees of another airline are eating Ramen. At this point, anyone wearing a uniform is deemed guilty by association. On the defensive, the workers deny any connection with our airline. Asked where the China Eastern people are, they reply, “They already clocked out.”

“LOOK AT THE GOD DAMN SCREEN BEHIND YOU!”

Fresh blood on a shark snout, that comment. The middle-aged women — we’ll call them the Aunties — are beside themselves and immediately pull out the big guns. “Everybody send out Weibos! Everybody send out Weibos!” Nervous anger and microblog posts begin to emanate out from our group. We demand that our two hostages contact China Eastern people, and we only leave when reports trickle in that our airline’s people are back at the counter.

Marching down the concourse for the third time, our posse is riling itself up for confrontation. As voices grow shriller, distinct sub-groups begin to emerge. At the front the Aunties are feisty and feeble at the same time. They’re dressed and hair-dyed in a way to showcase their (or their husband’s) moderate financial success. Creeping through their 50s, the three women appear to have channeled decades of quiet emotional suffering into indignation over the 800 meters they’ve been forced to walk tonight.

On the other hand, one of the words you keep hearing bounce around their conversation is “rights,” e.g., “consumer rights.” Now that’s something that’s rarely brought up in China (outside of CCTV’s exposes of “malicious” foreign firms), and it’s one that could use a little more play. Consumer rights in China are abysmal, with a company generally considered socially conscious if it doesn’t poison or outright defraud you. These Aunties’ tone may be shrill, but there’s a kernel of a legitimate complaint in there.

Behind them is a loosely assembled group of half a dozen young men. Nearly all wearing black jackets and tacky shirts, the guys look like the kind of people who hang out on street corners and try to sell you receipts or stolen Motorola Razrs. A Chinese person with strong regional prejudices might guess that the men were from Henan. We’ll call them the Goodfellas.

The rest of us are tag-alongs, sharing in the ire but unsure what to make of it. As we approach the China Eastern counter, now populated by three female employees, the Aunties’ wrath finds a target.

“Where the hell have you guys been? We’ve been marching back and forth for hours with no sign of what’s going on!”

“We’ve been here the whole time.” (Lie.) “And why have you been marching back and forth? The flight is delayed and departing from Gate 40.” (Infuriating, but interesting tact.)

As the employees persist with a combination of bald-faced lies and potential half-truths, the outline of our conflict takes shape. China Eastern’s position is that after a brief delay in information, the flight has consistently been set to depart from Gate 40 once the plane arrives. Our claim that monitors have been displaying a revolving stream of gates is met with absolute denial from the employees: the monitors have always displayed Gate 40.

This unfortunate employee has wandered in past her depth here, and she realizes she’s in trouble when the Aunties, Goodfellas, and tag-alongs cry out: “TURN AROUND!” “LOOK AT THE GOD DAMN SCREEN BEHIND YOU!” “READ ME WHAT IT SAYS ON THE MONITOR!” Oohhh. That’s going to be a tough one to wriggle out of, so the woman takes a bold stand: she will not turn around and look at the screen.

Cue: Frenzy Feed.

“You know what, respect goes both ways”

Everyone gets in on the action, with even the most reserved members of the posse spewing venom across the counter. Company policies are being cited, compensation is being demanded, and someone’s character is being called into question. Camera-phones are snapping pictures of faces, name tags, and television monitors. Cornered and argumentatively crippled, the woman calls for reinforcements in the form of a mid-level manager.

When back-up arrives, it is calmer, friendlier and about 125 pounds heavier. The man appears to be in his early 30s, and has probably sat through a few graduate classes on customer service. His hair is dyed and styled to appear slightly more Western, and his healthy potbelly also takes after certain aspects of Americana.

A fresh perspective and some diplomacy buy the man time, but in the end he’s fighting a losing battle. The Aunties quickly work themselves into a frenzy, citing a litany of health issues aggravated by tonight’s regimen of waiting and walking. One with dyed red hair and a complexion to match begins pounding the counter and lecturing Mr. Middle-Manager on her high blood pressure.

The Goodfellas have taken up positions safely behind the Aunties, contributing nothing except a periodic “Yea! She said it!” and the occasional slander of someone’s mother. One member of the gang makes his first real foray into the debate by wadding up a newspaper and throwing it at the manager’s head. It’s a bullseye, granted one without a whole lot of force.

This is where our pudgy middle manager truly shines, if just for a moment. He bows his head, takes a deep breath and says, “You know what, respect goes both ways,” before plodding ahead with his analysis. Unfortunately his position in the argument isn’t proving quite so flexible.

“The flight has always been scheduled for Gate 40… No, I won’t turn around and look at the screen… No, there won’t be any compensation for you passengers. OK?”

The last rhetorical “OK” is uttered in English over his shoulder as he turns to walk away from the counter. The man doesn’t make it two steps before a half-full plastic water bottle sails out of the crowd, over my shoulder and directly into the left cheek of Mr. Middle-Manager.

BOOM.

The man turns on a dime and lunges at the counter as the Aunties retreat. His pudgy fingers grasp at the culprit, a darker man in a grey jacket who is smirking from a safe distance. Slowly awaking to the public relations disaster on their hands, two male employees grab Mr. Middle-Manager by the arms as their female co-workers whip out camera phones and snap pictures of the culprit. The better restrained the big man becomes, the bolder our water-bottle thrower grows. He steps up to the counter and wags fingers accompanied by curses in Mr. Middle-Manager’s face.

“Everybody send out Weibos!”

By this point there are enough camera-phone angles on the scene to accommodate a Matrix-style freeze-frame 360. Each side is hoping to gather evidence for the coming trial to be waged on Chinese social media.

Unfortunately, our manager isn’t doing his side any favors. His initial composure has given way to an elephant seal battle for male supremacy. In struggling to free himself for the offensive, the man exposes his ample belly. Pushed up against a wall he grabs for the only large projectile on hand: a metal stool. Cursing the stench of his assailants’ mothers’ reproductive organs, Mr. Middle-Manager lifts the stool for launch. Lucky for him, one of his co-workers manages to get a hand on it, deflecting the missile onto the counter. The China Eastern staffers hold tight as the aggrieved manager rages and wriggles. Weaponry and energy deprived, Mr. Middle-Manager contents himself with a purely verbal assault as he’s ushered away.

As China Eastern’s lone combatant is dragged off to a back office, some female employees have managed to get around the counter and directly photograph the water bottle thrower’s face. Soon the argument re-centers around the bottle thrower, the Aunties and a gaggle of female employees. By constantly upping the ante and baiting the employees, one cunning Auntie manages to get a woman to swear at her. They all immediately seize on the lone curse word, wagging their fingers in the face of the embarrassed woman who knows she’s slipped up.

The chaos has finally garnered the attention of a higher-up who comes down to fill the role of our fallen middle-manager. He takes a similar tack, apologizing and even bowing. But our impassioned defenders of customer rights are not to be so easily placated. Despite inciting the scuffle, both the Goodfellas and the Aunties are now demanding financial compensation and a direct apology from Mr. Middle-Manager.

As it becomes increasingly clear that neither of these will be forthcoming, most of the tag-alongs begin the slow walk down to Gate 40. Some time between 1 and 2 am, our 10:40 pm flight finally begins boarding. We take our assigned seats along with around a hundred other customers who somehow did get the memo on Gate 40. In the end, the final delay comes from the Aunties and the Goodfellas who defended their honor until the bitter end. They trickle onto the plane after half an hour, empty-handed but determined to give off the mien of victory. The Aunties’ conversations are dialed up four notches as they give a blow-by-blow retelling of the most exciting thing that’s happened to them in a decade. When the emotional hollowness of the conversation really starts to grind my gears I pipe up with a simple, “That’s enough, thanks.” It earns a stink face from an Auntie, but voices are lowered.

Four hours after our scheduled takeoff, China Eastern Airlines MU5177 gains speed down the runway and finally takes off into the black Beijing night.

Matt is a journalist living in Beijing. You can contact him at mattsheehan88@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @mattsheehan88.

An eerily similar incident happened in 2011, also involving a China Eastern flight leaving for Ningbo from Beijing. And while we’re talking about airports, who can forget this official in Kunming?