I am over the bloody rubbish around here.  I cannot believe how much I generate, and I always seems to have overflowing bins, and of course nothing in which to decant the overflow.  The high point of my day is when I hear the rustle outside which is the garbage captors, and so I rush out and have them take my stuff.    For a simple, clean living girl, I sure make a mess.

So, last night I came back from Trevor's room and went to bed early - I was very tired, and all at once there is a bash, bash, bash on my door, and out I go to find two suited ones brandishing a 2-carton pack of strawberry yoghurt!!!  I am not sure if they were early for a midnight snack, or breakfast even, but there they were.  So I relieved them of the yoghurt and will enjoy it later.

Something very funny has happened here this afternoon, just after mid-day.  Anyone who had left their room and locked their door, found they could not get back in. We made lots of jokes about day use not being included in our package, and so it turns out.  The best explanation we can get is "card finished", and then someone comes and demonstrates how you can leave your door ajar, with the lock snibbed!!  Just as well there are no security concerns here.

The word on the street is that we are out of here at 5pm if we are going locally, or 6pm for the souls going to the airport, and the Chinese Government will pay for overnight accommodation for those unable to fly tonight.  I must say it has been most interesting watching those who booked their arrangements on the internet, try to manage..

So at around 4.00pm there was a commotion, and the suited ones came round and delivered us all a pink envelope it contained a "Just for you" card with a pink insert on which there was a message from the Mayor of the town we were in, apologising for the inconvenience and thanking us for our co-operation - each was hand-signed. We were also given a "certificate" in Chinese which we believe says we are Swine Flu Free.  I have to tell you this all happened at a most inconvenient time because Visnja and I had decided to watch a movie - Revolutionary Road, and it was only 15 minutes from finishing , and we are dying to know how it ended.  15 minutes more would have been perfect.

Then it was pandemonium and the one tiny lift struggled to cope with the onslaught of a whole floor of those very anxious to leave.  Eventually we reached the lobby and there was much joy.  Miss Xu was there and we gave her the goodies we had left over plus a note of thanks , and she hugged and kissed us and gave us a gift.  She then insisted we meet her boss - the local Director of Health who also apologised for the inconvenience caused us.  Much hand shaking and back slapping and photo taking.   Waiting in the wings was our driver from the RC - bottle of chilled Moet  & Chandon and 3 glasses in hand - I am not kidding!!  So, there on the steps looking like utter knobs we sipped champagne with gay abandon while our luggage was loaded into the car, and off we went for the drive into town.  Turns out we had been on the Pudong (airport/coastal) side of the city.  Eventually we arrived at the hotel, and my goodness, everyone had turned out to greet us, from the General Manager down.   There to take out luggage was "my Jerry" (my saviour from last year, and subject of a whole other story), then as we walked into the hotel, there was a guard of honour across the bridge, with them all clapping and cheering.  We were close to tears by this stage.  But, then we were whisked to our rooms - a suite for each of us, with flowers, champagne, and I am afraid each of us lost it as we got to our respective bathrooms - (each of them bigger than our entire room at Motel 168), and saw the monogrammed (our initials) towels, hand towels, face washers and bathrobes.  That did it for me, and later as we compared notes, the others too.   That bath was the best I have ever enjoyed.   We have access to the Club Lounge on 43rd floor, and we met the General Manager there for more champagne before being escorted to the fine dining restaurant where we were told to "just have anything at all you wish".   I might add that this is all complimentary.

Then as we were about to leave, they arrived with a birthday cake for Trevor (another one) and the staff all sang Happy Birthday - in tune with our hearts.    We are each being treated to whatever we want to have from the Spa (facial for me, massages for the other two), and dinner tomorrow and also Tuesday night - outside the hotel (no Chinese).  There is to be no bill for any of this.  

I can't tell you how lucky we feel.   I am about to hop into the wonderful bed in this room, and well, just collapse, and reflect on how it is to be a feather duster one day and a rooster the next!!!.

Thank you everyone for your phone calls and messages of support throughout the past week.   I am the luckiest person alive to have such a network of family, friends, clients, Rotary colleagues, and many other people previously unknown to me.  It has been an extraordinary ride.  Home on Thursday morning.

Love Anne

Footnote:  Fell into that lovely bed and could not sleep - up at 0300 finishing this!!!

Second footnote:  Nick (who was carted off from the Ritz Carlton on Tuesday night) gets out of quarantine on Tuesday.

Third footnote:  For almost the entire period of my incarceration, I had a cold (from the air-con) which I had to cleverly hide from the captors!