A Little Girl of 5, turning 30

Today was a long travel day! Our lovely host in Taipei arranged for a large car to take us to the airport in the morning and when we arrived, we checked in, checked our 5 bags, found the VAT refund place to get our purchase refunds of some sort and then went through security.  We went to the China Southern crown room that was really nice with a full restaurant of gross food- except for some beef noodles which dad liked. 

We were about to board the plane when mom realized she had left her backpack in the room and we had to run almost a mile back to the room to get it. I ran, my walked briskly and dad tried to hold the plane. Her pack was still in the room when I got there and I ran back up, met mom and we rushedback to the gate.  Finally we boarded the plane and had a nice flight to Guangzhou. Mom will never live that one down! Because this was an international flight we had to go through customs and immigration in Guangzhou before boarding our next domestic flight. We had to collect all of baggage to go through customs and then recheck it at the airlines counter. Everything was going quite smoothly until my camera went through the scanner and they thought my remote shutter release was a lighter. Eventually they figured out it wasn't and let us through.  We made our way to the crown room and they didn't want to let us in, but finally we convinced them that we were sky team elite. Very rigid.  We boarded our flight to Haikou and arrived an hour late to 80 degrees Fm.
When we arrived in Haikou, we were greeted by some people we didn't know holding our names. It turns out it was a group of Chinese artists that are a group related to the wife of a doctor who we have just joined for a portion of the China trip. There are 8 of them and us 3. We all piled into a mini bus and the bus driver got very lost driving around Haikou at 10pm trying to find our hotel.  Our initial reaction to Haikou is that it is touristy one minute, like Vegas, and poor the next.  Our hotel is called the Serengeti hotel, in English, and is a smoky place- our room wreaks of smoke and is not the nicest of places. Our beds are still hard but a tad bit softer than the last ones.  Because there are so many of us, it took forever to check-in and get our room assignments.  Apparently, the hosts here in Haikou assumed that when mom and dad said they were bringing their daughterthat I was a "little girl" around 5 years old and so they only got us one room because they assumed I could sleep anywhere. However, when they saw I was not a little girl, they were very surprised. So at the last minute theyarranged for a second hotel room because I am a "big girl." And that was just the beginning.