Press the button if he smiles

As a global recession cuts demand, do immigration officials have more time to reflect on the quality of their smile and service?

Perhaps that is what fuelled a decision by China’s immigration authorities to give travellers a chance to rate quality of its airport immigration services.

Shanghai Airport is one of the spots where travellers will be surprised to find they can actually give an immigration official a rating on the scale of one to four. To be more precise they can press one of four buttons near the kiosk to judge the official’s performance. Was it miserable, mediocre, good or excellent?

This innovation apparently surprises visitors arriving at an otherwise indifferent Shanghai where service and pleasing tourists runs a second best to the art of squeezing the best deal from business discussions.

Each immigration checkpoint has a small message that identifies the official and invites passengers to “rate my service.”

It prompts official to keep one eye on the movement of your left hand. Is a finger going to land on the red button – this guy sucks? Or will you give him the golden button – happy as a lark?

There are two buttons in between that indicate a kind of indifference or at most a passing interest in who owns the passport.

Whatever the outcome, who would have thought China would be interested in how foreigners rate their immigration officials? But apparently it is. Here is the golden opportunity to send a surly beast off to Tibet to milk goats on some forgotten hillside.

The row of rating buttons also gives us something to do while we watch an official stamp our passport.

Sometimes they take an inordinate amount of time to flick through a 32-page passport as if they are searching for a particular chapter and verse in a bible.

While this is going on we can fidget over the display musing over the consequences of voting this fellow out of a job. Would it work in Thailand, I wonder?

Cursed to hell and back

Siem Reap is home to Angkor Wat, a world heritage site, but that is no guarantee that it will escape the impact of global recession. On the contrary, the Cambodian heritage town is suffering a drop in bookings that leaves rows of hotels and guest houses with occupancy dropping below 30%. This is not as alarming as it might sound. Most hotels in Siem Reap can survive on a much lower occupancy than hotels in Bangkok or even Cambodia’s capital, Phnom Penh.

But it unnerves taxi drivers who need more than a fare to a downtown hotel to make a living. They assume that every visitor to Siem Reap must visit Angkor Wat, rain or shine. So with a little persuasion from an airport taxi driver a tourist will see the benefits of accepting a package that combines a taxi ride with a day at the temples.

Okay we can be forgiven if we think taxi drivers are not our typical history buffs, who can lead us on an extraordinary discovery of Cambodian art, history and culture. Underneath that rough exterior a scholarly mind could be lurking to unlock the door of learning.

This was tested to breaking point by a female business visitor who sadly just wanted to visit her clients and was not in the mood to embark on a her third Angkor Wat tour in as many years.

All she needed was a transfer to a five-star hotel in the centre of town and transfer back to the airport on the following day. Such a simple request got under the nose of her driver.

You can imagine his darkest thoughts as his ancient taxi stuttered out of the airport car park at an alarming speed of 15 kmph.

“What you don’t want to see Angkor Wat,” he shouted over the noise of his dilapidated motor struggling to shift up a gear.

He was arguing for a combination – transfer to the airport and a day tour of ancient temples all a price you would be daft to refuse. That is if you wanted to go Angkor Wat.

I mean where else would you want to be in Siem Reap – sitting in a lobby bar all day, playing golf or languishing in a steam bath?

“I just need to see a few customers in town and I will be back to the airport in the morning,” the female executive explained.

“What,” he screamed. “You are wasting my time,” he retorted.

He was so peeved he pulled over to the kerbside outside the hotel property and ordered the executive to get out and wheel her luggage along the drive way to the hotel. For good measure he swore at her in English called her all kinds of unprintable names, slammed the car doors and sped off in a cloud of dust back to the airport.

The executive complained to the reception and was told that this is par for the course, especially if the traveller is female, alone and savvy enough not to accept a rip-off tour to Angkor Wat from a taxi driver. They rarely pester male visitors or group tourists. Moral of the tale: Beware of airport taxi drivers. They are intent on hijacking you for a heritage ride and curse you to hell if you disagree.