If there was a discipline at the Asian Games called bureaucratic bungling, then the gold medal goes to Gagoc, the Guangzhou Asian Games Organising Committee. It turned a simple hop-step-and-jump accreditation process for a journalist into a marathon of frustration.
I have been the victim of officious bureaucracy at its worst, but this takes the cake - contradictory official views from such high places as China's central liaison office, its foreign ministry in Hong Kong, the immigration department in Guangzhou, and the mainland's visa section in Wan Chai.
It all began quite innocuously on Monday morning when I boarded the 11.28 express to Guangzhou at Hung Hom. The only drama occurred when the old lady seated across from me, opened her cavernous handbag and pulled out what looked like roadkill, a flattened piece of carcass, which turned out to be beef jerky on which she merrily munched for the entire one hour and 45 minute journey.
The first sign of trouble came in Guangzhou. The immigration officer told me my Asian Games press accreditation, issued by Gagoc, was not a substitute for a visa. I have been to the past three Olympics as well as six previous Asian Games - Doha (2006), Pusan (2002), Bangkok (1998), Hiroshima (1994), Beijing (1990), Seoul (1986) - where this pass served as entry into the host country. I didn't have to get a visa.
Despite pointing this out, the immigration officer, soon joined by a phalanx of policemen and policewomen, stood fast. I was told by Shirley Xie Xuemin, a stewardess who got more than she bargained for when signing up as a Games volunteer, that she would try to get through to Gagoc and sort out the problem.
In the meantime, I called for reinforcements from the Hong Kong Olympic Committee. Secretary general Pang Chung stressed the accreditation card should serve as my visa for entry into the mainland. This, he said, was guaranteed by the Olympic Council of Asia. I told him that maybe no one had informed Gagoc about this. I called Pang's boss, Timothy Fok Tsun-ting. He sounded as if he was having lunch and told me to call his secretary.
Time crawls when you are in a small holding room with menacing men in uniform watching you. In between trying to pacify me, Shirley was on her mobile talking to countless people. I now know how thousands of faceless aliens around the world trying to enter a foreign land on a wing and a prayer, without proper documentation, must feel.