WHEN security at Guangzhou International Airport spotted the female passenger’s bottle of liquid. she was told to drink it or toss it away. She drank it. But she refused to swallow.

She didn’t want to kill the tadpoles swimming in it. 

After a brief standoff, the woman spat the water and tadpoles into a bucket. She explained that the trainee frogs had been given to her by a friend and she did not want to lose them.

The tadpoles were “confiscated”. Presumably, the guards were worried that any delays would allow them to turn into frogs. The woman was allowed to board the plane.

Aeroplane journeys were once pleasurable. Now before you get to the splendid views and capsule of sachets and miniature wonders, you are over-controlled by militaristic staff. If you’re going to be strapped to a seat inside a cramped, metal tube and taken into the clouds, the guards want to know all about you. It’s all the wrong way around. I want to know about the pilot and his life. He’s the one in control, not me. You are utterly helpless up there, moving at the whim of the captain, whose face you’ve never seen. Many feel elated at being on a plane; many more feel relieved that the lengthy ordeal of getting onboard is over and steel themselves for the flight. 

Those tadpoles had it easy. They had leg room. The rest of the passengers had depravations in what amounts to an expensive hostage situation.