Now we have skin in this game with the Son and Heir planning to decamp to Chongqing next month for a year.
So I dragged myself out of my scratcher, and in the dark of a November Scottish morning, for the Chinese Tourism Market Recovery at World Travel Market Virtual.
Now every country has its own different approach and the Chinese meeting was more like what I would imagine the National Congress might be.
In short, China leads the world in tourism recovery (I read that off a slide) but judging by the scenes of people enjoying themselves now.
And their projection that the back end of next year will be when we will see a bounce back for international travellers.
They were also optimistic for small group travel which our friend Wendy Wu knows already.
Wendy is running a Black November offer with free worldwide flights for travel through 2021 and 2022 saving £800pp.
Taking the Michael
The Chinese could certainly do with Michael O’Leary’s presentation skills.
The redoubtable Ryanair CEO waxed lyrical on the failings of politicians to deal with the pandemic.
And the wisdom of Ryanair keeping its planes up in the air throughout it all.
Michael also gave us hope by predicting that next year will see airline companies and hotels dangle discounts at us.
Best of all, of course, is Michael’s unparalleled Irish humour and he had me smiling from the off.
When he reflected on how he brought down the turnaround times on the runway.
And that prior to his intervention pilots needed ‘to have an hour and a half for a smoke and a shag’.
