I am so fucking pissed off at the bus station in Xixia that I don't even have words enough to articulate how pissed off I am.

There appear to be more direct buses between Xixia and Luoyang than I am told exist as, on the taxi ride to Luoyang—the 1000y taxi ride to Luoyang—we pass two of them coming from the Luoyang direction.

There's also the issue of them having me wait two plus hours for a bus whose driver won't let me board for foreigner related reasons that aren't Covid but turn out to be military and legitimate existing regulations. Not that he phrases it that way. No. Because lying to me about road construction preventing the bus from getting off the expressway at that intermediate point and therefore not going all the way to intermediate point and therefore not being a place I can change buses is easier.

And how do I know he's lying?

Because the expressway is still under construction.

The existing vehicle ready section of expressway doesn't start until nearly 75km north of the intermediate point where I was going to change buses.

Almost all the way into Luoyang and well over 100km after the expressway started, I finally convince the driver to get off the surface road. He'd repeatedly refused before, each time citing the not particularly onerous Covid checks we'd been waved through as a vehicle with local plates. "They'll be worse on the expressway."

Convincing him is actually the fault of the GPS and then not being able to easily turn around and go back the way we came without admitting that the real reason is that he just doesn't like driving on the expressway. I've been scared tense plenty enough times in my life to recognize the squared off shoulders or the muscle strain in his arms as he deathgrips the steering wheel.

I should have been in Luoyang hours and hours earlier than I was. Even if I had still taken a taxi, it should have been earlier. Cheaper too, but an angry person storming out of the bus station is an obvious mark and my haggling skills are weak.