In Thailand, "

When I'm exhausted and have been sleeping on a bench for 6 hours, my acting capabilities are magnificent. The subtle choke of tears behind my pleading was enough to get my way at the ticket counter-- or so I thought.I don't trust china airlines. At all. Two months ago they lost the last bag I checked with them. Because they "don't have a contract with Frontier Airlines to forward on luggage." WHAT?Eventually, thanks to my good friend Kolyo in Chiang Mai, I got the bag back, 2 weeks later-- with stuff missing.And yes, when I arrived in Bangkok 2 months ago, I had practically nothing in my backpack. I had one change of clothes in there and some books.Total: 4 kilos.Now, that bag is full of all sorts of thai things-- it weights 11 kilos..... and... is in the hand of china airlines.At first it looked like the woman at the ticket counter was so genuinely sorry about the first time china airlines fouled up that she was gonna let me try to carry it on. She was thai and she was sweet. But she also liked her job and flagged my ticket.I got to the gate and beep beep. Step over there please. Put the bag on the scale.Shit.I tried to see if they'd put it with baby strollers so I could have it back in Teipei.No can, madam, not possible.So, they checked it at the gate-- and agreed to only send it on to LAX. Where I can-- god willing, go through immigration, claim it, go to departures(which is in another building), check BACK in with frontier ( would have had to do that anyway), go back through LA's horrific security, and get to my gate--- and get home.Nothing like a brisk sprint after a 14 hour flight.