Q: Why we still choose post service?

A: I'd actually forgotten about the postal service. Sign of the times, I suppose. The last time I sent a letter home, it cost 5.40Y. Mail to the UK seems to take around 7 days in both directions. I've never had problems with letters going missing, but anything important should obviously be insured or registered. Airmail parcels get very expensive very quickly, but surface mail is relatively reasonable. You may be asked to use the post offices own boxes (curiously overpriced) if yours is considered not sturdy enough.

Q: What are Service and Superstition in China?

A: The memo about China's customer service revolution appears to have got lost in the post on its way to China's Post Office, and don't be surprised if your envelope is rejected because it's a non-standard size. When sending a parcel don't seal it until you get to the post office - they need to check what you are sending. I've been able to send pirate CD's home, but a friend of mine wasn't allowed to send home the paper money people burn for their ancestors to spend in the afterlife on the basis that it was evidence of 'superstitious practices'. It obviously didn't cross anyone’s mind that refusing to allow her to send it was evidence of 'stupid practices' but she sent it with no problems from another post office anyway.

Q: How to send a parcel?

A: Sending parcels is a little time-consuming, and you'll have to wrestle with special Chinese 'non-linear' queues , forms, and people who really don't get paid enough to care. To guide you through the process, I wrote this.

1. Take what you want to send to the post office, unsealed.
2. Show the contents to the clerk at the sending things desk.
3. If your contents aren't considered dangerous or destabilising, walk over to the packing things desk.
4. En route to the packing things desk, take all the pirate DVD's, firecrackers and subversive literature out of your pocket and put them in the box.
5. Assure the clerk at the packing things desk that yes, of course, the sending things desk clerk said that all of these things were entirely suitable for sending through the Chinese Post Office.
6. Finish packing your stuff - the desk will sell everything you need if you don't have it already.
7. Take the finished parcel back to the sending things desk
8. Pretend you can't understand the questions about why the silk scarf for your mum and calligraphy brushes for your dad now weigh 9kg and smell of gunpowder, treason and plot.
9. Fill in a form or six, all in Chinese and French - the international language of the postal service, which must be the booby prize for languages. I'd love to have seen that meeting "Well, Jacques, lets see. I think we'll have aviation, business and commerce , the military, international diplomacy and you can have . . . er, well now, what's left. Ah yes, postcards. Very important, postcards. . . What's that? Terribly sorry, can't quite understand you. DO. YOU. SPEAK. ENGLISH?"
10. Pay up, get out. Simple, non?