Cars and a lovely chat with friends over tea at the fang zi

Since cars were introduced to China in 2003 I have witnessed a large growth in this phenomenum. When I first lived in Shanghai in October 2003 till February 2004 I noticed that most cars seemed to be Volkswagon Passat saloons (or at least looked like them), and were cabs. There were other cars, but mostly not recognisable to the Western eye. More so, in Guangxi I hardly recognised a single four-wheeler, except for a tiny minority of Japanese 4X4 (not least because A Zheng drove such a car for the leader of Pingguo).

Every year the variation of cars in Pingguo has become richer and richer. Brand is the main thing, and there are now a few BMWs and Mercs around. But I am more interested in the less "boss" type cars, and more non-showy-but-pricey cars. I first saw a Beetle (new shape) here two years ago, and it is still going strong. But this year for the first time I have seen a Mini Cooper and a Mini Clubman. Not to mention a few very recent Peugeot 207s and 307s. Even a couple of new Renaults. What I would love to know is where the owners get them serviced. To my knowledge there are no branded garages in Pingguo, so how do they get the parts, and the knowledge to fix the engines that rely on electronic diagnostics? Knowing the Chinese, they probably have it all sorted and in fact you do not need to go to an "authorised" dealer to have an expensive service. But it still makes me wonder... And today I saw a beautiful late-model Jag roll by our house...complete with the leaping cat coming out of the bonnet - not like the European variants that have the "health and safety" badge instead of the cat.

Anyway, for days I'd been telling the sensible boss (Hancheng) of the seafood place about our new abode, and how I'd invite him for tea one day. He told me the only good time would be around midday as he slept from 3am till 8am, then went and bought veggies for work in the morning, then had another sleep till the late afternoon before the long work hours. I hadn't realised he was married, or had a son, until I invited him to pop around for some tea that morning. It transpired he couldn't make it till 1pm, but at that time he arrived with his 9 year old son and his lovely wife. His wife had brought a number of presents that she really oughtn't have done, like a pack of expensive dried mushrooms, some dried gingery things that looked delicious, along with some beautiful Vietnamese biscuits and a couple of packs of mostly-dried fruit.

We spent the next hour drinking tea and chatting. It was very nice to be with my own friends, whom I'd not known for long, but just getting along very swimmingly. Good for the confidence in the language. Not perfect as at times I had to ask Hancheng what his wife was saying, but generally the conversation flowed without Tan to help me out. It is this sort of situation that I really like as I can't fall back on anyone and just have be like any normal friend. I learnt that the Tie Guan Yin tea I was serving was if anything likely to stop you sleeping - something that others had said was not true. I was well and truly shattered by the time we left our place at 2pm and maybe because I now knew that the tea could keep you awake got a very very small siesta before 6pm.

But after a quick bite to eat I drove down to the most hustly-bustly part of Pingguo to buy two wicker stools I'd had my sites on from a couple of days ago. They wanted 50 kuai each so I offered them 80 kuai for both (they weren't brand new) and was accepted without a bat of the eye. Damn, I probably could have got them both for 50 but sod it. Surprisingly, they were both larger than the two identically styled stools we already had. But in fact this was a good thing as for anyone with a slighty-larger-than-normal-arse the smaller ones would be quite uncomfortable. Ok, even I preferred the bigger ones, so it was nice to have a couple to give to the kids.

I really wanted to stay up to watch Man City start their European trek in style. I actually managed to watch the first half till 4am but then flaked it and only just managed to turn the laptop off before I did myself.