I walked to where I've now played badminton twice but to my dismay my friends were not there. I'd also noticed that the old people's leisure centre had no-one playing ping pong. With my big bag it was not practical to run so I sat down for a couple of minutes to contemplate the elders doing tai chi with swords. I went for a walk around the guangchang anyway and by the time I got back I saw a couple of people playing ping pong in the old people's leisure centre so I popped in. I soon found myself playing a woman in her 60s who was actually quite possibly worse than me. We played for about half an hour until Mr Table Tennis walked in and grinned like Mr Mischief. He motioned for the woman to sit down and relax as he started practising with me. That lasted all of 10 rallies until he said "five games". Oh dear not this again. Although he beat me 5-0 I had the moral victory that this time at least he played right-handed in every game, and I once got up to seven points. He made it easier by not spinning his serves when he was leading by five or more points.
Some Tai chi in the guang chang while I was pondering on what to do next
Normally it's winner stays on but here it's more like "foreigner stays on" so another bloke came and I nearly won the first game, losing 11-8. But I lost the next two more convincingly and apparently this time it was only three games. Then, the woman I'd been practising with challenged me and finally I was victorious 2-1 in games. It was a bit unfair as by then I'd got back into the habit of doing backhand smashes that even the locals appreciate.
I made my excuses at 9.15 as needed to take the kids to school, but when I got home I found that Ling Ming had already taken them to Waipo's house. So off I went to find they'd had breakfast, but Er Jie was still there and insisted that they didn't go to school, reasoning that they'd already spent a year in school and should relax. She sort of had a point but I like them learning some of their culture so we made a sort of compromise: they would go back to school when A Da and Nong Kaicheng were back from Beijing in a couple of days.
But the kids didn't want to stay at Waipo's so we went to Ma Laoban's computer shop where I let them play silly flash games for a bit. Ma Laoban's wife came in (she loves Xixi) and invited us to go to Tian Ping (?), in the countryside where her parents live about 10 km outside Pingguo, which apparently takes 10 minutes. My reaction was to not go but thought it might be interesting so asked them when they were going. "Zhun bei zou le", was the reply "we're ready to go". It was not yet 11am and I suspected a little oriental time-mongering going on. I said that would be good but I'd need to get back early as I'd had little sleep and needed a siesta - no problem we'd be back when I wanted. Half and hour later it was 11.20 and nothing had happened. Another 25 minutes and Ma Laoban arrived with a couple of blokes who seemed interested in buying computers. Another 10 minutes later there were a few blokes drinking tea and Leilei said he wanted to go home. I looked for Ma Laoban's wife but she was nowhere to be seen so told Ma Laoban I needed to take the kids home and he apologised for being busy. I said no problem at all and was relieved as I suspected had we waited for them all to go to it would have been another half an hour, not getting back till 5pm and I was already pretty shattered.
So I took the kids back home but before going in we walked to the place that does the lovely jiao zi and bao zi and bought two portions of the former and one of the latter. Surprisingly the kids ate just about everything I gave them - not bad, three of us stuffed for just over a quid. I had also bought a case of beer, something I haven't done for a long time, maybe two years. I only bought them as I wanted to know what the price was, and surprisingly it was the same as the last time I bought some: 33 kuai, or about 38p for a 595ml bottle. It would have been rude not to try one so I did that with our food. I was ready to try a siesta and Tan was ready to go out but she wasn't taking the kids as she had some sort of heat blisters and she wanted to go to the hospital to treat them. This meant I had the kids and although they were due a siesta they were not in the mood. I wouldn't have minded as they have their own rooms and I was just settling down when Tan called to say Ling Ming was coming with a delivery of some sort of low sink for the balcony so it would be more practical to wash the floor. Fair enough I suppose but it could have been better timed.
Ling Ming and the sink bloke came and he installed it on our balcony but he couldn't manage to fit the plug unit without it leaking. So after half an hour he had to go back to find some material to fix it. He did this by about 2pm, by which time the kids were not at all interested in sleeping so I threatened them with going with Ling Ming to Waipo's house. In fact this threat was not a threat at all as Ling Ming said he'd take them to Yi Xiao too on his way to work.
Finally, by 2.15pm I had the house to myself and tried to settle down for a sleep, which I finally managed with minor help from Gordon, until 6pm. Only eight missed calls this time, four each from Ma Laoban and Tan. I thought I'd better call Tan first and she unsurprisingly told me that everyone was waiting for me to eat at Waipo's house. So I got on the bike as it was starting to rain and luckily this time by the time I arrived I was still fairly dry as it didn't deluge. I called Ma Laoban as I was approaching Waipo's and he too was inviting me to eat at his place. I explained my predicament and he understood ok.
In fact at Waipo's most people were just watching tv, and continued to do so for a few more minutes before we were called to eat. The food was quite nice and simple and the kids didn't join us. I found out a bit later that this was because Chuan Chuan was taking them out to the new place I'd had pizza at a few days ago. So that left Waipo, Er Jie, Tan and me watching some drama on tv that wasn't as interesting as many things I can imagine so Tan and I went home. The rain was still falling, but not at a level that would soak us on the dian dong che on the way home and we managed the three minute journey without getting too wet, except for my bum as the seat is torn and soaks up water at the back. If only I'd listened to Tan and let her sit at the back like most ladies do when with their man on a bike. The problem is I'm taller than most men and if I sit in front my knees stick out like wings.
As if the morning exercise wasn't enough, a little later I decided to go to the old people's leisure centre once more, as Tan had decided to stay in for the evening. I thought I saw Yang Haiwei's car outside so called him to find he was upstairs. I saw a couple of blokes I hadn't seen since last year and we caught up on old times while the maestros played on. Then it was my turn to play Lao Ma. I actually did ok until it was time to play a game and then lost 3-0 but not before getting a fair few points past him. Then Haiwei announced that we'd go to the government building on the other side of the guangchang to play as there were too many people here. So we drove there under the ever-increasing rain. There were two tables, and one bloke waiting for us, so Haiwei and I practised for a bit before I lost 3-0 in games again. Getting a bit predictable, this, but I'm hoping it's for the better of my game.
While Haiwei was playing the other bloke, another bloke came along to play with me - he was more my level, or worse, but for some reason we didn't actually play for points. Tan had rung before 10pm to ask me to get 10 chicken feet and 10 pig intestines as you do, so by quarter past I made my excuses and walked to the bbq place through the rain-sodden guangchang. I'd never seen it so empty at night. For once I didn't make an effort to talk with others while waiting for the bbq - the normal place hadn't even opened so I was elsewhere, but even there it lacked the usual jovial atmosphere. I added an order of five duck tongues and some Chinese leek for me and 20 minutes later paid my 49 kuai and for once the bloke who brought it over accepted a 1 kuai tip with a smile.
Five minutes later Tan was tucking into her feet and I was chatting to Ma and Cat on Skype, or rather trying to as the connection was dreadful. I feared that it was my connection - worried that work meetings might be affected, but when Cat reconnected via tethering to her phone it worked a charm...time to get a new ISP Ma....
Browsing the web, it looks like we are suffering from the effects of Typhoon Vicente, which caused minor chaos in Hong Kong yesterday and is now on the warpath from Guangdong to Guangxi. However, it has probably calmed down somewhat due to being inland and although the rain is still falling quite heavily the wind has assuaged somewhat.
Ling Ming came in some time after 1am and we shared a single bottle of beer. He explained that he was hoping to get a new car in a couple of weeks for his birthday. He's going to get a Chinese brand, a Chang Cheng M2, which is a sort of mini people carrier (or SUV as the Americanism holds here). It looks ok to me: http://auto.china.com/zh_cn/mill/changcheng/M2/ except he wants the white version. I also found out why I haven't seen Xiao Nong's MG 3 on the road before. It's an Anglo-Sino design/build and was only available in China from 2011, becoming available in the UK some time in 2012 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MG_3
Knackered by 2am but remembered I hadn't put out the washing to dry, and didn't want it to become stinky for tomorrow, so tiredly did it, taking sure not to drop any clothes through the rails to 13 floors below. I did last week with a pair of Ling Ming's underpants and although it was 3am I still went downstairs to look for them in the rain. Strangely they were nowhere to be seen and I must have looked a wally searching by the light of my mobile at that time. I reckon they must have landed in someone else's balcony - oh well, Ling Ming's loss, someone else's gain. I should have told him though.
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