I thought about choices quite a lot, and how it's not always a good thing to have a choice because it also brings with it responsibility, and the possibility of being wrong. I used to call Tan from the supermarket to ask her what she wanted, but that call, however well intentioned, gives a bit of stress, as now to some extent what we eat, or how we wash our clothes, is up to her rather than me. But having choices is desirable too. I want to be able to choose lots of things like number of minutes/GB/text per month on Giffgaff etc., and would actually prefer to be called by Tan if she was shopping.
The trick is to know your audience and offer the right kind of choice, generally limited to avoid stress. I think Apple are good at this; in general your choice is black or white, more memory or less memory, but not 4", 5", different processors etc. For some people the choice will always be the wrong one. Not in a falsifiable way, but in a self-perceived way. These are the pessimists, who will always wish they'd chosen the other way, thus self-fulfilling this. I've been guilty of this on numerous occasions but have taught myself to think how I would be thinking had I made the other choice, and how it could still be perceived as the wrong choice. As it's unlikely both would have been wrong choices you can at least be happy that there is a chance you made the right choice. A bit like buying the dian dong che within a week of being in Pingguo. Had I not bought it I would have regretted it no doubt, though been 250+ quid better off (and less mobile) and had I waited another week or so it would have made the time to use ratio less enjoyable.
I chose to go to the seaside while feeling ill on Friday, and chose not to show it. And now I was really ill but that didn't make it the wrong choice. I mused for an hour or two before getting a call from A Xia in the room opposite. Tan was already up and in the shower so I said we'd be half an hour or so. But I started feeling feverish again so found one of the kids' face towels and soaked it in cold water and lay down with it on my forehead. When Tan got out, instead of being pitiful she got all "travel" moody insisting that everyone hurry up as A Dong needed to be at work soon in Pingguo. Fair enough I suppose but going out for a weekend I thought that at least part of Sunday would be part of the holiday.
When we were ready, and the kids had eaten some seriously sweet and light cakes for breakfast, we knocked for A Xia and found that her and A Dong and Su Liyi were still not packed. And when they were what did we do? Tan had said she'd go ahead with them and Huang Xiaoyun in their car due to A Dong's work commitments, and I'd leave later with the kids in A Wu's car. But in fact we all descended on the place we ate before the bbq last night. It was well gone 10am so I guessed this would be breakfast, but we ordered a private room and before I knew it A Wu was barking off an order that made me realise this was no egg and toast.
While he was doing this I was falling back into a feverish state, not helped by the four hours' sleep. There was a hard wooden bench in the private room and I lay down sideways and started dropping off despite the lack of comfort. I just rested my head on my arm and the noises in the room merged into a soft cacophony that somehow helped me drift away. Before I actually fell asleep I felt Tan prodding me and pushing a tiny bottle in my direction. It had an even tinier straw sticking out of it and I knew straight away this meant Chinese medicine. This can be good or bad, but normally the latter. In fact this was the worst medicine I had ever tasted, Chinese or not. Just the shock of the taste woke me from my slumbers enough to get to the table and make me realise I was hungry. I did avoid most of the seafood though, and replaced it with loads of greens and lotus root. I was starting to feel myself again and had a go at translating the medicine box. Apparently it was designed to make you sweat out your fever. Well it may or may not have have use, but due to the air con I was not sweating at all.
It was not much earlier than midday before we finally set off for Pingguo, but as it was raining it didn't feel like we'd wasted a good day's beaching. A Wu said he was driving slower but it didn't seem like it. 30 mins into the journey I once again chastened A Wu's driving and asked him seriously if he was tired. Of course he said he wasn't (no man, or woman, would), but just a few minutes later we pulled over into a petrol station where he slept for half an hour, while A Ni took Xixi out to get some sweets, and I just lay in the car monged out.
Back on the road it was still really uncomfortable. I counted at least six crashes in the 140km stretch between Fang Cheng Gang and Nanning, and many of these were in the road work areas of 60kph limit, or maybe due to the slowing down for them. The driving habits here are totally crap. The overtaking lane is the normal lane for all except lorries, so when you want to overtake you have to go to the first lane and dodge the lorries before slipping back. It's horrible and will have to change. It has happened in Europe and must happen here. My faith in trains remains.
After Nanning I thought I heard A Wu asking A Ni to talk to him, tell him a story or something. In fact I was right, and I feared it was because he was tired again. Apparently he had been cai-mai'ing till 2am last night. Indeed five minutes later we stopped at another petrol station for half an hour to let him have a "five minute nap". The reason it took so long was because he kept receiving phone calls, and of course answering them. Can't you just turn it off?
Leilei and Xixi relieving the stress of the journey home by playing cai ma
We finally arrived in Pingguo at 4pm. Tan went out to see A Ni and took the kids as she would be be going to KTV later. A Wu told me we were to go to a meal at 5.30/6 and I said I needed a rest first. At 5.30 he called me again but I was just about to sleep, and told him I'd call him later. I slept till 7pm, when Tan got back. I finally felt a bit more myself, which was nice. As I was relaxing A Wu called me again so I said I'd call him back in a bit. I just wanted to watch the beginning of the GP and did. Unlucky for Hamilton getting a puncture from his team mate. After that I did call A Wu who tried to tell me where he was but I didn't understand. I gave the phone to Tan who told me.
She was not close either, and a couple of phone calls with A Da later, I finally got him to come and find me in the centre and we drove the 200 yards to Boss Tao's place. Boss Tao and friends had been drinking for two hours. I couldn't and didn't want to catch up, but was somewhat forced to. I stayed for an hour, but avoided the red wine A Wu and A Ni were drinking, preferring to cai ma some Li Quan. Although I told Tan I'd pick up the kids at 10pm I used this excuse to go there considerably earlier. I did have to stay for a good half an hour and have a couple of thimblefuls of gan beis, before Tan spotted me and suggested I had some tea instead. For once I didn't disagree, and took the kids back with me.
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| The kids taking the KTV very seriously |
As it was not quite 10.30pm we passed by the supermarket to see if the gin they'd ordered had been delivered. Of course not. Well, no worries, I didn't really want any but was just interested if what they said would be easy to get would be so easy. They've had it here for the last five years or so but I suspect I have been the only person to buy it in that time.
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| Well we did make a small detour on the way home to do some exercise |
We got home a couple of minutes later and got the kids showered and to bed by 11.45. Tan got back a bit later and I watched some of the Sunderland-Man U game, just making it till the end and a 1-1 draw before zonking out at 1am.
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