Beijing delay is kids' ok

As I had stayed at this hotel before I hadn’t ordered breakfast as 1) it was crap, and 2) it would have delayed us. So much to their chagrin I got the kids up at 6am (at least they’d had six hours’ sleep as opposed to my three and a half), and got us checked out by 6.15 to get the 6.30 bus to the airport in preparation for the 9.20 flight to Beijing. As luck would have it for the first time in years the check-in went without a hitch and we got to the landside lounge in good time. Having said that there was nothing much to entice us in this lounge, though from experience I knew there was nothing much more in the airside lounge. So we took advantage of the lounge’s own security path and got through half an hour before the flight after the kids had had their fill of shitty sugary drinks and wasabi peas. I was hours away from wanting a drink so braved it onto the flight, which could have been worse.

Oh the lounge in Beijing is one of the best we’ve been to in the world. Great food, comfortable seats in our own area, and a decent choice of drinks. Well, by now it was well after 1pm and our flight wasn’t for another four hours or so. The kids were in their element, with wifi and electricity, but we still found time for actual communication. Tan was coming back a couple of days later so we made sure to video chat with her.

While we were going through our second course of food we got the “terrible” news that our flight had been delayed one hour, and the kids cheered! I’ve justified it a thousand times before but when you’re obliged to travel as much as me (and hate it) then these little luxuries (although paid for) become incredibly worthwhile - it’s like an insurance for delayed flights and indeed it somewhat literally is. And then when our flight was delayed another half an hour I joined in with the celebrations and got myself a G&T because why not?

Lounge lizards

The flight was stress-less, maybe because it was just the three of us, and we arrived at Heathrow more-or-less on time anyway so who cares? I was really tempted to go to the arrivals lounge but the kids were tired so after unsuccessfully trying to get a local cab we tried Uber, which I feared would be much more expensive, and got a price much better that we’d been quoted for the cab that didn’t turn up.

Well Pingguo was over for a year...we all accept and mourn it a little. My main concern is that the kids won’t want to come back next year. But it’s been another lovely summer and we should concentrate on that, and the fact that within a few days the kids will be back in school and it will be all go again…. But I really hope we’ll be back next year.

Last day in Pingguo 2018

It was a good idea to do the Last Supper last night as tonight we had to head to Nanning to stay at a cheap hotel in order not to have any stress tomorrow getting the flight. Not to mention it was just the kids and me. But first there were some things to do, like feed the blighters. So, sadly for the last time this year I took them to get some jiao zi and bao zi from our local shop, and thanked the woman and said we’d look forward to coming back next year, not sure how much the kids might be looking forward to it.

An important picture that I should remember in order not to bring back too many toiletries next time

Visiting Waipo for the last time I was a bit shocked to see Er Jie had bought a new tv and simply stuck it in front of the old one - I could do with that!

Note to self - see if I can get the smaller tv next time...

Sooner than we thought evening came around so I decided to take the kids to Boss Zhou’s for something decent. He was happy to see us and I ordered some “normal” pork with rice and some jiu gui yumi. While we were waiting we spotted a delightful grey kitten/cat that responded to the kids’ lasers as you might expect, which made waiting for the meal that much quicker. Afterwards the woman only asked for 20 kuai, which I felt was too low, so I remonstrated with her and after a while she came back to me saying 50 would be ok - it was like something out of Monty Python.

Lovely last meal at Boss Zhou's

Cute kitten that couldn't resist lasers

Trying to make sense out of this but I think it's how much we owe for water, despite there being a character for electricity (Tan says)

As per every last day for the last few years I entertained the thought of going for a massage but there was a supermarket trip to make and other boring stuff like packing that got in the way. I had tried to insist that the three of us get a train to Nanning, where the hotel was a five minute walk away from the train station, but Tan and her cousin told us that was a rubbish idea and we’d never get the luggage on board, and insisted that A Heng drive us. Oh bloody hell I really wanted to argue but knew it would be futile, so rather than a 7.30pm train we were picked up at 6.30pm by A Heng and a mate in the old people carrier we’d been used to for the last few years.

Just outside of Pingguo was a urinal for "special children" - well that was something we wouldn't have got on the train I suppose

What ensued was the most annoying journey ever. Well at least we weren’t due to arrive at the airport any time soon. The drive to Nanning was ok but as soon as we arrived A Heng got lost. Worse than that, I had the map on my phone and tried to show him where to go but out of pride (?) he would not look. Which meant he got lost again and again, and with Nanning being the metropolis it is now it meant being stuck in traffic jams that wouldn’t apply to trains. Jeez, by the time we finally arrived at the hotel it was nearly 10pm, and the train would have got there by 8. I shouldn’t be angry - they were trying to help I suppose - but it was the most frustrating moment of the whole summer - next time I will just take the train and not tell anyone.

What was nice was that the hotel was the same as one I’d taken a few weeks earlier to go to Canada, and the receptionist spoke Mandarin to me, and as I’d been before I pretended I understood every word as I knew where the lifts were and there wasn’t much more new information he could give me. So as soon as we were up and dumped the bags we set off in search of our last bbq for 2018. It took no more than 10 minutes to find a suitable place on the road, and I got the kids to eat a bit at least while I managed a quick beer. We got back at close to midnight and I was still bloody annoyed about the lift we had as otherwise we would have got the chance to go to Zhong Shan Lu and experienced proper Nanning bbq.

Finally enjoying a bit of bbq on the last night in Nanning

There were two single beds so I got the kids together and apologised, but luckily they were too tired to argue. I had to do an hour’s work while they fell asleep, then organise baggage as we would be up in four and a half hours’ time. Not complaining any more though.

And finally sleep while I spent some time working...

Last Supper 2018

As it’s sadly nearing the end I took the kids out for a bike ride and Leilei had another go by himself in the hotel car park again. We went to the west side of town and found A Wu’s old house that we’d lived in for three months 13 years ago, at least Leilei had. He may not have remembered, but it brought back memories to me as it was our first real living experience in Pingguo, meaning doing the trivial chores like washing and drying clothes, cleaning the floor etc., the things that make you feel more a part of somewhere you are staying. Well the kids didn’t particularly care for my reminiscing and we made off again back to town where I had the idea to get a print out of the stitch-picture I took the other day. We found, after a couple of wrong attempts, the advertising friend’s new shop which is 2-3 times larger than her last place.

I have a sad fascination for how many km our dian dong che does

Printing out my stitched picture of the view while waiting for our lift - at least she didn't question why

Of course it was fine to make a print-out, and of course she wouldn’t take anything so we had a couple of cups of tea until the kids got bored and said thank you again. The previous time we’d got such a print-out was about 10 years ago. Back at home I found I still had a pack of face mask cream from The Body Shop so was able to reciprocate the favour.

Now there was one more thing on my list of things to do before we went back - seeds. I’d looked in a few shops but none sold them, but was told that the market in the centre should have them, and indeed they did. What would have been an even more boring trip for the kids (what kid wants to buy seeds?) was made a little more interesting by watching market vendors plucking out soon-to-hatch baby bees from their hexagonal sleeping quarters to be sold on to restaurants and fried up deliciously.

The bees that made the trip to the market more interesting

Rather than leaving The Last Supper to the last evening I decided to message my mates for tonight to meet at Huang’s Beihai seafood place, as has become customary in the last few years. I IM’d each one to come from 9pm and without fail they got back to me to say they could (though those with kids may be along later). It seems that the Chinese penchant for turning up early to eating events is more a female trait than male, or maybe if the food is being prepared for you then there’s not so much point turning up early. Certainly no-one did as I got there late myself which would have been frowned upon.

I’ve grown more in confidence about ordering food myself recently and did so before any xiong di turned up, and I think I did a good job. One by one they all turned up a great meal ensued. It had that typical Chinese flavour of people coming and people going and always maintaining around 75% of the total number of invitees. At some time before midnight it was decided that we would move on so I paid the reasonable bill of 900 kuai, said goodbye to Huang, and we moved on to another place to continue. I have no idea why - were they concerned I’d have too big a bill? Anyway, for the first time in a couple of years at least I had bbq pig’s penis washed down with more Li Quan pijiu. For some reason Li Kun wouldn’t let me drive home later so I took his car and a mate accompanied us on our dian dong che.

Last Supper 2018

Post-Last Supper 2018 with pig's penis

Ah it should have felt sadder than it did, going home, but I rationalise that each year is a smaller percentage of my life and that therefore it will feel like less time before the next such excursion.

没洗头

Well it was bloody work all afternoon, but I got to take the kids out to eat at the Yumi Tang place in the evening, although for some reason it was really busy. We did some shopping at the shenme dou you shops and I got a cap with 没洗头 (not washed hair) written on it as it was the only one I could find in Chinese. Back home at work I worked out that my fingernails were too long on the right and had calluses on the left. This made it rather difficult to type, resulting in 30% slower words per minute including fixing mistakes, by my calculations. Would I cut my nails and dip my left hand in baby oil? No way...guitar is more important when no piano around.

没洗头

I went to the market supermarket to get some drinks and noticed it was the supermarket’s 11st anniversary. I thought that might mean something but apparently not. Lunch was jiao zi and bao zi with the kids. They wanted to buy stuff so we went around on the bike but didn’t find much until Xixi spotted a huge spider behind some advertising over a shop. She seems to have an eye for detail. But so do I as I noticed a flask in a shop adorned with “Your title here” ok it’s not really that interesting but it did remind me of the Polish road sign in Wales where it was the content of an out-of-office email which was much funnier.

Horrid arachnid shape just above the "o"

Your Title Here

.
Finally finished work at 10.45 to go to the waterman’s friend’s shop opening, where they’d been badgering me to come for ages. They were already pissed and welcomed me like a long lost friend. Apparently the girls were all friends of Chuan Chuan so I should be ok. Almost stereotypically, the girls doing the bbq were rather chubby, but less so the girls eating it were smoking and cai mai’ing, and I had to join in the latter.

Smoking

Cat head in the toilet

Teaspoons and lovely meal with Chen

I thought I was clever waking up at 9.30am but when I opened my eyes again it was an hour later. I really should be taking advantage of a bit of time without the kids but instead I just slooped about at home, before meeting up with a friend for some watermelon juice. I then started the rather sad task of going to the supermarket for one of the last times to get such things as washing powder and tissues to last us till we go back.

Teaspoons are expensive here - note to self: bring lots of teaspoons next time

I just noticed that they "spelled" 平果 wrong on the card for the fairground - they wrote "Apple" (苹果）tut tut.

I took a stitched view while waiting for the lift

On a positive note Chen IM’d me to invite me for another meal which was nice. Of course it was for this evening and of course I said I’d make it. It was the first time I’d gone over the river bridge to actually go somewhere - usually it’s to look out from the bridge as there is no road on the south side of it. But there is a stony path and it is that that Chen took as he picked me up from our place. This time his son was here. He’s a great kid of about 12 but seems almost too happy to see me and I wonder if he’s “on the spectrum” which is a horrible expression in a way because we all are. He’s one of those people whose Mandarin I just can’t understand so maybe it’s my problem 100%.

Chen had invited quite a few people and there was a huge rotating table. I got the impression that not everyone had turned (haha) up by the time we were due to start, judging by half of the seats being empty and more food had been ordered than could possibly be accepted by the eight or so stomachs around the table. But during the meal some more bosses turned up in various levels of inebriation. One, who was there from the start, had brought a box of six bottles of red wine, and although I said I didn’t drink the stuff I did indulge in a couple of glasses to keep him and Chen happy.

On the south side of the bridge

Sumptious

Not heard of this one...

...but it was ok

I went to the loo and on the way back got semi-accosted by a bloke from another room in the same restaurant and needed to do a few gan bei’s for a bit in their room. Then got back to Chen’s room and A Wu was there, so more gan bei’ing was necessary.

Then I got a message from Huang at the seafood place asking to meet up. Ah well let’s see. First I went home at 11pm to find the kids were back and it was lovely to see them but they were knackered and were going straight to bed. Well as there aren’t many days left I popped out to meet Huang for a couple of beers and had a decent, if difficult, chat with him till I had to go back at 1am knackered.

Football - oh dear

Yay, no work. I brunched with Haiwei and some friends at 10am which was earlier than I’ve been getting up recently. Then brunch turned into lunch and a few beers were imbibed but nothing unreasonable. Despite this I was unable to grab more than a two minute siesta much to my chagrin as I’d accepted an invitation from Zhang Hua to play football at 5pm in the kit he’d sorted me out with last year.

5pm came around and although I knew where we would be playing I hadn’t had a message from Zhang Hua. But I couldn’t really feign ignorance as I could see the guys practising in the astroturf field near our place. I turned up 20 minutes later in high 30s heat and really wasn’t in the mood. It was people in our kits versus people in not-our-kits, but I understood everyone was pretty much from the same team. I asked what the score was and someone said it was something like 6-2, but I didn’t know to whom. I got called to come on but I was still trying to work out if it was already half time, as by now I’d been here nearly 45 minutes.

The view from our house - I had no excuse

So eventually I made the effort. I’m sure I was the eldest, and probably the least fit on the field but it was more a gesture to Zhang Hua who’d got me the kit in the first place. I played left back (I wish it was left back in the changing room ha ha) and immediately realised my trainers were not meant for Astroturf as they had little grip. I was pretty bad too...my teammates were calling out “bu yao jin” - don’t worry/take it easy, and I did. The job I’d given myself was to pass to teammates as soon as I got the ball. That sounds quite easy but in the sweat of the game it’s not so simple to follow the game-plan. I did at least make one good defensive header to get the ball out that received some polite applause so I’ll dwell on that.

My main fear was knowing that we were up by about four goals when I started and I just wanted to remain on top. I think we did in the end, but it was lower than a four goal margin.

They obviously needed some help before I came on...

I had been told that we’d go for a meal at one of the player’s hometown 20 km away, so I said I’d quickly pop home to get my laptop as I wanted to watch City’s game at Wolves in a bit. I was told we’d now be eating at a local restaurant which I was more than happy with as the match was starting soon. I nipped home to grab the laptop then popped to pick up Zhang Hua, but very annoyingly I’d not zipped up my bag properly and the laptop dropped out onto the cold hard floor and I feared the worst, but had no time to check as we needed to go to the restaurant.

Once there the worst was confirmed; the laptop didn’t turn on. Well, there was no time to moan - it was my fault and that was that. I made my apologies and hurried back home to get my old laptop and bade them start the meal. Ten minutes later I was back and turned on the laptop I hadn’t used for weeks. The restaurant wifi wasn’t working well so someone offered to tether to their 3/4G phone. Thank goodness for cheap 3/4G. Bugger. Windows needs to update in 15 minutes - please save any work...not even the option to delay. At least it was getting on for half time by now. We’d managed to watch a whole five minutes of the first half. To make things worse I found I’d forgotten to bring the AC adapter so once again had to make excuses and leave them for a further 10 minutes while I got that, as my now four year old Lenovo Yoga 2, as much as I love it, does not last much more than an hour on a single charge now.

Finally we had a stable stream and good food and most of the chaps were interested in the match, having just played a game. Disappointingly we played out a 1-1 draw but to be fair Wolves pretty much deserved it. It’s only the second game but losing points to a team that’s just been promoted isn’t the sign of champions. Liverpool on the other hand are looking great so far.

We moved on to Zhang Hua’s place after the meal for more beer. Most people left after a while but then the rest of us moved on to some other place - I took Zhuang Hua on the bike. I started gan bei’ing with another table too but even I knew when enough is enough so left at 2.30am and took Zhuang Hua back to his shop to sleep, and did the same soon after.

At Zhang Hua's

The rain

Wii cleaning and Mario Kart

Up at a reasonable 10.30am to have a breakfast of a custard tart the kids had left in the fridge. Worked till the early afternoon but needed a break so played a game of Worms Armageddon on Steam that I remembered doing while living in Portugal 19 years ago or so but why not?

As I was in a sort of gaming mode I decided to sort out the Wii. For some reason before turning it on and making sure it worked I decided to clean it of its 10+ years of yellowing. I took a good 10 minutes doing this including the flexes and each passing minute I became more convinced that it wouldn’t work, yet I adamantly stuck at the task as though I had a speck of ADHD or whatever. But the nice clean Wii did turn on and I did manage a couple of games of Mario Kart which was half fun and half sad. I’d rather be playing with someone else. I’ll have to sort it to work online like I’ve done with the Wiis at our UK home.

I do like a bit of Koopa Cape - almost retro now the console is 12 years old

Then Haiwei reminded me I was going to his place in an hour so I did 20 press ups and a minute’s plank before showering after a quick beer. It was pissing down so I put on the blue overall for the dian dong che and managed to stay relatively dry this time.

When I arrived Haiwei was still cooking so I spent some time with his son speaking English which is really one of the reasons I was here. He spent most of his time playing an excellent looking game called PUBG and pronounced "Pub". It looked more like Fortnite for adults, as there was a bit more killing. I expressed an interest and started downloading the Chinese version only for the download to stop after a few minutes on the local wifi. Eventually Haiwei's son had the good idea of making me tether on his phone and within half an hour the gigabyte or so of data was downloaded. Great. Except I needed to register with a Chinese social media account that had KYC and basically my WeChat didn't have that so I was buggered. Still, it was interesting to watch him play with the thumb-thingies that made his phone more tactile. He said he would sort me out a pair for Leilei.

PUBG - Looks pretty good actually

The meal was a sumptuous family one though Haiwei and I were the only men, but that changed an hour later when some more people turned up. One of them was 2-1, who I remembered from many years ago, and we enjoyed reminiscing a while.

Another sumptuous meal

The fashionable Li Quan beer this year: "1998" Bill Clinton....

Despite the good meal I ended up having to go home to work as my clients were getting to the office on the other side of the planet. Not complaining though - just needed to send a couple of emails and IMs to show I was looking after them. I did prefer when I was on English/European projects working from home in China though….

Tan and kids to to Kunming/Dali

Got up to say good morning and goodbye to Tan and the kids as they were about to head off to Kunming (actually Dali a bit beyond) and I was about to head back to bed for a bit, before work raised its predictable head again, but as I was about to get on with it Haiwei rang to drink tea. That sounded a nicer prospect even if it would mean having a later night so I went there to talk shop and eventually a bloke went out and came back with four portions of bao zi, nearly as good as the ones from downstairs at our place, and I gobbled my portion as breakfast had made way for sleep earlier.

I then made my genuine excuses and went back to work on through to the evening. At 6pm Haiwei called for me to go out to eat but I had to be good and stuck to my tasks at hand. During my 9-10.15pm meeting he called me three times to ask where I was, even though at the end of the first call I told him I’d call him when finished. Anyway I dutifully did and I found him with his sons at some eatery by the market supermarket. For a change it was not loads of meat, but white carrot in a soup with spicy bean sprouts, a refreshing change. Then came the tofu skin and fried tofu, followed later by a load of oysters done with garlic and a bit of chopped vermicelli spaghetti which were delicious.

Some more people turned up and one had a son of 12 years with whom I managed to make speak a tiny bit of English. Then he built up some confidence and lifted up his glass and said “cheers!” to everyone’s delight. But by close to midnight I could see there was still stuff to do for work so again made my excuses and went back. Ended up working till 3am then chatting to Awl till 4 as there was no-one in the house to disturb, before falling asleep without the air con on for the first time this year.

Leilei's First Drive

It was a bit of a late awakening for one and all but I did get the kids out to eat some jiao zi and bao zi at the usual place and they ate pretty well. Afterwards I thought I’d let Leilei have a go on the dian dong che in the car park of the unused hotel we checked out (not of) the other day. He absolutely loved his first experience of driving by himself and I didn’t have the heart to tell him that vehicles would mostly be self-driving by the time he would be legally able to drive, and I’m quite glad I didn’t because I will likely be wrong. But when it happens it will happen quickly and the number of lives saved on the roads will be numerous - it’s an absolute no-brainer that it will happen...a bit like lab-grown meat (or at least not growing animals to kill and eat) but on a shorter timescale.

Leilei driving the dian dong che for the first time...

Work took up most of my time after lunch until the kids went out to the supermarket to get stuff for their upcoming trip to Kunming that I unfortunately will not be able to participate in thanks to the aforementioned work. But at least it will give me more time to focus on it. I nibbled some spicy dou fu for tea on my own.

The view while waiting for the lift...changes each year a bit

Then Yangwen IM’d me to ask if I was able to go for a walk. I’ve been saying no for too long now so I decided I would go get some fresh air. Not that it was very fresh - it was one of the muggiest evenings I’ve known and I was wearing fairly heavy shorts and a cotton shirt unlike literally everyone else out, who was wearing very light sporting clothes (well I wanted somewhere to put phone and keys and money). We walked up a new road north east of the guangchang, wider than the M25, for a whole 2k and met up with some other bloke along the way who accompanied us. He also was from outside Pingguo so the conversation was slightly easier as it was more “normal” Mandarin.

Eventually get out of work at 10.30pm and went for a bite to eat with a neighbour and her “sister”. When I arrived at the Beihai seafood place Boss Huang was rather drunk and greeted me like an old friend (which I suppose I am) and then gabbled for a few minutes while I pretended I understood and afterwards said it was because we were nalouzhan (old mates) and he shook my hand so I felt a bit better.

We left around 1am as the little sister was being called to go home and look after her three month old daughter. As we’d only had three bottles in an hour and a half I was still a little thirsty, so I went for a quick ride and found Zhang Hua outside his little cigarette shop with some mates eating and drinking. Of course I was called over and joined them for a while. One of the blokes hadn’t seen me for years and kept saying that. I wish I remembered him and pretended I did.

After that I stupidly went for a ride to use up the rest of the dian so that I would get more for my buck when I charged it up later. Loads of people were still out, and I arrived at Lao Tong Kao Ji where I had performed the other week, and got called over to some people I apparently knew. I had a couple of beers but had to call it a day at 3.30am. Got back and remembered to charge the bike and went straight to bed.

Yumi Tang and Massage

I took the kids to the Yumi Tang place as we hadn’t been for a few days. Sadly I had to work after that so dumped them at A Xia’s until a couple of hours later I got a phone call from Xixi saying mama was going for an hour-long massage so I needed to pick them up.

I had a message from Uncle Yellow later in the morning about meeting up for a bite to eat at 6pm. As it rolled around I realised I’d have the kids still so took them along. We ate cow’s head and tongue, along with some more edible chicken, but not a quarter as good as last time I was here.

I took the kids shopping at 8pm, then back 40 mins later as mama wasn't answering her phone. Leilei got some wireless headphones I begrudgingly allowed him to as we did a check and found they were the same price on Amazon (about 30 quid). Got back to Uncle Yellow to find mama was out eating bbq so took the kids there and could finally enjoy a few beers in the company of adults.

It was only a few though, as a friend called and we went for a late foot wash at nearly midnight. Very nice, and where else could you be so indulgent at midnight? Sleep was easy after that.

Guess Age

I awoke to Tan asking if we could get tickets to go to Kunming. I wasn’t awake so said “yes” of course. Why wouldn’t I? I was then thrust into work as is my wont this year it appears. But I did make a point of taking the kids out for a Magical Mystery Tour as is another wont here, though not necessarily as exciting as it sounds.

I met Ma Laoban for dinner for the first time this year, with some colleagues and red wine. Luckily only two bottles between six adults (and one kid - Lao Pang’s son). But Ma Laoban only had a sip as he was driving (about the only person I know who would do that, but he technically doesn’t drink anyway so hardly a big deal), and one of the ladies had just had an injection so didn’t partake. As Lao Pang was Tan’s friend, I knew I wouldn’t get into trouble as I would have a witness to me not drinking too much, and anyway I had a meeting scheduled for 9pm, so I had to leave at 8.30. Then I found the meeting had been moved to 11.30pm - damn.

Then as that time rolled around it got cancelled, or at least I no longer had to attend, so went for a ride and met Zhang Hua, then went out to another place with some of his mates and played “guess age”, which .makes a change I suppose.

Zhang Hua's little shop

Outside Zhang Hua's shop with his wife and son

Zhang Hua and me enjoying a latish beer

Unexpected guitar at Li Jia He Xian

Up lateish due to yesterday but so what I’m officially on holiday now for a bit. I got a call from Li Kun at 1.30pm and at first I thought he was telling me to come and practise music but then realised it was to go for a meal with musicians from the town of Baise (an hour and a half north of Pingguo). I wasn’t really thinking but I knew I was on holiday so I thought “sod it” and I said I’d be there “soon”. I  didn’t tell him I needed a shower so would be longer than the 5 minutes he was expecting, so obviously when I arrived he was already waiting outside the famous restaurant Li Jia He Xian where they were.

Wow. They were well into their meal and I thought it a little strange that Li Kun had only called me at 1.30pm rather than the day before. A few beers were drunk and then a violinist started a very professional piece with the classical guitarist (though the former wasn’t drinking the latter was). It was a spellbinding session for me and I clapped heartily when they finished earlier than most people who were filming it (ok I was too).

Unexpected wonderful violin performance

The guitarist was great too

But then came the problem. Li Kun said it was my turn to perform. Actually one of the men at the table had said it was very interesting that literally the minute I had arrived he had been watching a video of me playing Scarborough Fair (Canticle) and when I turned up it was like some sort of vision (his words not mine). Li Kun picked up the classical guitar that had just been played beautifully and thrust it in my unwelcoming hands. Apparently it was worth more than a thousand quid.  I hadn’t played a classical guitar for well over 10 years and explained so. But apparently that wasn’t a problem, and as soon as they heard my excuse Li Kun was on the phone ordering an acoustic guitar and not 10 minutes later one arrived at the restaurant.

What could I do? They’d only bloody arranged a delivery of a guitar so this white man could try to entertain professional musicians…. I was quite embarrassed so actually drank a glass of red wine which I don’t normally do here. I’ve never sung Scarborough Fair before, only played it to accompaniment so I put the capo at a much higher fret than I would normally have. Oh it was not good...my voice was quiet and probably not on key as I am no Garfunkel, but I got polite applause afterwards.

I downed a beer and decided that I would show them I wasn’t that bad, so went to another scale and belted out Sounds of Silence and Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard and got an actual appreciative round of applause. That gave me the confidence to break into a couple of more S&G songs that they really liked.

As is sometimes the case here I got a “review” from the main guitar player from the violin piece. He said I was “too weak” for Scarborough Fair but really came alive for the other songs afterwards. Chinese people are often this frank and I do appreciate it, especially in this case.

There was a bald bloke (I think another guitarist) who got really drunk and then just leant forward and fell asleep as you would I suppose, but no-one batted an eyelid. Well this was a really unexpected afternoon, which normally, due to work I wouldn’t have taken up. But I’m very glad I did, strangely to hear the criticism more than the praise. I got home at 4pm.

I stayed up to have the luxury of watching City beat Huddersfield 6-1, and David Silva was a peach. I love many of our players but he will probably always be my favourite, despite Aguero scoring a hat-trick. But Man U lost to Brighton which made the day that much better!

Nice bonus watching us win convincingly

Muslim beef and meeting Chen Again

Up a bit late and took the kids to the Muslim place I took Xixi last year for lunch. While we were making our way through some beef some boss entered the establishment and I recognised him from somewhere recently. He chastised me for eating so late (it was only just gone 1.30pm). He too was eating with his son and a few minutes later as he left he shouted out that he had paid for my order too. I tried in vain to reject this but knew there would be no availability of avail. I wish I could have thanked him by name….

The beef was gorgeous and the kids had quite a bit despite it being a little chilli. The kids ate a fair bit of the hand-made noodles too. Then Leilei decided to try eating some cut-up chilli on the beef and spent the next 15 minutes in agony trying to stop the burning and finishing my water...we couldn’t understand how the beef was so mild with those chillies all around it. We had to doggy bag the rest of the noodles as I couldn’t bear wasting it even though I was nearly certain it would find itself in our bin within hours.

The kids enjoying some beef at the Muslim place

Although the rainy season appears to have left us for the sun, and it was blisteringly hot once again, we went for a ride around until we could feel that the sun was doing us a disservice and stopped at my favourite watermelon juice place. The girls I remember as mere tots were now serving there and seemed to remember us with a smile, as they told me they’d just run out of watermelon and would honey melon be ok? Yes it would, and Leilei took a zhenzhu naicha too before getting back on the dian dong che and knocking over a standing bicycle. Whoops sorry.

The best watermelon drink place in Pingguo...I first came here when they were literally half the size (the girls not the drinks)

We stayed most of the rest of the afternoon in the sanctuary of our air-conditioned flat until Tan went out to see friends and then Chen pinged me to say we’d meet at 蚝门螺吧 at 6.30pm. I didn’t really understand the Chinese as it looks like Oyster Door Snail Bar, but I didn’t care as it was really close to our house and nearly next door to Tian Yang Po’s, Tan’s favourite bbq that we’ve been going to for close to 15 years….

We ended up having a great meal for me, but not so much for the kids but they had their various sweet drinks so they were relatively happy. And I was sensible with the beer.

Great meal with Chen

Xixi "sort of" enjoyed it - Chen waving...

The toilets warning it is forbidden to poo

Later I went to a bar with the waterman and bar owner but I didn’t stay as long as I might have done due to paternal duties and tiredness. But it was weird that when I left I had to take a fairly heavy woman home and I worried that I wouldn’t have enough in the battery to get her home but thankfully I just about made it.

Just for historical reference I'm checking on how many km the dian dong che is doing between charges...not amazing but don't need to change batteries very soon

Mario Land and a lizard

I took the kids to A Xia’s place but in the end they wanted to stay with me which I didn’t mind at all. As we were getting back on the bike a shiny white car bibbed me and nearly hit me then the window wound down and I noticed it was my mate Chen from a couple of years ago, the bloke married to the Nanning dancer with a son who likes to smile a lot but talks in a way I find very difficult to understand. Well we hadn’t met up last year so he invited me to a meal tomorrow. I didn’t think I had anything arranged so I said it should be ok thank you, and we exchanged WeChat details as his last one was no longer in use due to him forgetting his password. A slightly dubious excuse as these days you can get your friends to confirm who you are if you forget your password...but I certainly wasn’t going to enquire.

I noticed this pasted at the ground floor. Annoyingly at the time of taking it I didn't understand it, even though I could read 40% of the characters - progress of sorts, but lots still needed. Must do better.

I took the kids for a ride in the afternoon and found a really weird place with concrete holes like Mario Land. We stood there for several minutes trying to work out what it was but were nonplussed. Later, back on the road, we noticed a lizard crossing the road and made sure we missed it, but then turned around to see where it was going.This was actually more fun than expected and it dodged death several times and miraculously made it across to the other side of the road. We thought we’d lost it in the bushes but we found it again climbing a tree. Several minutes amusement for us to the bemusement of anyone looking. The kids then ordered me to take them to a shenme dou you shop… Leilei nearly bought a set of wireless headphones and tried them on and they looked a bit silly but I’m glad he did. Xixi bought some face mask stuff as she doesn’t seem to be able to leave a shop without buying something....not sure where she got that from..

The weird Mario Land-like holes in the ground

Modelling the face mask she had to buy...

Some other dubious wares in the shop I'm glad they didn't see...

The lizard that survived the crossing of the road and gave us more enjoyment than reptiles should normally do

I went to Haiwei’s for tea as his son was around and wanted to speak English and Spanish. I couldn’t tempt the kids to come with me though. Of course it was a nice meal and we had a couple of beers but nothing silly as I had to get home for a meeting at 8pm. It went better and quicker than planned but there was no point going back to Haiwei’s as his son had gone to his mum’s to sleep - he’ll be going back to school tomorrow at 6pm...grim.

I had to do more work later before deciding to do some guitar practice before realising I didn’t have my capo. Google translate makes the Chinese for “capo” look really bad but Li Kun understood and said I could pick it up. I came over to his place and there were loads of people there playing music. A guitar was thrust into my hands and I spent the next 20 minutes playing Scarborough Fair with Li Kun. Then I took my leave and called Haiwei, who had been calling me for the last hour. As I was checking the map location he sent me I saw it looked really close and then I heard a shout “Tom!!” and of course it was him and a couple of mates. They were right opposite Li Kun’s place! The next hour or so was quite a fun session of cai ma and talking about how lucrative being a middleman between China and Canada could be.

I offered Haiwei a lift as he was obviously pissed but he pointed to his car, so there wasn’t much I could do. I made my excuses and left for a relatively early night except I played World of Tanks with Mat for more time than I should have.

Rats

Up 10ish, so before the kids, and decided to get up rather than lie in. It was a bit late for breakfast so took the kids to go to lunch at 12.53. We went to the underground car park to unplug the charging dian dong che to find out it wasn’t plugged in anyway. The security man was shouting something to me about electricity so I feared the worst, but on turning it on I found it seemed to be full. So we all got on but as we tried to mount the slope to get out it gave up and I accepted that we had no dian. However, on further inspection it turned out to be a flat tyre. The bloke who had just shouted at me then told me there was a place that would fix it just around the corner so we started walking there. But as soon as we got to the waterman’s place just 30 seconds later the drizzle we’d been having turned torrential and we were stuck so we took advantage of this and went to the jiao zi place to eat. Leilei ate all of his plus one of mine and added some chilli sauce which made me happy. Xixi had a portion of bao zi and managed all but three which wasn’t bad. The rain eased off and we walked the dian dong che to a small place with tyres outside and woke up the man lying there. He checked the back wheel and straight away identified a buckled rear wheel and got to work straightening it out. Five minutes later it was working again. He said “wu kuai” and I tried to give him 10 but he would not accept and pushed back five kuai into my hand. I was really grateful though not surprised and knew it could have been a lot more in a different place.

Checking the mileage on the clock

The buckled wheel

Fixing the buckled wheel

Lunch of bao zi

We were supposed to go to A Xia a yi’s but popped home first to do the important job of putting fizzy drinks in the freezer so they would be solid by the evening. Mama was still there so ordered a di di che to take them to A Xia’s. This is the equivalent of Uber and is incredibly efficient and cheap. We’re talking about 5-6 kuai for most rides, so undercutting san lun ches and not to mention they’re air conditioned etc. Sadly for me this really could be the death of san lun ches here, but it is simply a sign of market forces in action.

As soon as they were gone Haiwei called me to remind me to go to his office and drink tea. Well it was 2pm and I wasn’t going to get a sleep so why not? When I got there I bumped into Boss Huang and first had some tea in his office with his wife and kid and some other bosses. Then Haiwei came and we moved to his office, just the two of us. It appeared he wanted to talk business. Over the course of the next hour I learnt that his new job is at an aluminium factory, except it’s not actually aluminium that they will produce but some sort of fluoridised version that can be used for extracting pure aluminium from alumina during the electrolysis process.

Haiwei was very serious about this and kept writing down terms with a pen in Chinese characters that I couldn’t understand (quite frankly I couldn’t understand the English versions most of the time). He had to keep writing on my Pleco app so I could see what he meant but at the end I understood he wanted me to become a middleman between his company and foreign aluminium factories that would be interested in buying this flouridised substance. Of course I had many questions and posed these questions as coming from a potential client rather than trying to sound critical. Why wouldn’t other companies do this? How good is the quality compared to what they are using etc. It boiled down to the “fact” that the environmental impact of producing this substances is considerable, and many countries won’t allow it.

As I’ve been going to Canada quite a lot recently he wanted to give me some samples to show to prospective companies. As if I could just step out of the office and walk up to a factory owner and do this. To be fair Canada is the world’s third biggest aluminium producer after China and Russia. Then he said there’d definitely be money in it for me and when I said that wouldn’t be necessary he nearly took offence and said it wasn’t up for question...if I managed to help a sale of course I’d be recompensed...no option. He was already talking about bringing prospective clients here and showing them the factory and taking them out to eat and drink, and the factory won’t even be operational until November.

Then we leapt into his car and 15 minutes later we were at the factory grounds, where it was in the process of being built. We entered an office and met his boss (with whom he’d worked about 15 years ago in a similar business). They then talked shop for the next half an hour at a pace I found difficult to keep up with, so I buried myself in my phone and started studying the aluminium production process. Maybe I have a low threshold for this sort of thing, but I found the process fascinating; pure aluminium doesn’t occur naturally on this planet as it requires huge amounts of electrical energy to separate it from other chemicals. Typically, alumina is first extracted from bauxite, before being hit with very high currents of electricity at a high temperature so it can be sucked away from the other elements. It’s a very complex process that’s been used for over 100 years, though there are constant efforts to refine it, one being to get rid of carbon anodes in order to avoid spewing out a load of CO2. But once the aluminium is made it’s very clean and more recyclable than other metals as it doesn’t corrode.

I still need to understand properly where the fluoride stuff fits in in the last part of the process, but if nothing else I hope to learn some more chemistry here. This is how education should be done; instead of going to school and learning ionic and covalent bonding in order to pass a test, then instantly forget it, we should first identify a need, then work out how we fulfil that need. In this case the need is for a clean metal that is currently mixed with a load of stuff we don’t particularly want. So we need to break the chemical bonds by using other chemicals and energy - kinetic (crushing), electric, and heat. When you have the context of this need you have a much stronger drive to learn. I’m really trying to find these contexts for the kids to make their learning better grounded instead of just going to school because you have to. I don’t expect it to be easy but there must be some way to make then find a need to learn algebra. I’m going to make a concerted effort to be more aware of this during everyday situations. I wonder if I could have used the dian dong che’s wheel as an example. The man had to let out air then use some metal pincers to bend the metal...so much maths and chemistry there, from the angle and length of the pincers, to the pliability of the metal wheel, followed by the pressure from the machine to pump back air into the tyre and the spraying of water over the fixed area to check no bubbles were coming out. Why can’t the kids be so fascinated by this?

Anyway, we eventually left the factory office and headed back to the bosses’ place to drink more tea. Haiwei said he was going to play ping pong this evening and I said I’d join him with the kids. But when we got back to the office one of the kids pointed to a yellow bag and told me to look. Inside were two giant frozen rats, each the size of a sturdy man’s forearm. They were on their backs with their front feet sticking up in a begging position. Nice.

So 6 o’clock rolled along ushered in by more tiny cups of tea and finally we were all told to eat. We went into the room that the bosses usually drink red wine in to find a table with two trays of meat on it, but no rat, at least yet.

Two frozen rats

Two non-frozen rats

 A non-rat dish that was fine

Soon after the red wine and beer appeared, followed by lots of cai ma. I actually got a bit tipsy on the beer so at 8.30 I made excuses and went home to pick up my guitar to take to Li Kun’s to practise, but not before the rat appeared, thankfully in small non-rat-like chunks and I did try some - not bad if a little tough.. I spent a couple of hours at Li Kun’s drinking only tea and practising Scarborough Fair with him on the flute, focusing on the timing mainly. A couple of mates dropped by and then a woman appeared with beer, and then some food arrived and I realised this is where I would be for a good hour or so.

Haiwei called me a couple of times to come back to the bosses’ place and the third time Li Kun answered and and shouted that I was over at his for the evening! Eventually though I did head back to the office but Haiwei had already gone - well it was after 1am.