Well I got up at 10.30am but needed a little more time as my tummy wasn't ready by 11.30 and of course that was fine. The boys had already gone to the cat cafe and five minutes after I got to the hotel foyer I saw them coming back with Chuan Chuan and Xiao He. Apparently they had paid to eat but the food hadn't turned up after 45 minutes so Chuan Chuan had ordered a refund...so I suppose they got the best of both worlds - playing with the cats and not paying anything. Which was good as Chuan Chuan announced that instead of eating at the white water place we would eat here as there wasn't food there, unlike what she'd planned yesterday. As much as I doubted this I didn't want to argue and we ended up having a lovely brunch at midday and of course we had to da bao a fair bit of it. Someone had mentioned their dian dong che batteries getting stolen and then it dawned on me why the bloke had to use an axle grinder to remove my old ones; they were there simply to keep them from being stolen and now I was able to worry about how easy they would be to steal now...oh well it's out of my hands.
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| Cute cat at the cat cafe |
It got to 12.45pm so we found the car and left for the hour's journey to Dawanglin through the windy roads of northern Baise county, hardly noticing the mountains anymore. About 15 minutes from our destination Leilei announced that he really needed to go to the loo. In fact one minute earlier I had felt rumblings from my nether regions and feared I wouldn't be able to hold on either so his request saved my embarrassment of asking the same thing. They asked if he could hold on but he couldn't so Xiao He found a short driveway off the main road and we went to look for a suitable bush on the other side of the road but Chuan Chuan walked straight up to the first house where the front door was wide open of course and shouted for the houseowner who duly turned up, where she explained the need and of course there was no problem. In fact Nezha wanted to go too so while we waited for them we chatted to the grandparents, the mother, and the little girl on douyin on the sofa. They could have been long lost friends for all the smiles they showed, and seemed genuinely happy that we'd come to use their loo. I suppose seeing 2.5 foreigners turn up unannounced is not an everyday occurrence. For the eighth or so time this year I managed a squat and was happier to do it in such a residence than a public one. But you had to really lower your head to get to the toilet and the door was barely 5' high, I'm not sure if by design. We said our thank yous and goodbyes to more smiles after a very successful pitstop (or should it be piss-stop?), and indeed arrived 15 minutes later.
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| Poky little entrance to the loo |
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| Some slightly surprised inhabitants of the place we stopped off at for the loo |
Indeed I'd forgotten to bring a pair of shorts but no worries I could buy a pair there for 30 kuai, although when I went to pay the woman said 40 kuai for some reason but Chuan Chuan came over and refused to let me pay anything. I went into the small building by the shop and they pulled the shutters down allowing me to change. I naughtily whipped out the other small bottle of medicine alcohol and necked it during the three minutes I was changing as I knew from experience that this rafting can be scary, very scary. But in fact it should have been Leilei who was scared as he'd had literally the fright of his life almost 11 years ago and I thought he'd never get in a boat again. However, Nezha was really looking forward to doing this and Leilei showed no signs of wanting to go back at all. I wonder if it would have been the same had Nezha not been there.
By now it was gone 2pm and we were ready and being told to "kuai yi dian" so we left our effects with Xiao He who apparently didn't want to go but probably was kindly looking after our stuff instead to allow the four of us to take two boats. Chuan Chuan explained she had got tickets from the place I got my shorts, which wasn't technically part of the rafting place, so she got them for 100 kuai each instead of 150. A Similar thing happened 10 years ago in Dali where A Wu somehow got our tickets for cheaper for this reason. Again, I had my doubts but thought better than to enquire more lest it sound rude. We went to a shaded waiting area and indeed waited 10 minutes for a bus to arrive. It duly did but we weren't on the list of numbers they called out so had to wait a few more minutes for the next one. I started talking to the lady next to me and found out she was a local. I was interested in the transparent, waterproof phone holdall she had around her neck and asked how much it was - 20 kuai - at which Chuan Chuan interrupted to say she could have got it for 10 kuai at the place I got my shorts.
Eventually we got in the bus and took the shortish 10 minute journey to where we were to start. There were about 100 people milling about choosing 救生衣，船桨，头盔 (life jackets, paddles, helmets) so we did the same and after finding a quiet place to take a leak without everyone seeing me we went to find our boats. We started on a still pond with numerous boats ahead of us queueing to start the white water where there's a person-made boat-sized gap ensuring you can only go one at a time down a steep slope to start you off with a big adrenalin buzz. I wanted to be behind the boys but somehow Chuan Chuan and I got ahead of them. I made her sit facing the same way so we could see where we were going and when it was our time the bloke with a pole pulled us forward and for about five seconds it was like one of those log flumes and we nearly leapt into the air when we eventually landed at the pool at the bottom. Well I think I justified the quick nip I'd had 20 minutes previously and forgot about the boys for a bit but when I looked back they were there with big grins on their faces having survived the initial "fall".
The next couple of minutes would be the smoothest for the best part of the next hour. This one really was more aggressive than the Pingguo or Dali ones I'd done before. After a short while I realised all we had to do was sit face-to-face, put the paddles in the boat, and just grip the handles making sure nothing was protruding out of the boat. Blimey it really was white water almost all the three or so kilometres, constantly being buffeted rather viciously by the rocks and going at quite some speed at times. It was at least four times more bumpy than any bumper car, with the added dimensions of going up and down and being splashed to high heaven. Every 50 yards or so there was a sign saying "big fall" and I hoped Leilei was ok. Eventually I managed to see them, stupidly with paddles out as if they could control anything. You need to respect the water and I could easily see a rock smashing a paddle into a face so gestured at them to put them away and hold on. Obviously my gesturing had no effect (it's difficult to gesture that when you're trying to hold on for dear life) but I think they got the message soon after they'd experienced nearly capsizing again.
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| The boys having a whale of a time! |
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| Chuan Chuan and me descending a person-made fall for the second time |
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| Genuine smiles towards the end |
2.2km to go, 2.1km to go, every 100 yards or so there were blokes dotted about so they must experience capsizing from time to time but I didn't witness any luckily. There was a sign saying if you capsize just abandon the boat and walk down the path created by the side of the river. Very different from 11 years ago where we were made to get straight back on the boat again. Finally we arrived after about 50 minutes of almost pure adrenalin, and the boys were stoked too. This is definitely something I'd like to do again, and I hope Tan takes Xixi here while they are about. Nezha said he really wanted to go swimming in a lake but it was clear there was no swimming allowed here, so I said I'd organise something for tomorrow in Pingguo as I'd been to a reservoir there a few times, and assumed it would still be there.
So we'd ticked off one of the very few boxes we'd created for ourselves and were very satisfied with it. We'd all forgotten to bring towels but luckily Chuan Chuan had three so the boys shared one and I took one for myself and we all changed in the same small shop building, before getting in the car back to Baise, where the boys promptly fell asleep. I would have liked to too but find this almost impossible in a Chinese car. Xiao He was a very safe driver in the posh Lexus, but it's about the other drivers and for some reason I feel the need to keep alert.
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| Sleeping after rafting |
I noticed a message on Weixin - Uncle Yellow had IM'd me to say Boss Zhou's father had died recently, and that they were at the funeral and I was to come. I explained that I was in Baise and wouldn't be around till 9pm and would that be too late? No, they'd still be there apparently. This would be a first time for me, although Waipo's should have been had we been able to get back for it.
We arrived safely back at Baise around 4ish and had a slow walk through the shopping area before finding a nice looking restaurant in the inside area and were told we'd need to wait five minutes before we could enter, which was ample time for another quick wander. The place specialised in Guangxi delicacies and was one of the top two meals we had, with roast duck accompanied by tiny glasses of hawthorn juice to counter the oil of the duck apparently, mini pork ribs, omelette, beans, skewers of succulent port, and gorgeous octopus. This time there was nothing to da bao, and Nezha kept asking for more of the crisps which were meant to be just a snack before the meal and accompanied cold radish, so we had to keep eating the radish lest it be wasted. The four of them ordered huge plastic glasses of various mango-tea and other stuff to be delivered to the restaurant and I just kept to the supplied tea and tiny hawthorn glasses, making it one of the few evening meals I'd managed to avoid beer.
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| Another perfect Guangxi meal |
I mentioned the funeral to Chuan Chuan and wanted to know as much information as possible in order to avoid offending anyone. She said I'd probably need 200 kuai, or up to 500 kuai if he is a good friend. I had no idea what type of friend I would be classed as - I mean I give him a hug when I see him, but generally see him a handful of times a year...oh well no doubt I'll find out somehow. I also said I would change out of my pink top and she said most definitely I would not wear colourful clothes - white or black would do. Yes, white is a colour associated with death here, so a bright white top would be fine, but I planned to play it safe with black. Also, I would need to find a white hong bao (a white red envelope?) to put the money in. I IM'd Tan to corroborate this and she said yes it would be 100-200 kuai but it didn't matter what colour I wore. I think I'll stick with Chuan Chuan on this one.
As we had time, we went for a walk after Chuan Chuan had paid another 300+ kuai, well the boys went off on their own and us three walked by the new stadium for a bit before realising it was far too hot to be doing so. But we did manage to have a decent conversation about Baise and the differences with Pingguo. Here, the football team is pretty weak and literally not in the same league as Pingguo. But I guess if someone with money decides it will happen then it will. The subject of the conversation wasn't so important, but it flowed nicely and that alone gave me a bit of a boost. I'm very slowly climbing the second wall of language acquisition despite having slipped a few times. I'll almost definitely never be bilingual but I can at least aim for it, and attain a higher degree of fluency than I'm currently capable of. It's really a question of vocabulary from a speaking and writing perspective now, and I'm realising that just socialising has some limitations. Even for Weixin I'm not translating messages most of the time now but if I were to pick up a newspaper I'd still be lost, knowing around a third of the characters. So it's going to have to be putting my head down now, and choosing more challenging topics for conversation than I'm likely to find at a boss meal.
It was gone 6.30pm so we headed back to the shopping centre to find that the boys had gone to an iced tea place and were just being served, so back to the car and we were at the station soon after 7pm, well in time for the train. But I found I still had a can of beer and I was worried that security wouldn't let it through, so what would any self-respecting Englishman do with a can of Guangxi room temperature Li Quan? It wasn't that refreshing but somehow I had the confidence to pick one from a fridge in the shop nearby and ask the woman if I could take it on the train with me. She had the honesty to say she didn't know (how could she not know?) and I so appreciated that that I paid the 6 kuai for it and put it in my bag determined to find out.
Ha, it went through security with no problems and when we sat down to wait I found the empty medicine alcohol bottle that also hadn't been found. Maybe the machines in Pingguo are more sensitive. I considered going back out and getting another can but I wasn't that desperate. We were in the same carriage but different rows so I didn't feel guilty cracking it open once on our way and made it last nearly all the 45 minutes or so to Pingguo, hiding it under my tray when security walked past just in case. I decided to double check with Tan about the colour of clothes to wear, and after having said it didn't matter she changed it to "wear a black top" - ha. Back at Pingguo we decided to take a san lun che again for what may be the last time in a long time, or ever if they end up being killed by didi ches.
After a quick shower at home I IM'd Uncle Yellow to check they were still there and indeed they were and he sent me a weizhi for where to go, plus he told me to bring 200 kuai - phew I found out last minute. I picked up my bank card and hopped on the appropriately coloured black dian dong che to find a bank. Memory didn't serve me very well but I eventually happened upon one as Uncle Yellow was calling to ask where I was - I told him exactly what I was doing and should be 5 minutes but of course the bank didn't accept my card. Unfortunately, looking for another bank, I came across a police road block where they were only allowing one vehicle at a time, and stopping many cars. Of course I'd forgotten to put on my helmet and feared I'd be stopped, as I saw other dian dong ches stopping before the road block presumably for fear of something similar. But I'd also seen police further back on the road and guessed they would be catching those people who had stopped as it would be easy pickings for whatever they were guilty of. So instead of stopping I just drove through and if I got a fine then fine. But it was fine and no-one stopped me so I gratefully moved on. The next bank's ATMs were out of order so I searched for the nearest other bank and went out of my way to find one that normally is ok, but this time remembering to put on the helmet.
At the third bank there was a bloke already in there and seemingly not finished after his first withdrawal. This is not that unusual as there are limits on how much you can take out and if you need more than that you simply start the progress again like it would be back home I suppose. But unlike back home I was dripping with sweat, partly worried about being so late to the funeral and partly just annoyed about this bloke taking so long. I asked how much longer and of course he said "zhun bei" which could mean anything, but meant one minute and after another call from Uncle Yellow was finally able to withdraw some cash.
At least Uncle Yellow had told me they had white red envelopes there so that was one less thing to slow me down and I eventually got there around half past nine. Wow, there were probably well over 100 people there on various tables strewn about the street, which had been probably blocked off all day for the festivities. Tan's loud classmate shrieked when she saw me and bade me to sit down but I said I'd first have a gan bei with Uncle Yellow as he was the one who invited me here and was my actual friend, so we did, and then he said I should sit down with A Qiu (I'd totally forgotten her name) which I was not exactly in the mood for as she can drink most men under the table. But it was fine as I hadn't been drinking all day unlike everyone else. For a funeral most people were in fine spirits although the pissed gentleman to my right kept leaning on me and spouting random crap most of which I couldn't understand and what I did understand I didn't care about. So I nodded and gan bei'd him once, after which A Qiu told him to shut up and stop leaning on me, and I think he got the message for 5 minutes at least.
After a few more gan bei's Uncle Yellow lead me to the stripey tent that had been erected outside presumably Boss Zhou's dad's house. But first I went to pay my dues and indeed we put the 200 kuai into a white envelope, and he made me write 彭多明 in my best handwriting on it, so it would be registered. With whom, I had no idea, but it was fine, I was officially in attendance, and received a small red envelope in return. I was then led into the house where there was a table with a dead, boiled chicken and duck, and half a lamb's head. There was incense burning and five small glasses. Then I saw Boss Zhou wearing a white robe with a sort of pointed top that had a slight KKK look about it but I knew it was properly holy. He gave me a big smile and said "sup see lo!" as if we'd just met in a bar, but I didn't have the heart to reply "ham sup lo!" as it just didn't feel like the right place or time, not to mention there were a few rows of similarly clad people sitting in rows at the rear of the room, who I guessed were family. I nearly had the instinct to take some photos but again this wasn't the time or place, or at least I wasn't going to take the risk.
Uncle Yellow lit a few incense sticks and gave one to me and a couple of other blokes. Someone put a bright green towelette on each of our right shoulders, then we all bowed towards the table three times together, before sticking the incense sticks in the pots. Next I had to use a spoon to take some white alcohol from a pot and pour a little into each of the five glasses. I had to do this three times according to tradition, before we stepped back again and gave three more bows to the alter. The whole experience was over in a few minutes but was quite emotional too. I'd actually participated in something that was almost in no way related to my ethnicity or Tan's family, just the funeral of one of my oldest and best friends here. Would I have met him had I not been a foreigner? I can't say for certain but I knew him through Uncle Yellow about 15 or so years ago, and I knew Uncle Yellow through Tan from around 19 years ago if that means anything.
Haiwei had also called me to go for a drink but I explained the funeral came first, which he sort of accepted, but said I just needed to go and give the white envelope then leave. But there was no way I was doing that with all these people here, especially two of my best friends, so when he called to ask where I was I said I'd be here for a short while. Uncle Yellow had evidently been there all day and came round to my table to apologise that he was going as he was so tired, and I told him I totally understood and had been in that situation multiple times before. The meal went on but I could barely eat anything, still stuffed from Baise but did a few gan beis here and there. I managed another 45 minutes or so chatting with various ex-colleagues of Tan's and other people who said they knew her. I guess she should really have come too, but was as usual at A Hua's place with the ladies chatting.
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| A Qiu front left with some ex-colleagues |
Finally I made what I thought would be my final gan bei to the table to take my leave, but as soon as I made my first steps towards the dian dong che the next table ordered me to sit down and have a drink. I told them I needed to go so compromised by standing up and doing a gan bei with them, before moving on to the sounds of them telling me to take another. The same fate befell me at the next table too but this time the two blokes almost physically pulled me onto the stool where I managed two more gan beis before apologising and saying I needed to leave at 10.30.
I checked that Haiwei was still about and indeed he was, and sent a weizhi that was exactly the same place as A Wu's office. Hmmm...then his elder son sent the same weizhi and told me to call him when I arrived, and indeed when I did it was the same building. And we took the lift to the 4th floor where indeed A Wu was there in a not too sober state, as was his wife, while his kids were playing on their phones in the other room. There had evidently been a meal and I realised it was for A Wu's wife's father, with whom I had to gan bei twice. And then again with the few blokes who were left from the meal. I was slightly confused as it was Haiwei who had invited me but he was nowhere to be seen, but the mystery was solved a minute later when A Wu told me to take the lift one floor down to the third, where I found Haiwei, a couple of other blokes, and four ladies around a table with the remnants of a meal there.
It didn't take long to be stuck in cai ma and the young lady to my right absolutely smashed me something like 10-1. We continued like this for a while and I managed a morsel to eat, but the bosses were drunk and teetering on the lecherous, which the ladies and I were aware of so unfortunately they left soon after, leaving the blokes to cai ma till I said I was just too tired, which was semi-true. So soon after midnight I was taking Haiwei very slowly on the dian dong che back to wherever it was he was sleeping, and slowly continued home from there for a relatively early night.
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