I woke up sad. Sad that mostly everything has been so nice. And not doing something is relatively not nice. Whereas normally in the UK not doing something is neutral. Also, the weather is changing again back to cold. So rather than be down in the dumps I went for a pre-lunch walk to the guangchang。 It was overcast but within a few minutes I had to take my top off as I was sweating, although no-one else was short-sleeved. I walked up to the football stadium and climbed onto a bench to watch some people erecting new floodlights. It was scary to see two blokes in what looked like a mini tipper thing being hauled up 20 metres or so to affix some sort of rope to the recently erected floodlight. I could barely watch so decided to go back home and get a bite to eat.
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| No way I'd do that |
A bit later I remembered my resolution to get back to piano practice after three weeks without. I didn't have my music with me so found it online and downloaded to a USB drive. I knew a place that advertised printing photos so walked there and sure enough for 6 kuai the bloke printed off the 13 pages of the sonata. I got to the music place at 4.30pm and sure enough the lady took me to a different room this time where there were two out-of-tune pianos, but slightly better than the ones last night. Other than last night it was the first time I'd touched a real piano in years, and I suddenly felt very self-conscious and started to sweat profusely. But I persisted, and gradually I felt it coming back, and started to care less if anyone was listening. Oh why didn't I find a place when I first got here? When the hour was up I felt slightly elated. I must make this a regular thing for the last two weeks.
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| Finally back to piano practice |
Back home it was 6pm and I had no plans for the evening. I pinged a couple of mates but they had already eaten. Fair enough, I have a go at people for making last-minute plans so I shouldn't expect much when I do the same. In the end I was so hungry I thought I'd just go and find somewhere by myself, but it's pretty sad to eat an evening meal alone here, so I thought I'd see if I could get myself something at Beihai Huang's. He wasn't sitting outside as he normally does so I went inside to see him at a table with a few other blokes. He immediately pointed at a chair and made me sit down and grab some food. I have no idea with the occasion was but he said he'd forgotten to call me which may or may not have been true. Either way it was a fine and very welcome meal, despite the dog meat in the centre of the table.
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| An unexpected meal with some blokes at Beihai Huang's |
A Wu pinged me half an hour into the meal to show me a video of where he was eating. If he'd only told me an hour previously I could have gone to the place he was. As it was I told him I'd go over in a bit. That bit ended up being well after 8pm after several more pings to tell me to hurry up. But at 8.30pm I turned up and obviously most of the people had already left, but there was still plenty of wine and beer at the table. There were a couple of women, one dressed in what looked to me like a sort of country club outfit, all in white and light beige. She gave a little squeal when she saw me, and again when she heard me speak Chinese. She said it was the first time she'd spoken to a foreigner, and she ganbeid me with her red wine, only to let a little bit drop from her mouth to her white top. Being the gentleman that I am, I quickly picked up some tissue and started wiping it off before A Wu started laughing and I realised I was wiping her right breast. Gosh I was rather embarrassed, but she didn't seem to be.
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| The lady in white who would have been a bit more red had I not leapt in |
The alcohol shop woman was also there, doing her job of helping the men drink their red wine that the presumably had bought from her earlier. Other people came and went, and of course I had to cai ma until the beer was finished. But then more came of course. I guess we left around 10pm and I took A Wu home. He suggested going for a couple more drinks but he wasn't the best for wear so I said we'd do it another day.
Back home, I got a second wind, and pinged another friend, who just happened to be out with her friends by Xiao Bai de Tian, so at 11.30pm I was out again to drink you cha and a bit more beer. It was actually more fun than the previous meal, and we cooked pig ears and ate them with lettuce leaves. I stayed for about an hour after which the only bloke there paid the bill and we got ready to leave. However, I noticed Li Kun was in Xiao Bai de Tian so I popped in to say hello. Well it's never just "hello", and of course I sat down with him and we had a few more beers as you do. The owner performed some songs and what I assume is his son accompanied him on the drums for one of them, which was nice, and I gave him a high 5 when he got back to his table.
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| You cha next to Xiao Bai de Tian |
So what could have been an empty night at 6.30pm turned into a very full one just a few minutes later, with no planning at all. I really should be able to invite people out but if I did that I'd be one person inviting another person, whereas when I'm invited out it's always a number of people I meet. I'm not really sure how to fix that other than to arrange a few people that already know each other to get together, like I often do at the end of a stay at Beihai Huang's place. I guess I'll just have to do that a bit more often.
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