First New Year's Eve in 20 years

Managed to sleep in till gone 1pm and when I got up Jiuma was about and told me to eat. I couldn't really disagree so asked her when as at 1.30pm it was a bit late for lunch and a bit early for tea. Her answer was the typical 等一下 so I still didn't know, but I'm used to that sort of response now.

Food being offered to Tan's parents, may they Rest In Peace

At 3pm she knocked on my door to eat. Well that's a first for me at this time. As it was New Year's Eve I expected a family meal but in fact she'd cooked for me only. A whole chicken breast and some beef with a large bowl of rice. Ah, that was so kind of her and had I known I'd never have let her spend all that time cooking for just one person. And of course I couldn't finish it, so when she wasn't there I had to chuck half the rice, but I put the rest of the meat in the fridge. I knew I was invited to Haiwei's again this evening and would need an appetite.

I somehow found this printout of how they are going to introduce me in the Bangxu festival: The next moment that is refreshing for everyone has arrived. Are you looking forward to it? Where is the expected applause? Next, I invited a partner from the UK to bring us an English song "Sounds of Silence". Everyone gave us the warmest applause and invited our Mr. Peng Duoming to give us a wonderful singing performance. !

But soon after 4pm Lin Hong called me to eat with them. As she is genuine family she took precedence over Haiwei so after I got a message from him to come over I let him know my plans and that I'd be there later and he was of course fine with that. Lin Hong had said to come over in 10 minutes. I know from experience this was not necessary and told her I'd need to shower and be over in 十几分钟 which I still don't understand exactly. It literally means 10 minutes plus some, but I don't know if the "some" is between 1-9 or something else. Maybe it's the equivalent of "umpteen" but Google boringly translates it as "ten minutes", which is definitely not true. I guess I'll think of it as 10+ minutes where the "+" is indefinite. I was watching a fascinating video about linguistics the other day and there was a bit about the Piraha Amazonian tribe that literally does not have the concept of numbers. Wow, it's almost unimaginable. Apparently if they watch sports they can't conceive of the "score" but just enjoy it. It's almost too extreme to believe.

Well anyway I grabbed my shower and of course with tooth brushing and moisturising it was closer to half an hour by the time I left, and then I received a message from Lin Hong to come in 10 minutes. But I was only 2 minutes away, and she had said to come in 10 minutes 30 minutes ago. I know she is not a member of the Piraha but I wonder if she is some distant relation. Anyway I said I'd be a couple of minutes as her house is opposite our old house by the guangchang, and she said she'd send her husband A Zheng down to meet me.

But when I turned up, after stopping off at one of the few open shops to pick up some longyan fruit, he wasn't there. I got a phone call from an unknown number and unlike in the UK I answered it and it was him asking where I was. I said I was at the main entrance by the guangchang as would be expected. He said ok he'd come to meet me, and I expected that he'd come from another entrance, but in fact nearly 10 minutes later he turned up on a dian dong che. Oh, apparently we were going to eat at his father's house. Blimey, Lin Hong! Couldn't you have just communicated that slightly important piece of information when we talked on the phone just 40 minutes ago? I really really like Lin Hong. I feel she's genuinely like an aunty to me (and I think she genuinely is as her and Tan's grandfathers are literal brothers). But for want of a handful of words I was in the wrong place and her husband had to spend minutes of his time coming to meet me. Moreover, when we got to his dad's place Lin Hong wasn't there as her father is seriously ill and she had to help him have a drip.

Well it really didn't matter. I'm here in Guangxi and this sort of thing is to be expected. I followed A Zheng on my dian dong che and got to his dad's house around 5.30pm. His dad is very aged, and was sitting in a comfy chair around some burning wood, although today it's been a pleasant 17 degrees and I could remove my coat inside for the first time in days. I was slightly bored sitting indoors, with everyone, including the aged dad, on their phones, so I went for a walk but of course A Zheng accompanied me.

I noticed some young kids playing with bangers and fireworks and my youth instantly beckoned me to go over to them. I so miss playing with fireworks and it was great fun as they ripped the sticks off mini rockets and put them in little tubes to fire up, except one nearly flew into a house and A Zheng scolded them a bit and told them to aim it better. I could have stayed to join in but eventually Lin Hong came back with her daughter driving the dian dong che. Funny to think I remember her mostly as a 7 or 8 year old taking out my kids to play but now she's 24 and driving her mum around.

The meal was fine despite the constant contradictions of being told to relax and being told to eat more all the time! Literally every 2 minutes I was being told to eat more chicken! But fair enough, apparently it had been raised upstairs on the 5th floor as is normal here. Despite my 3pm lunch I managed to eat a slice of zongzi and four pieces of chicken and some greens before I made my excuses after some other people had. That was fine, and I was told to come back tomorrow at 5pm and I really appreciated it. This time of year is for families after all.

Lin Hong on the right and her daughter Tian Tian in the middle

Lin Hong has been really busy helping to organise the Bangxu festival I'm due to take part in on the 12th and 13th. But this morning I found out I'm also due to be one of the presenters. I've been given a document with the words I need to say and thankfully it's not too much and hopefully I'll be able to commit it to memory: 在新的一年里，祝大家财运亨通，事业有成，幸福美满，万事如意! (In the new year, I wish everyone good fortune, success in career, happiness and all the best!). I was getting worried as Tan had said that there would be thousands of people but she is one to exaggerate, so I asked Lin Hong how many people there would be there. She said 200, and then without even looking like she was joking followed it up with "tables". Then A Zheng did the math and confirmed that meant there would be 2000 people! Shit! I then asked the obvious question as to when it would start and Lin Hong said eating and drinking would start at 4pm and the show itself would start at 7pm. I will absolutely need some Dutch courage if it's true about 2000 people as it's literally 20 times more than I've ever performed in front of before.

Next it was back to Haiwei's mum's place for a second meal. This time I had the forethought to get some longyan and 12 cans of Li Quan weak beer. And it was worth it as they still only had Hoegaarden from yesterday. Again, I couldn't really stomach much, but the bloke sitting next to me with an 80s Hong Kong hairstyle kept putting stuff in my bowl anyway. Apparently he is a calligrapher, which is a pretty important job here. Well I did have one thimbleful of Haiwei's tealeaf alcohol and it wasn't half as bad as most baijiu is here, but it was still baijiu so I moved on to the beer afterwards, as did Haiwei. During the meal Haiwei's second son told me that there was an English girl in his school. Damn, that would mean there were at least three more foreigners here as I assume her parents are also here. Also, she spoke very good Mandarin which is fair enough I suppose but at least I've not yet seen another white person this year.

My one and only glass of tealeaf alcohol

The calligrapher bloke noticed me using my left hand for chopsticks and started using his too. I tried to show off that I could use my right hand too but I'm still rubbish, like the correct muscles never developed and I can barely get enough pressure to pick up a single noodle. But he said he was ambidextrous and could use either hand for chopsticks or for writing. I know that in general the Chinese think this is a sign of intelligence so I praised him for it but he said no it wasn't a sign of intelligence at all. Oh well, at least I tried. Anyway, I was invited to his house to eat tomorrow which was nice of him.

I left around 8.30pm and got home and realised I was really alone. I couldn't just go out for a walk and get randomly invited to eat with people as no-one was out and about. Almost literally. I've never known Pingguo to be so quiet. At around 10pm I pinged Fen, who got back to me to say she was drinking with friends at a location near to A Wu's office, and to come over. So that was my New Year's Eve sorted.

I turned up and found a load of blokes eating at tables outside and was immediately invited to sit down with them and ganbei. Fair enough! Much mirth was had in the ensuing 15 minutes or so while Fen came down from the 3rd floor to fetch me, but she also got held up having to ganbei some of the blokes. Eventually we went upstairs in a neighbouring house where there were a few women and just two blokes, and I was poured a large glass of what looked like tea but was obviously fairly strong fruit alcohol. Well, it was New Year and I wasn't going to stand on ceremony, so joined in and enjoyed the experience, with all the bangers and fireworks going on in the background.

New Year's Eve was not alone at least

As midnight arrived there was no counting down or anything. We just continued chatting and drinking and I can't remember what time I got back home, but I managed it safely and had had my first Chinese Chinese New Year in 20 years.