Spontaneous trip around town with Xixi

Got up at 1pm and lazily helped myself to the leftovers of yesterday's octopus and fried sweetcorn. Work was not on the agenda so I took the electric bike down to where the kids often spend most of there time during the day - Jiuma's house. I found Xixi there, who was apparently ready to have a snooze, but on hearing my voice snapped right out of that. We drove around for a bit and found Waipo playing Ma Jiang (Mah Jong?) with some friends. I get the impression she really missed this sort of stuff while she was living in the UK.

I took Xixi down to the river to have a look at what chances we may have of being flooded like so many other places not so far away this year in China. It seems that the river has a long way to rise before it would come close to threatening our town. We drove down to a boat restaurant that I'd never seen before, and I made a mental note to visit it one evening for a meal. We then drove by the mountain to the railway station. This must be a new road as the last time I went to the station it was a good ten minute ride on a san lun che, but going south of the mountain it took us three minutes. I took details of the trains to and from Nanning, while Xixi had fun with some kids there. Then we drove to a new bridge that we'd seen, the promises to be yet another way to get into Pingguo in the next few months.

The view from the restaurant "Shui Shang Ren Jia" (水上人家), which literally means "Water on people family", but translates to "Boat Dwellers"

The next place I took her was a nice park frequented by elders, where we witnessed some of the harmonious singing the elders like here. All in all it was one of the nicest days I've had this year here; no pressure from others to do stuff, and spending quality time with my daughter exploring new terrains and having a great deal of fun.


A snippet of some of the lovely sounds to be heard in this local central park, with most of the traffic sounds filtered out by the trees

We then drove a bit further south following a river through by tall dwellings in empty boiling streets until we came across a few men sitting inside one such house. The men were actually finishing off their meal but they grabbed a small wooden chair and told me to sit down, explaining what the various dishes were. One of the ladies got me a bowl of rice and a glass of beer, and suddenly it was just like any meal with friends here. We joked about lots of things, and when I explained about the family situation and that Tan was from Bangxu it transpired one of them was too. How they laughed as I spoke out the names of the various dishes in Bangxunese, and then moved on to a couple of games of cai ma. It was one of those spontaneous magic moments, an hour very enjoyably spent, and I made a mental note to come back for a bite to eat before I leave. The owner's name is Lo Jing Ping, and he has a daughter of ten, and a son of four, reminding me that in the country it is permissable to have two kids if the first is a girl.


I will try to remember to go back and maybe bring a little packet of English tea as a present

I went home and found Tan there. She wanted to buy some trainers to go jogging, so I dropped off Xixi and took her to the shop I'd got mine from, and A Wu and A Ni went too as A Wu has the discount card. Tan decided on a pair identical to mine except for being a more ladylike shade of light blue. Then she said that there was a special offer and that it was two pairs for one, so I could choose any pair I wanted for free. I smelt a rat so I went and chose an expensive pair. Then she said that I had to pay 38 kuai to get the second pair for free. I started the sentence that would have been "But if I have to pay 38 kuai it's not free", but thought better of it and just said "38 kuai is not bad for a second pair of trainers". And then it transpired that the "free" second pair only counted if you a) paid 38 kuai, and b) chose a cheaper second pair. As Tan's trainers had already been discounted to 139 kuai, A Wu and I decided to get a pair each for a total of 280 kuai and split the cost. He got a nice pair of grey/blue trainers like my previous ones, and I got a black pair with red details, as my other pairs are white and get dirty very quickly. I've now bought three pairs of trainers in the last month.

In the sports shop I got a phone call from Jiuma to pick up Xixi, so I came a few minutes later and found she had had a "little" sleep for an hour or so. That meant it wouldn't be easy to get her to sleep later in the evening, and as Tan went out with her friends, so it transpired. I finally got them both to sleep at 11.30pm.

Er jie came today for a few minutes (fair enough, it is her house). She spent a few minutes with Xixi before moving on to her husband's boss's place. That reminded me that a few days ago on the 12th July she rang me to ask if I knew about grapes. It took me a couple of minutes before I realised she was asking me if I could speak Portuguese. So I said I could speak it but it had been ten years since I lived there (for one year). Then she said something about a business deal in Angola, and she wanted me to go there to help her. I didn't want to say no so I just asked her to send a text with the details, although I was pretty sure I wouldn't be able to be a part of her business deal. I didn't tell Tan, as I knew what her response would be.

More work and sea food boss

Yet another long day at work but at 8pm I decided to go and play table tennis for an hour or so. It was a nice expenditure of energy but I ended up working till 4am again.

By 12.30am I'd pretty much done enough so I stepped out to what is slowly becoming my regular haunt for a bite to eat at the witching hour. This is the seafood place not a minute away from our place. I happened to meet Lu Hai, who was already half cut, and the owner and manager of the place. I ordered an octopus and some fried sweetcorn as I had had enough of pure meat for a few days. We spent an enjoyable hour or so chatting, and the owner(?), well he was the main cook and his wife seemed to take the money and they have a beautiful six-year-old daughter - told me he wanted to work in England. I explained that most of my Chinese friends in England weren't too happy there but it seems like some sort of dream. I told him he'd be working in a little room 16 hours a day but he still seemed non-plussed. Maybe one day if he comes he'll really understand....

Work work work

After about four hours' sleep I woke up at half nine and got some more work done. Luckily the kids were taken out to Jiuma's house, where Waipo and an allotment of other more senior female members of the family spend much of their days. I was peckish by midday so went for a little walk outside our block. I decided to call A Wu and see if he fancied having a bite to eat too. He answered and said that a friend would come around immediately and pick me up. So I decided to wait in a local shop that sold drinks and some food and other little bits. I ended up buying a tube of superglue for 2 kuai to try to fix the toys that almost always break, plus a towel to wipe my sweat when I play table tennis. Ten minutes later I got a phone call from someone saying he'd arrived to pick me up. I said I'd be there in 30 seconds and to wait for me. So when I arrived I gave him a ring and asked what colour his car was - he said "it's blue" but I couldn't see any such car...then I heard him shouting "I see you, I see you!" and found he was leaning out of a dark green pick-up truck. That is such a normal thing to happen.

We drove to what turned out to be A Wu's new office. It was rather bare but looked like a nice place, conveniently situated on the floor above a car cleaning garage. Then a few minutes later we drove to a simple restaurant where we for once did not sit in a private room, but enjoyed the ambient temperature in the mid twenties due to the fact that it was raining and had been all day. We had a simple meal of beef, lotus root and pork ribs. So nice to have a simple meal once in a while. That was enough to make me tired enough for a siesta but I fancied checking up on the house so I rang Lin Hong who said she'd meet me there in ten minutes.

So after the meal A Wu dropped off A Ni somewhere and then me at the house. I took the lift to the 14th floor and met Lin Hong there waiting for a worker to come with the key. He came five minutes later and we went in to see - not much difference from a couple of days ago. The kitchen is pretty much done now, and Lin Hong said that the floor would be put in in two days and that within a week the house would be finished. I have a very strong feeling of doubt about that.

Finally got home at 2.30pm and managed to get an hour and a half of kip before another marathon work session till 5am...boo.

School stops again

Only a month till we go back..boo hoo! I woke up at 7.30am, having slept a whole hour, to take the kids to school. I got some takeaway buns and pancakes from the breakfast place and just went home to have a bite to eat. After catching up on some work I had an early siesta at 10am that lasted till 2pm. Worked all day, then Tan picked up the kids and came back soon after 5pm with all their bedding saying that the school needed emergency repairs and that there would be no more classes until 23rd of August by which time we'd be back in the UK. Well, we got our money back but it seems very badly organised; surely they would have know that the school needed this work before they started accepting kids back. A major irritant for a great many people who relied on this service so they could continue to work.

Tan ordered a takeaway meal and she and Xixi and I tucked into some nice grub at home. In fact Xixi ate a sausage, a bowl of zhou, various mouthfuls of pork and rice and potatoes, and still came back for more - that doesn't happen much. I wish Leilei would do the same from time to time. Then a couple of hours later she (Tan) said she was hungry again and could I go out and get her some duck claws, so I said I would do so a little later. I popped out at 10pm to Qing Xin Tang, one of the bbq places opposite the guang chang, where one of Tan's aunties works, and ordered ten chicken claws and ten duck tongues for good measure. I then popped inside their shop and saw they also sold fruit juice. As there's nothing I love more than a fresh watermelon juice I ordered one - ensuring the girl only put in a half measure of sugar as I'm not into the sweetness of most of the drinks here.

I followed the process with great detail. She keeps the watermelons in the freezer. This makes then harder to cut open but negates the use of icecubes, which I guess are not great for the blender. She cut out about a quarter of a melon into the blender, and didn't make any effort to take out the pips. She then added a small spoonful of some sort of sugar syrup (as opposed to a large one they normally do), and a scoop of nearly frozen water. She blended it for nearly a minute, then sieved the contents into a cup before stabbing a straw into the juice that a perfect consistency. Very refreshing and I daresay healthy. While I received my melon juice I noticed Saozi walking in to put some water into her jar of whatever it was she was drinking. Saozi is a relative with whom I spent some time a couple of years ago in her house. Her husband likes a drink and I remember sharing a bottle of wine with him that I didn't really appreciate, but he also introduced me to "medicine alcohol" which I also don't particularly like but at least it's palatable (and good for you apparently). Anyway, as soon as I noticed her I said "ni hao" and I was directed to the table she was sharing with two of her good friends. Tan's claws were going to take a good few minutes so this was fine by me.

We had an interesting cultural conversation about how England was better in their eyes and Pingguo was better in mine, and they made me eat some chicken claws, chicken liver and duck intestines that they no longer had room for. Then Saozi got up for a minute. When she came back she announced that she'd paid for all my stuff and that there was nothing I could do about it. I said that was not fair and I would tell Tan but she said "no" - we were friends/family and that was what we did. I'm used to this enough now to know not to argue, so I thanked them, and then they went on their way. The next 10 minutes were spent talking to "Ai yi", my aunty in law who was cooking the bbq. I finally got home 10 minutes before my 11pm meeting. 50 minutes to get a little bbq. And of course Tan told me I'd got chicken claws instead of duck claws. Grrrr.

Sofa so...good

After I dropped off the kids I gave Ma Laoban a ring to see if he'd eaten. He hadn't so I invited him to go for a bite to eat at the local breakfastery. I had a couple of meat-filled buns and a savoury pancake and he had some zhou and soya bean juice and wouldn't let me pay. He then asked me about how our house was going so I told him to wait a minute while I popped back and got the key, then we drove the whole 30 seconds to get there. The lift took longer to get to the 14th floor than we had taken on our bikes. When we got there the door was open and there were already a couple of men at work, and also Lin Hong was there, keeping her beady eye on them.

The only discernable difference from a couple of days ago was that the kitchen now had most of the cupboards and the sink in place, so at least that was something. While we were there inspecting the house, one of the workers built a sort of A-frame thing for cutting wood on. Why bother buying one when you can make your own for free in 15 minutes? After half an hour we left Lin Hong watching the work and Ma Laoban went to his computer shop and I went home. Tan was there and asked me to take her to the supermarket to get a notebook and a plastic tea container. We then drove up the road to look at sofas for the house. The one Tan wanted to buy the other day was no longer at a discount, and was 7000 kuai, so we decided against it, but I was interested in a sofabed for the spare bedroom (my office). I found one and asked the bloke to make it into a bed, which he did. Then I did the important test of sitting on the side of the bed and it slid around before depositing me on the ground. A good test. I didn't buy it. I left Tan to go to A Hua's shop while I went home and did some work before having a small siesta at 2pm. Small because Tan called me at 3pm to say she'd seen a leather sofa in a new place at 5000 kuai - a bargain at half the price. I didn't have the energy to ask the relevant questions so relented and said yes put it on Lin Hong's credit card and we'll pay her back in a couple of weeks.

Tan picked up the kids as I was busy with a meeting. In fact I'd been very busy most of the day so I decided at 8pm, when I found everyone had gone out, to go for a swift game of table tennis. No volleyball today as we'd had a couple of showers and were probably in for some more. Finally I got my first win against a half decent player. Having said that he was younger than me and wearing jeans and shoes and a teeshirt, as opposed to me in just shorts. I won 7-11, 11-9, 11-4 and even had some witnesses. So I hope I'm starting to become someone people want to play for the game rather than for the fun of playing a foreigner. I left by 10pm and spent the next eight hours working, broken only by a brief skype chat with And and Awl. Got to sleep at 6.30am.

Back to school and cracking sport with the elders

Awoke at nearly 8am after four hours' kip as the kids were due to go back to school. Bleary-eyed, I got up pronto and sorted out the kids' spare clothes, got them on the bike and five minutes later we were finding out which classrooms to go to. Although the school is officially on summer holiday they open up for preparation classes for kids who will be starting school in September. Also they have classes for kids with working parents. I think that there are four weeks of this, and it cost 300 kuai per child for this time. Surprisingly they let both kids be in the same class "Xiao Wu Ban". There were a few other kids there but not as many as a normal school day. Both Leilei and Xixi ate most of their breakfast zhou, and as they were sitting on the table, neither cried when I left them to get their bedding.

Before that I had breakfast at the local breakfast place as you do. I had a savoury pancake that they cut into pieces with a pair of scissors, and a rather nice dumpling, with a glass of water. It filled me up and only cost 2 kuai. Magic. I then found some pillows and covers and beakers for the kids and took them back and put them in the dormitory they will be sleeping in. Again, when they saw me they were happy and rushed to me in the middle of class, but neither cried when I left again.

A Hua came around with Tan and A Ni and A Wu at 4.30pm. A Hua had been to Nanning and had brought back 7kg of duck cooked with lemon and chilli. But before we were to eat I had to pick up the kids and also was asked to get some "qing cai" (greens). The highlight of the journey to school was thinking I wasn't a million miles away from having a goosepimple or two on my arm as I drove at top speed of 42kph (that's what it said - could have been a lot slower for all I know). The low clouds were protecting Pingguo from the sun, and the temperature, though I have not seen a thermometer since I got here (not that I would trust it) must have dived to the mid-twenties.

Both the kids were ecstatic to see me and tremendously proud of the "hong qi" they had received for being good - pushing them into my face so I could see clearly what a red flag printed on white paper looked like. Red flag, gold star - same meaning, different culture. It's really funny to see the two of them interacting now; they do so nearly exclusively in Mandarin though they never do with me. I have made a resolution to go to classes for the first time when I get back as it won't be long before they start saying stuff I don't understand.... We drove to the local market and picked up one jin (pound) of some leafy qing cai, and one jin of flowery qing cai. Then just as we were about to leave the heavens cracked open dumped what they had been saving up for the past two weeks on a parched Pingguo. Rather than drench my kids, I decided to take a san lun che home, which they think is fun, but not as fun as the bike. Back home it was nearly time to eat and even though I'd been asked to buy the qing cai no-one cooked it. Also there was no rice, just zhou, which I can't eat, so I had to be satisfied with the duck - and that was not hard because it was blooming delicious, just the right amount of lemon and chilli. Plus everyone passed the breast to me as they know I like it and they don't!

It had been a long day working, broken by a little siesta enforced by the early start, and then the duck. As I have been semi-regularly going to play sport some evenings, if I haven't gone for a few days I start to really miss it. So at 8pm I decided to have a break and get on the bike with my bat and three bottles of water. A Hua's son, Nong Kaicheng, was the only other person in the house and he was playing some shoot'em up game on the computer so I decided he'd had enough and took him to his mum's shop before going to the old people's place. I had a quick practice with the experts in the upstairs room, but soon realised that it must be getting a little tiresome for them to play with someone of my quality. The elder of the group, who is definitely one of the best ping pang players in the establishment started doing his stretching exercises - not just touching his toes but putting palms on the floor with straight legs. He asked how old I was and I told him. He then said proudly that he was 57, and also does Kong Fu. I didn't doubt him but he preceded to show me how he would disarm me if I threatened him with a knife. He grabbed my arm and held it up and then kneed me in the balls. Except he didn't go as far as actually making contact, very thankfully. Then he laughed and said he was joking. I think he meant he was joking about how you disarm someone in Kong Fu, rather than him being a Kong Fu expert. He is a really good laugh, has the reactions of a house fly, is as strong as an ox and as fit as a fiddle. He really is an inspiration to me and I'd love to be so fit in 18 years' time. Except that as soon as he's finished demolishing someone at ping pang he sparks up a fag, and when he's not on the table nearly chain smokes. In the table tennis room as well, as most of them do. I guess the secret must be to take up smoking.

I left the creme de la creme to have a competition that it would not be worth me entering, and went downstairs to find some mortals to practise with. Unfortunately the mortals hadn't turned up and there were mostly demi-gods and goddesses in their 50s and 60s and 70s. I stood in awe for a few minutes before being ushered to play with a bloke I hadn't played before. Previously, upstairs, I had been given two more pieces of advice: relax more, and use the biceps when hitting forehands - apparently I'd been keeping my arm straight which was preventing my topspin from being as effective as it should be. I'd been concentrating on the latter at least and found I was getting better at smashing the ball...starting off a bit slower then with growing confidence dominating the ball and whacking it even from a few feet from the table. It is a great feeling when you have such a rally. When we started to play for points I only lost 11-5 11-9 and I was proud of the last game as I didn't get the impression that the bloke (who was only in his 50s) was giving me points. Then I got mashed by a woman in her 60s who has a very mean forehand, before playing the funny man that had beaten her before. This bloke is not much taller than five foot and very slender. But he hits the ball like a wildcat pouncing on a marsupial, never missing a returned ball. He's fascinating to watch and impossible to play. But I tried, and although he certainly gave me some easy shots at first, as I gained confidence he started hitting the ball harder and harder. A small audience of five or so people had started to watch this foreigner get pulverised but there was one rally where he nearly set the ball alight such was the speed and spin, yet for a split second I felt the Force and instinctively smashed back his smash right into his body in a way he could not fashion his bat to return. There were shrieks of delight and hand-clapping from the onlookers, and my opponent had a wide grin of appreciation, as I'd just hit the best shot of my life...and had witnesses!! I'd played for a good ten minutes so I thought I'd better let some others play and sit on my laurels for a bit, so I went to have a quick game of volleyball with mostly women to warm down. If this is what being old is in Pingguo I want to retire here.

Disciplining fractious son

Although got to sleep at 4am after stupidly watching more golf on TV, I woke up at 9am with the kids. Waipo rang me at that time to ask if the kids were at home. I answered in the affirmitive thinking she would be arriving any time now to take them out. Apparently not. There was no-one else around and they wouldn't eat breakfast so at 11.30 Tan and I took them to the new eatery around the corner for lunch. Leilei was very ill-behaved and broke the straw to his drink but wouldn't go and ask for a new one - preferring me to do this. I'd had enough of his shyness and told him to ask the waitress for one but he refused, then refused to eat his food. So after five minutes I grabbed his arm and frog-marched him back home where we spent twenty minutes sitting down and assessing the situation. I hate to do this but otherwise he gets what he wants by moaning and crying. I reasoned with him, and after the tears assuaged he agreed to go back to the restaurant to finish his meal.

He had a few mouthfuls, and then Tan and Xixi went to buy curtains for the new house. I took Leilei home for a bit, then found that Tan and Xixi had already returned home (so much for the curtains). I tried in vain to get both of them to sleep, but just as it seemed I might be winning Tan came back in the room and said she'd take them out to the supermarket. As I'd had little sleep I declined, preferring to catch up a few Z's, but managed only five minutes as as soon as I fell asleep I got another phone call. Why didn't I remember my advice to myself to turn on silent mode?

We all went to check on the house at about 6pm. Nothing more to report. Then went for an evening meal after 7. The kids were a bit fractious but at least ate something. We had Japanese tofu and I had some nice "la chang" (sausage). I then had the nightmare of taking Leilei to have his hair cut. Anyone would think he was having his tonsils out as Lu Hai gave him a trim. I just hope he's learnt that it's not that bad. As the kids had not slept during the day I managed to get them both to sleep by 9.30pm. Then Tan got back at 11.30pm after saying she would be back at 10pm. As it was Sunday I popped out at 12.30am for a bit of octopus at the local seafood place, where I bumped into the manager and shared a couple of beers with him plus the octopus.

Trainers and unlaid eggs

Ahh...a little bit of precipitation...how refreshing. Up at a dreadfully late 1.30pm although was disturbed by the kids at 8.30am but I was lucky Jiuma took them out soon after. Then worked till around 4.30pm when Tan called to say A Wu had invited us out to eat at a chicken-speciality restaurant. That was music to my ears as I've had enough sitting in front of the computer for the last two weeks and it is indeed a Saturday. I just had time to put on some clean socks and put my dirty trainers in a bag before A Wu and A Ni came to pick us up.

We drove to a nondescript place near A Ni's parents' house, and picked up their kid, A Da, on the way. He currently spends most of the time living at a teacher's house with a few other kids during school holidays. It is this teacher's business outside of school hours. I asked what A Da was taught and I was told "good manners" along with how to wash dishes, wash clothes and other general tidying up. I suggested to Tan (in English so I wouldn't be understood) that that was what parents should be doing. She agreed and said she'd said that to A Ni but still...seems a little sad to me, to only see your kid on a few occasions as though he was a minor irritant. Well, the meal was particularly good - a large pot of chicken soup and a pot of some other soup that contained congealed chicken blood and - one of my favourites - unlaid eggs, absolutely gorgeous. Apart from some spinach that was, and some rice and yu mi zhou.

My favourite unlaid eggs

After the meal Tan went with A Ni to get a massage, and A Wu and I went to find Xixi. However I first had to put my trainers in to be cleaned. I pointed out the shoe-cleaning place I wanted to go to but A Wu said "no" and that we'd go to one 100 yards up the road as he had an account there. An account at a shoe-cleaning place? Why not? For future reference his account number is G186. He paid 20 kuai to the woman and she got out her book and noted the amount. I then gave her my pair of dirty sweaty trainers and she said it would cost 3 kuai, 2 kuai cheaper than the last place I'd been to so I guess the account makes sense. We then drove to the sports outfit shop that I got my last pair of trainers from as he has a discount card there. Not actually a discount card for the shop, rather for the brand "361 degrees". Ingenious. The brand name and the idea of having a discount for the brand. Over here we might have a store card but I've not heard of a brand card you can take to any shop.

My lovely new trainers with the 361° brand in Man City Blue

Anyway, in typical style the young lady in the shop pointed out a particular trainer and advised me to them as they looked good. I didn't care too much for the look as comfort is the most important for me here. I told her to find a size 265 (that is China size - 43 Europe size, or 9 US). As she sent her assistant off to look I grabbed a pair that looked identical to the pair I bought two weeks' ago except for the colour of the logo and asked her to find the same size in this style too. After ten minutes I enquired as to whether the assistant was having trouble finding my size. Oh, no, apparently they didn't keep that size in the shop and she'd got on the motorbike to wherever it was that had them. Eventually she did return, and the pair she had first suggested were ok, but slightly wide and a tad short. I told her so so she reluctantly opened the box of the other pair I'd chosen. Well these were a sublime fit, like gloves, and so light too. I knew that the pair I'd bought previously were still going strong so I was quite confident in the quality, so at 199 kuai I went for them. This was lowered to 159 kuai with A Wu's discount card!

The kitchen now has tiles on the floor

We went to pick up Xixi from Jiuma, but found her asleep. It was 7.30pm and she'd been sleeping for half an hour apparently. I didn't want to deal with a two and a half year old daughter as awake as a leprechaun at 2am so I tried to wake her up but it was impossible. So I let her sleep till 8pm then managed to prise her eyes open with the promise of taking her to the guang chang. She actually woke up slowly, and we got into A Wu's aging car and drove there. But as soon as we arrived A Wu had a phone call and he had to leave to pick someone up, whatever that meant, so Xixi and I got out and I told her we'd go for a boat ride.

So much for that. The boat ride I'd enjoyed last year with And no longer existed. The lake did, just not the boats. That was a bit disappointing for Xixi so I told her we'd go home and take the bike to the supermarket which cheered her up. We did just that and spent some time there buying a new pair of shorts for me, plus some nibbles. The shorts were a bit hard to buy. They only cost 20 kuai, but I had to give them to an employee who wrote out a quadruplicate receipt saying I had to take it to a particular till to pay. So when we'd got our stuff we went to this till, and put all our shopping through plus the additional receipt. We had to pay separately for some reason. 113 kuai for our shopping and then 19.8 kuai for the shorts. Once done we got our shopping bagged and then took it to the bike. It was nearly 10pm so after a few phone calls I fathomed out where Leilei was (at some birthday party) and went to pick him up. We all got home when I realised while putting the shopping away that I didn't have my new shorts. Bugger. I told the kids we'd have to go back to the supermarket which they were more than happy with. As I opened the front door one of our neighbours was walking down the stairs. I asked him what time the supermarket closed and he said 10 o'clock, already closed. Which was true as it was 10.05pm. But I had a call from A Wu asking me to go to a bbq place opposite the guang chang, and as the kids were ready to go out I thought fair enough we could go for a bit. I took the route past the supermarket and found it open, so we parked the bike and walked in. I asked the security guard at what time they closed and he said half past ten.

I found out that when I paid for my merchandise earlier I should have walked back inside the supermarket with one of the receipts to pick up my shorts. So I went back to the shorts place and they recognised me (however I'll never know) and said they wondered why I took so long to come back. I showed them the receipt and got my shorts as the kids ran havoc around the place, pulling toys off the shelves and playing with them as if they owned them. They have been spoiled rotten here and will have a lesson to learn when they get back. Afterwards we found A Wu and co. near the guang chang. He was acting ah so nice and daddy-like to the kids, who played into his charms and loved being picked up by him. The ladies around the table said how the kids liked him more than his own son did. Although not meant as a criticism I can't think of a more damning thing I could hear if someone said that about me and someone else's kids. He loves the attention he gets from them as they're used to him. Yet his own kid is staying night and day with an unrelated teacher. He was getting them to call him "A Wu baba", which was going a bit far in my book, but when Xixi fell over and hurt her knee she came running to me. And I decided to take them home as it was gone 11pm and I needed to shower them and get them to bed. Something that took till nearly 1am to do as Tan and her friends were home, and then A Wu turned up. Finally by 1.30am Tan and the kids were asleep.

Ping pang and badminton

Up at 8am to continue with work, which I did till nearly midday when I got a call from A Wu inviting me to have lunch. Fair enough, I'd skipped breakfast and was peckish. He picked me up and we went to a place on the other side of town (a three minute drive), where we entered a private room with three rather pretty girls already waiting. Actually they weren't that young, and one of them owned a bar that I haven't been to yet apparently. One by one, Boss Yang and another couple of bosses turned up, then another couple of girls. Well it was an innocent meal with some nice food. I decided to gan bei a few times with people as I planned for a siesta. A Wu took me home at 2.30pm and I grabbed an hour's kip till Tan rang me to ask me to put the bedclothes out to dry. Note to self: put phone to sleep next time take siesta.

At 5.30pm Tan called to say Lao Pan had invited us to an evening meal at 6pm. It's lovely to be invited to so many meals, and we need to reciprocate more, but why oh why do they leave it till a few minutes before to let you know? Anyway, I shouldn't complain, I'm often like that. Leilei came to the meal with a number of his friends, but we managed to get him to eat a bowl of "yu mi zhou" (sweetcorn porridge - very popular among everyone except me), and a sort of bread dumpling with something meaty inside, and most of a bowl of "da mi zhou" ("normal" rice porridge). I made my excuses and left at 7.30pm (with A Wu taking me home) as I had work to do and a meeting at 9pm.

Leilei with his friends at Lao Pan's meal

I got home to find that my 9pm meeting had been cancelled. As this week has been one of the most long and stressful in terms of work, at 8pm I decided to get my bat and go to the old people's place to hit some ping pang (yes it's "ping pang" here, so presumably our "pong" is wrong). I practised with one of the old timers I know quite well for over an hour. We did nothing spectacular - just practised forehand - starting off slow and getting quicker and harder, and then I realised playing table tennis is a bit like making love to a beautiful woman. First you unzip your bat, then your opponent holds your ball...no...no...back on track.... I got to the point where I was playing about six feet away from the edge of the table and returning semi-smashes with my own semi-smashes. Very tame compared to the surrounding tables but a necessary step in my learning to be a decent player. Then a woman who was at least in her sixties came to play me and nearly wiped the floor with me. However, I used my head, I noticed she only had one serve - a vicious backspin with a bit of side - so I learnt to counter it. Then I saw she hit 90% of her shots with backspin, so I learnt to return most of them with backspin. Then, the hardest thing, how to return her backspin shots with a topspin smash. It took many goes, but eventually sometimes I avoided hitting the bottom of the net and scooped the ball up with enough intensity to return it over the net with interest. Unfortunately she was wise to that and mainly returned these with a more vicious smash than I had mustered. But just to have returned some backspins with a forehand smash meant I'd learnt something new today - and this is a very important string in my bow. I have about four now - lordy knows how many more I'll need, or whether I'll live long enough to learn them.

I got a phone call from A Wu at 10pm asking where I was. I'd forgotten I'd told him I'd play badminton with him at that time. So I said goodbye to my friends, put on my Man City away kit from 2008, and drove to the leisure centre 90 seconds away. After two hours getting smashed by pensioners, the last thing I needed was the even more energetic game of "yi mao qiu". I'll have to learn what "qiu" really means. It means "ball", but they also call a shuttlecock a "qiu". A Wu had brought his friend from the shop where I got my trainers, and both of them were there waiting for me. When I first played A Wu four or five years' ago I was the better player by far - it wasn't that long before that I'd regularly played with And and Awl. But I haven't played for two years, and the last time I played - two years ago in Nanning - I did my back in and had to go for a painful massage the following day.

Maybe because I'd loosened up with the table tennis I didn't get the back pain from last time. And I didn't play too badly. A Wu is greatly improved and he beat me 11-5 and 12-10, and I drew one game all with his friend. During my third game with A Wu he gave up leading 6-3 as he was too tired to continue, so I suppose I was the victor. He'd only played for half an hour but after sitting out for 15 minutes we called it a night and went home, where I was just in time for my 11pm meeting. Although knackered after today, I decided to have a beer and watch The Open for a little while on tv. I never normally watch golf, but I thought "why not?" and was interested in how difficult it was in the heavy wind at St Andrew's.

Li Kun's daughter's first month meal

My friend Li Kun rang me up to invite me to a meal in the evening to celebrate his daughter's first month in this world. I couldn't make it till 6.30pm but it seemed everyone had waited for me to arrive, rather embarrassingly. Anyway it was a lovely meal with nice people. Then up till 4am working, but did have a good skype webcam chat with And, Lis and Thomas as they had just got home from hospital earlier today.


My good friend Li Kun, his lovely wife and his lovely daughter at one month

Welcome to the world Thomas!

Thomas CW born this morning 3am!! Or as should really be, yesterday evening at 8.07pm - congratulations And and Lis!!!!!

Nothing else here compares.

Went for a checkup on the house to see how things were progressing...not a great deal but the kitchen tiles have been put in and the bathrooms finished tiling...


The kitchen has simple white tiles now


The balconies also have their own tiles


Ensuite bathroom thankfully quite tasteful


and the "common" bathroom in the same taste as en suite

Powercut postponed so ping pong and volleyball again

We found out at the last minute that in fact they had cancelled the electricity cut-off for tomorrow so we didn't go to Nanning in the end.

After working all day (it's lovely that the kids are generally taken out during this time) I needed some physical exercise. As I was alone in the house I drove to the old folks' home for a game of table tennis. I warmed up by playing a lady pushing 60 who was actually worse than me but screamed in amusement every time she lost a point. Then some bloke in his sixties came around and he was a lot better. He used me as practice by trying to return my smashes, and I found it a very good exercise as I really improved my accuracy. This time I played topless and it definitely helped, though maybe because it distracted my opponents.

I thought it must be getting on for 10pm when I fancied a break but it was only 9. And the elders from the volleyball court bade me come over and play with them. So I did, and this time I was much better as I knew the rules. They were in peels of laughter as I started doing smashes. They all thought I was two metres tall. My team won all our four matches and then I was told to go to the men's court. Ah, I'd been playing with mostly octogenarian women for the last half an hour. The men's court had people closer to my age and leaps and bounds better, literally. I didn't play particularly well and we lost 21-17 - probably all down to me. But they welcomed me back the next time I could make it, so I thanked them and gratefully went on my way home for a shower.

Massage prior to powercut

Happy Birthday Mum!
Busy during the day but my back was hurting from my two-and-a-half hours of exercise on Saturday. So around 9.30pm I drove to a massage place Tan had suggested, near to A Hua's beauty salon. I only went to one proper massage last year, with Andge and Ailun, and none the year before that as I preferred the head wash variety. However, this was for medical reasons. It was quite relaxing, and sometimes painful, as I remember from the past. I'm not sure I really believe in this as a cure - especially when they crack your neck. But you do feel good afterwards and at 35 kuai for an hour it's got to be fifteen times cheaper than the UK.

Apparently tomorrow there will be no electricity from 5.30am till 10pm, same for Friday, so we are all going to go to Nanning where we'll stay in Er Jie's house (which has internet). It is her new house in Nanning so I'm looking forward to seeing what it's like. Waipo, Jiuma and a couple of Tan's friends are coming too so it will be a bit busy.

Dog meat and World Cup final

Woke up early afternoon to aching bones after yesterday's exercise. Although it was a Sunday I spent half the day working as I knew I'd use up some time tomorrow sleeping after the World Cup final. Today A Xia's husband invited us to eat dog at the restaurant Lao Pan had invited us to not three days ago. This is a fairly important occasion so at 5.30pm I left the kids at home with Chuan Chuan and took the bike to the place. As soon as I arrived I was told I should have taken the kids...grrr...before I'd been told not to...

There were two tables - one for the kids and ladies and one for the men. And there was plenty of food including four full metal bowls of dog meat. A few blokes arrived and drank some beer, but didn't seem to eat the dog. Then one of them left and a couple more came. But still the dog meat was not touched. After an hour of this I asked Tan if people weren't eating the dog because they were waiting for someone special to come. She just said that some people don't eat meat for "religious" reasons. So then, an hour after standing on ceremony by not eating it, I tucked in and it was very nice. Then more people started on it. We didn't leave till about 8pm, when A Wu and I agreed to go for a head wash. So I followed him home on the electric moped and went in to change my clothes. We then found a very nice place for a decadent hour of head/face wash and massage, with a facemask thrown in too. I couldn't believe it when it came to 30 kuai for the both of us.

We went for a quick bite at the local seafood place afterwards before bidding farewell for the evening. But it was still three hours before the World Cup final. I ended up chatting with And and Awl and Mat on skype for an hour or so which was a good laugh, before calling Lu Hai to meet up at the seafood place again to watch the footy. I correctly predicted 1-0 Spain but didn't think it would take extra time. In fact I really didn't want that as it was 5.30am by the time I left and it took me rather longer than it should have done to get home...

Ping pong and volleyball

No more rain but still humid. Was nice to have a lie-in under the air-conditioning as Jiuma took the kids out for the morning.

At 5pm took Leilei for a meal at the place around the corner that just opened last week and had a nice ribs and rice. Then just after 7pm the kids had gone out and I had some time to myself. So I put on some shorts and took the bike to the old people's leisure centre. Immediately a woman asked me to play ping pong with her. Surprisingly I was much much better than her (although 20 years her junior). Then some old bloke turned up and she gave the table to him and me. And then I found the meaning of pain. Then another even better bloke came along and watched for a while. I found another depth of pain as I practised returning serves and returning a few smashes. After one hour I was sopping wet and felt like vomiting. I walked outside to search for a semblance of a breeze and found a slight one next to one of the volleyball courts. 

My face was as red as a table tennis bat, and I was sweating like the outside of a cold bottle of water. But I held my head up to watch the 60 and 50 year olds playing five-a-side volleyball. I was asked to join in but my legs disagreed so I made my excuses and kept watching. But 10 minutes later I said "ok" and I walked onto the pitch to the delight of the other players. I had no time to take in the rules but I learnt after a while that your team could have up to three hits before hitting over the net and you weren't allowed to hit downwards (a smash) within three feet of the net. Apart from that you circulate every time you win a point. This was incredibly fun! I spent an hour listening to incredulous laughter at my height, my shots and even my misses. Every good shot was cheered and bad shots were not criticised - for all members. Although the other members ranged from 60-80 years of age we all had a great time and I've never seen so many genuinely wide grins on both teams. Our team won three games to one. But most importantly I felt that in not too many years I'd love to feel part of such a community.

Power cut postponed

Apparently now the power cut will be on the 13th, not today. That's handy. There is a new eatery opened up just around the corner from our block so I decided to give it a go at 2pm when peckish and there was nothing to steal from the fridge. Had a very passable goose and rice together with soup, greens and some other vegetable that was 99.9% water but refreshing. Busy all the rest of the day till 11.30pm but managed to get an hour to have a meal out in the evening with Lao Pan and all the ladies.

Finally got five minutes of rain today. Very comfortable to be a few degrees cooler today at the cost of higher humidity.

Tan back and another power cut

Tan came back around lunchtime, which was nice, though she was very sweaty from the 100 yard walk from the san lun che to our front door. I have been told that there will be a power cut tomorrow from morning till 10 in the evening. This will not do. I will have to go to Nanning in that case to be able to work. At least Er Jie has a house there. She said she would give me the key but that someone else would have to pick me up in Nanning, or go with me from Pingguo. Why? If I have the address most taxi drivers will get me there in five minutes, surely?

No let up on the heat. I think that all the air-conditioning units have helped use up the electricity supply here hence the planned cut. We do have a large damn just outside Pingguo that apparently provides a healthy percentage of the electricity needs, but this is one of the hotter summers on record - even Beijing has reports of 40+ degrees so imagine what it's like here.

Wild cat or wildcat

At 5pm Jiuma said she was going to the house to have a look at progress so I said I'd come with her. Xixi had been asleep since 3pm but Leilei had just fallen asleep half an hour ago so was impossible to get up. So I went on the bike with Xixi to check on progress. Most of the walls have had their first coat of white paint now, which makes a significant difference to concrete colour. The main toilet is mostly tiled and the ensuite bathroom is in progress so nice to see. Still no chance of the three weeks work that Tan reckoned, unless they finish in four days' time.

Bathroom coming along nicely

Living room looking better in white

One of the workers doing the ensuite bathroom

A Wu called while I was at the house to invite me to "eat snake". It was a family affair apparently instead of a mafia one. I told him that would be nice, and that I'd need to go home and get a shower and do the same for Leilei, then we'd take the bike over to the snake restaurant. Must have been called five times in the next half an hour asking where I was and telling me to "kuai yi dian!". He hasn't learnt that if you want to invite someone for a meal you don't do so fifteen minutes before it is being served. Embarrassingly I got a little lost on the way there so we turned up fifteen minutes later than I thought. But it was fine and I was treated to a sumptious meal of snake soup with snake balls (not testicles, more like normal meatballs), a plate of snake skin and another of snake meat from the tail end. The snake was good but the highlight for me was the "ye mao", or wild cat. I think they meant "wild cat" as opposed to "wildcat" which sounds like an American Football team. I imagine this was more of a stray. Also the minced "hong mao ji" (red-feathered hen) was really nice.

Got a call from Tan at 10pm saying she'd just arrived at Nanning 90 minutes late so would stay the night there with friends. Then Lu Hai rang up and asked if I wanted to watch the footy with him. I said I wasn't sure I would make it but would call him later. Leilei didn't sleep till gone midnight and as I was still awake I rang up Lu Hai and we arranged to meet at the seafood place outside our house after 2am. There were still quite a few people outside on the streets watching the telly on projected screens or large LCD tvs, and I managed to stay up to see Spain defeat Germany 1-0 exactly as I had predicted, while at the same time enjoying some nice prawns.

House becoming homely

Kids slept in late and so did I for the first time in a long time. Had a lot of work to catch up on but late morning got a call from Tan saying I needed to take the wire I bought a couple of weeks ago for charging the bike to the house. I also had to buy a light, as the workers wanted to lay the tiles to the bathrooms but the ensuite one was too dark and there was no electricity. I wasn't sure how the 15 metre length of wire would help if there is no leccy but couldn't be bothered to ask. I got Xixi on the bike and tried to leave as Leilei was watching something with Chuan Chuan on the computer but he sensed he was missing out and cried when I said there wasn't enough space and he could come next time. We drove to one of the shops I frequent that sells diy stuff and they found me a bright bulb and an adapter so you could plug it in to any mains - 8 kuai for both, then we delivered it to the house where Lin Hong was waiting for us. Finally they have started painting the walls and it is just starting to look a little homely.

Slowly getting there

Hadn't heard from A Wu for a while so it wasn't a surprise when he called at 9pm asking me to go out with him to sing song. I haven't been out for a while so said I wouldn't mind but that I was busy at the moment so I'd get back to him. Then I realised I needed to get some cream for Leilei's mosquito bites. He has a great many and it's horrible to see as a parent. I keep the anti-mosquito thing burning at night and electrify any I find flying around with the cool electric tennis raquet that kills them instantly with a satisfying "bang!". I found a chemist two minutes away and asked for the "Li Yao Gao". They had small pots of the stuff for only 2 kuai so I bought five and adminstered them over Leilei's body.

Actually finished what I was doing by half ten so I took the bike down to the normal KTV place where one of the lovely ladies at the door, adorned in a purple full-length dress with no sleeves, ushered me to one of the big rooms that was filled with about thirty people mostly around my age, with a couple of kids. I was a bit shocked at how drunk they all seemed to be (not the kids). The women (whose husbands were all there) all came up to me with bottles of beer (luckily 330ml) asking me to gan bei with them. I managed three of the small bottles but was full of fizz and couldn't manage any more. One particularly drunk man was trying to get me to dance with the women, so instead I did my party piece of singing "You Are My Rose" and "Friend", then even A Wu looked uncomfortable at the inebriated state of most of these people, especially in front of the kids, so we made a hasty exit and went to sit outside at the seafood place near our house where some friends were, and had a more civilised time until midnight when Waipo rang me up to say Leilei wasn't sleeping. So I said my goodbyes and got home two minutes later to find him sound asleep with Xixi. Although tired, I somehow managed to stay up to watch the Uruguay - Holland semi final. I'd put a quid on 3-3 at 100-1. With just a couple of minutes left Uruguay came back to 3-2 so it was an exciting last part of the game. I predict 2-1 Germany over Spain tomorrow.

Red water

Up at just gone 7am to prepare the kids for school. Neither wanted to go but they love riding the bike so at least it's easy to get them there. At Xixi's classroom the teacher tried to explain to me that I needed to go to the main office because school was breaking up today due to "Hongshui", which means "red water". They weren't supposed to break up till 15th July, and this is annoying as Tan is away till Wednesday evening and I will be quite busy. Up at Leilei's classroom the teacher corroborated Xixi's teacher's red water story, and as if to prove it handed me 40+ kuai in some sort of recompense. The teacher did say that the kids could come back on 19th July for "preparation" classes for the next year, designed mainly to help with working parents I gather.

So I went to the main office and asked about this mysterious red water, expecting them to give me back some of the money I'd paid for Xixi. But they didn't, and I didn't want to make a fuss over a few quid. I still didn't understand the evil red water that was shutting down the school two weeks early.

After the school run I went to check on the house. The tiles have been delivered but more importantly the floor had been concreted and things were just starting to look a bit different as both the bathrooms had doors fitted. Lin Hong first took me to the 9th floor to look at an identical flat. Identical that was until the owners decided to move the door of the middle bedroom a few feet to the right. They had simply concreted up the doorway that was and cut a doorway out further up the wall. When I asked why Lin Hong explained that the door had been opposite the front door and that was not good feng shui. She asked if I wanted to do the same thing and I laughed and said "bu yao!". She saw the funny side too but I presume she took me to this flat to genuinely ask if I wanted the same thing done to ours.

All those pipes now covered by concrete - too late to ask for the ethernet cable...

At home Tan rang during a break in her class. She had been learning how to wash faces, and said that it was really interesting, and said she could give me one. We'll see. I explained about the school closing early and discovered that it was hong with the second, rising, tone - not hong with the third down-and-up tone. This "hongshui" means flood. This goes to show how important it is to get your tones right in Chinese. Ok, I knew that the red water wasn't responsible for closing down the school now but it hasn't rained here for over a week, and today is the hottest day so far at 37 degrees C. Are they expecting torrential downpours tomorrow? I knew it was 37 degrees as Er Jie rang me up at lunchtime to ask me if the school had air conditioning. I said it didn't and she told me I should take the kids home as it would be too hot. I said I wouldn't as they have fans and that none of the other kids would come home. Yes, they'll get a bit sweaty but that's part of life here.

Later Waipo was calling me in the house. Jiuma (Tan's brother's wife who now also seems to be living in the house) was in our new house, and had left the key inside while going out to chat on the phone. As luck would have it the only breeze to brace Pingguo in the last week had turned up on the 14th floor and nudged our front door closed locking her out. So she'd called Waipo and Waipo was now panicking asking if I had the other key. When I finally worked out what she was talking about I said I didn't have the key, but maybe Lin Hong did, or would know its whereabouts. Waipo shouted that Lin Hong was in Bangxu and couldn't get back. I asked whether Lin Hong had the key but again Waipo shouted that she was in Bangxu. I thought I was being misunderstood so I asked in very clear Chinese: "Lin Hong you mei you di er ge yao shi?", but still Waipo said she was in Bangxu as if I was asking where she was.

Then it dawned on me to call Lin Hong myself but both her phones were engaged. As Waipo was getting more animated I said I'd go to the house to see what I could do. On the way Lin Hong returned my missed call but the line was so bad I could hardly hear a word. In case she could hear me I shouted that I was going to the house, and that if she didn't have the second key on her person could she arrange for the person who did have it to bring it there? I met Jiuma at the house a bit later and explained I'd tried to speak to Lin Hong, whom I rang again and when she answered passed the phone to Jiuma. It transpired that the second key was indeed in Pingguo and the worker was coming over to deliver it. So we went up to the 14th floor to wait and lo and behold when we got there the door was open and the workers were there working.... Apparently the bloke with the second key had turned up two minutes after my call to Lin Hong. Jiuma looked slightly sheepish as she picked up her purse with the key in it.

Tan to Hangzhou for beauty course

A relatively quiet day, but extremely hot. Tan went to Nanning at 4pm to catch a flight to Hangzhou where she is doing a beauty course on behalf of A Hua who cannot go due to work constraints. I suppose Tan will teach her what she learnt over there. Kids wouldn't sleep during the day so were not best-behaved during the evening. However, Leilei decided he really liked the dumplings that Waipo cooked and he ate two bowlfuls. I had waited till after 7.30pm before trying to feed them as 5pm is too soon after lunch in my opinion. I was quite peckish at night so I went across the road near midnight to get a little bbq. The second I sat down to wait I was called over to sit at a table of four blokes and a woman and gan bei'd and cai ma'd till my duck tongues and pork were ready.

Football betting

I brought a DVD player from the UK as strangely they are cheaper there than here. It was only 16 quid but I've just realised that it only has a scart output and that they don't have scart here. I'll have to see if I can get an adapter so the kids can watch some of their UK stuff, not that they're particularly missing it at the moment.

While Leilei was out with his friends I took Xixi out to see mama at A Hua's beauty shop. I left Xixi there and went to meet Lu Hai, who I hadn't seen since last year. He was one of the first people I met in Pingguo in 2003 and I always make a point of going to his salon for a haircut. I invited him to Number 5 Cafe and he was happy about that as he loves his football as most of the people do here at least for the World Cup. He explained he lost 300 kuai on Holland beating Brazil. This is not the first time I've heard such a story. At least two people (one of whom was a woman if that means anything) had told me they lost a few hundred kuai when Germany beat England. And just about everyone has told me that if that disallowed goal had been allowed England would for sure have gone on to win. I disagree but maybe they are just justifying their bets. I drew a very clear map of where Number 5 Cafe was, relative to the guang chang, but I got a phone call before 10pm saying he was already there and I should hurry up. I arrived a couple of minutes later to find 15 of my friends there but no Lu Hai, so called him and found he was in the wrong place.

I warned everyone that Germany would win as Argentina had no defence, and was proved right by the 4-0 drubbing. How can Messi be so ineffective in such a good team on paper? Then again the same could be said about Rooney (or "Looney" as he is known in Chinese) and Ronaldo and a few other big stars. I should have bet on the game too. Andge sent me an email saying he'd bet 2 quid on Germany to win 5-1 at 150-1....ooh so Klose.

A Wu left at half time to go to KTV, which he bade me go to. I said I wasn't sure but by the end of the game I thought it would be nice to take Lu Hai there as I guess he doesn't get out so much. We stayed under an hour and did exactly the same as we always do in terms of the songs and the beer.

Embarrassing moment and BBQ with the Americans

Although it was tiring getting up so early to do the kids, at least Tan or someone had got them dressed and I just had to bike them to school. Xixi still cries when I leave her and Leilei was a bit tearful today too. At least it's Friday. I had a morning nap this time. Was about to go out for a bite to eat when A Wu called to ask me to eat with what has become the main clique of bosses I know: Boss Yellow and Boss Yang, together with some girl whose name escapes me. I noticed she wasn't really in the conversation much, so as I recognised her as the only girl at the meal last night I asked how her tummy was as she'd been drinking white alcohol then. Very embarrassingly for me she was not the same girl as last night and the blokes laughed at how westerners thought Chinese all looked alike. Bugger. I picked up my nice clean trainers and put them on over a glass of tea with the bosses until they all decided to go for a nap.

Picked up the kids, where I found that Xixi had been good today. I was worried as yesterday the teacher told me she had been hitting other kids.. At 8pm we went down the the "ye shi jie" (night market street) down by the river, which is pretty much filled with barbeque places. Our American friends had invited us to eat, and I suggested "ai yi" (aunty)'s place that Tan and her friends swear by. Although they have spent much longer than me in China and were fans of ducks tongue, they had not tasted the delights of ducks intestine or chicken claws, so I ordered some of that together with the more normal pork. To slightly balance out the meal we had some greens and a bowl of fried sweetcorn too. The kids were a little tired and getting fractious and as Tan has a bad belly at the moment (doesn't only happen to me), she took them home so we could have a proper conversation. By the end of the meal it was time for footy so the three American kids and their mom went back home while the dad went with me to what has become our "local", Number 5 Cafe. All my friends were there (i.e. mostly bosses), and we enjoyed an exciting upset as Holland beat Brazil 2-1. I do hope Robinho returns to City though I doubt he will.

Rare meal at home before common meal with bosses

I have found a cool phone browser that works very well on my Nokia E71. I generally use Opera Mini but that no longer works here (you are directed to install a Chinese version). So this year I had found Skyfire to be pretty good, but I started to get a warning that it would stop working on 1st July in this country. So I found Bolt, and so far so good - I can check the news and the footy results away from home.

Had a quick nap after taking the kids in, then after some nice exercise in the air-conditioned bedroom I noticed Tan was listening to her music through the crappy built-in speakers of her netbook. So I thoughtfully went down to Ma Laoban's computer shop to get a pair of speakers. He had just left but his wife was there and helped me choose. It was a toss up between a pair of Lenovo speakers that got their power from USB, and another identical pair but smaller and fatter and 50 kuai cheaper. I couldn't tell the difference in sound (both were good and had a nice bass), but Ma Laoban's wife said the cheaper ones were much better quality...I didn't argue and took them and an underneath fan cooler thing for my old laptop as in this weather they can overheat quickly. The total should have come to 118 + 68 = 186 but she charged me 140. That is what I would have expected in a normal shop but there I would have had to ask for such a discount. I'm glad she didn't just give them to me as has happened in the past.

I rarely feel ripped off here, and people are not out to get you as they would be in touristy areas. Last year I remember I had a bunch of 100 kuai notes falling out of my pocket and some old bloke ran across the street shouting "Boss! Your money is falling out!". Today when I bought a nine-pack of beer for 29 kuai the woman wouldn't accept keeping the 1 kuai change! That's around three quid for ten pints of bottled beer! I then went to have a couple of chang fen (flaccid penis-like noodles) for lunch with a can of Li Quan. The can cost more than the food. My nice new trainers were now nice dirty trainers due to the meal outside of Pingguo on Tuesday so I took them to a local shoe-cleaning shop as you do and paid 5 kuai and was told to pick them up tomorrow.

A beer and flaccid peni for lunch

After the school run we had a rare meal at home with the family. They'd cooked a whole duck especially which was very enjoyable. Then Er Jie took the kids out to the guang chang and I rather predictably got a call from A Wu asking me to "drink tea" with some bosses. This meant going to another private room in a restaurant to eat meat and drink beer. I was full but thought "why not?". This particular restaurant had a lovely area on top of a four storey building where there was a courtyard with a fountain. Note to self: invite friends there before we leave. At the table I sat next to the boss of the restaurant himself, who was rather the worse for wear. Half the bosses were drinking thimblefulls of white alcohol, and the others were on red wine with ice cubes. This time they didn't try to serve me anything but 7 degree (3%) Li Quan, which I appreciated. I was too full to gorge on much more than the lovely Lao Hu Cai (tiger salad - very spicy) and some smoked meat. And I really couldn't drink much beer, so I picked the wrong time to play cai ma with "Big Boss". I lost my first seven hands and felt totally bloated. But as custom has it (unless this was made-up) I had to at least win one hand before I could leave. I showed all fingers and shouted "chut!", he showed two and shouted "clee!". Finally I'd won a hand and they all had a hearty laugh. I made my excuses and left as I had to get the kids to sleep - Tan had gone out with friends.

When they were asleep I helped myself to a Gin and Shui Bi, then took the bike out for a ride in the slightly cooler night air. I fancied a little barbequed ducks tongue so I drove to the place I used to frequent when we lived here two years ago. Ten sticks of tongues (two per stick) and ten of beef cost 40 kuai which I thought was on the pricey side. While they were being cooked two oldish men invited me over to their table were we had an enjoyable few minutes talking about Bangxu. One of the men's wives was from Bangxu too and we found it amusing to have that part of our lives in common. As they were drinking a weaker variant of the white alcohol I had a small sip with them as it would have been rude not to do so. Then I was called over to another table who had overheard our conversation and wanted to drink a glass with me. It would have been rude not too so I gan bei'd with them a couple of times with beer until my bbq arrived and I explained I'd better get back.

At home Tan was there with A Xia and A Ni, plus Er Jie and her kids Chuan Chuan and Qiqi. Am I supposed to put a gap between the syllables in pin yin Chinese or not? And do I capitalise both words if they form a name? I've not been at all consistent.

The television was not working and some bored faces were watching the blank screen with it turned on in case it should come back any time now. My bbq was demolished by all in the room so Chuan Chuan and I went out to get some more, plus a portion of snails. This errand took half an hour and by the time we got back at half midnight there were some hungry bellies that once again demolished the food.

Had a skype chat with Awl at gone 1am but I was flaking and nearly dropping off. Apparently he won't come this year as it's too pricey including the fact he doesn't get paid leave. Big pity as he would have had a great time...there's always next year....

Flat progress

Back in December last year Waipo's younger brother died. He had been ill for a long time and it wasn't particularly unexpected, but we didn't tell her anyway as being stuck in the UK may not have been the best place to mourn. Waipo was talking about it the other day and how no-one had told her in the UK, and I didn't know if she was in some way scolding me or just mentioning it. But her main point was that one evening Xixi was throwing a massive tantrum which is not like her. Waipo did something really weird; she lit a piece of paper and let it burn on the floor in the hallway, then picked up the smoking black remains and tried to smear it on Xixi's forehead or neck. It looked a bit voodooish and didn't do the trick and she was only consoled when I held her in my arms (Xixi, not Waipo). Anyway, Waipo told me that that was the day her younger brother had died, and that Xixi's behaviour was an indication of that....

Anyway after leaving Xixi crying in school again I later went to meet Tan and the girls for lunch at the Ming Dian Coffee Language Hotel restaurant. The weather has become properly hot now, though not as humid as when the clouds were ever-looming. Now the streets are emptier during the middle of the day, except for a tall foreigner who insists on going out on his electric bike. I really like the meals they served in the Ming Dian last year and the year before in what looked like a bento box. I asked Tan if they still did these boxes and she said "yes". Then the waitress came and Tan found that they don't do the boxes anymore. What is wrong with "I don't know"?

I asked Tan if Lin Hong had the house keys as I wanted to keep an eye on progress but she said today she was busy at work and didn't have any time. So after lunch I rang Lin Hong anyway and she said she was on her way there: "zhun bei dao le" (just about to arrive). Ten minutes later she did come and explained that she had just picked up the keys to her house today as we had ten days ago, and she also wanted to check our house. So much for busy at work.

Well there certainly were changes. Unbeknown to me there were now railings all the way to the ceiling on all the balconies. This gives the place a bit of a prison feel to it but it is done purely for safety as there will be kids around. More predictably there were lots of pipes around the place. The floor was littered with water and electric pipes stemming from the mains and going to all the rooms. There was already some electricity built in but I guess we were expanding it. All this will be covered in concrete soon so I managed to get some grainy snaps on my phone camera first.

This is a pile of stones to be used for making concrete for the house, and was donated to us by A Wu. Thank you A Wu

The full-length bars we now have on all the balconies

Some of the pipes that will soon be covered by the floor. Green for water, white for electricity

Back home I had a little nap and when I woke up to get ready to pick up the kids I found that some bastards had hemmed in my little bike between theirs. If I had knocked one of theirs over there would have been an expensive domino effect so I had to be careful and only set off two alarms while slowly getting it out.

Tight squeeze

As there was no space to park in the appropriate zone when we got back I just left the bike near the door, out of the way of anyone else. Later when I popped out I found I had a sticker on it saying something I didn't understand, but along the lines of "Don't park here!". As yet I don't know if there is a fine. I decided to go to the old people's place to play table tennis as I hadn't done so in a while. Boss Yang was there along with some mates, one of whom was probably the best player in Pingguo. I sat mesmerised by the quality of play and was sadly aware how far I was behind. It didn't stop them wanting to play against me though and to my credit I did score a couple of points on returned smashes that got rounds of applause.

Boss Yellow's new wood factory

Took the kids to school again, and on the way back I was enjoying the slight breeze in my face as I rode the electric bike down the long road past the guang chang. I closed my eyes for five seconds which was quite exhilarating at 40kph. I opened them and found I hadn't swerved a foot from where I was on the road. I did another five seconds blind driving and again the same. There was still a couple of hundred yards to go before the lights so I decided to go for ten seconds. By seven I was getting scared...eight seconds arrived a long time later...nine seemed like a minute and the moment I got to ten my heart rate had raised dramatically. A cheap buzz maybe but when I opened my eyes I was in the middle of the road a few feet from running some bloke over who had unwittingly decided to cross the road without looking for some stupid lao wei on an electric moped with his eyes closed. I did swerve and avoided some embarrassment. I won't be doing that again in a hurry, although it was fun.

A Wu called as I was on the way back to ask me to go to Boss Yellow's factory opening. Sometimes I feel like I'm in a Quentin Tarantino film. I told him "wo you shi" (I have a matter), meaning I was busy. That didn't stop him calling again at 11am saying it was an important occasion. As I wasn't actually that busy I said ok I'd go, just give me 15 mins to get a shower. Surprise surprise 30 mins later he wasn't there, so I called and he said 2-1 was coming to pick me up instead, and to hurry up! Sod that, I got in the car with Mr Football Score and we drove for three minutes to the shop where we're going to buy our tiles from. It transpired we were now going to wait for some other bloke (Mr Pink? who the fuck knows?). We ended up waiting half an hour for this bloke, during which time we had a nice few glasses of tea with the shop's proprietoress if that is a word. Then I found out this place was outside Pingguo town, on the way to Bangxu, where Tan is from originally.


Tan's 2nd sister's lovely new Mitsubishi Outlander. She doesn't even intend to learn to drive...I hope I will have use of it in Pingguo while she is here as I did a couple of years ago with her smaller car

As we drove the half-hour route we kept getting phone calls telling us to hurry up. I told 2-1 "an quan di yi" (safety first), and he was one of the few men who actually seemed to know what I was talking about. I think most of them think driving accidents are all to do with "fate", and they are the ones who won't live to show that that is a load of bollocks. Although A Wu had said I would be leaving by 1pm it was already gone midday when we arrived.

I hadn't actually realised this was such a big deal. I quite like Boss Yellow, and although I couldn't quite work out what his factory was for - something to do with cutting wood judging by the tools - there were a good thirty people there if I'm not mistaken, many of whom were women. They were possibly relatives of Boss Yellow as they were not particularly slim, as most Pingguonese women are. By the time we got there it seemed they had been holding out on eating, but not drinking as they were all half-cut. Well I understand that starting a business is a big deal and this is all part of the culture but I could hardly physically gan bei as much as they wanted me to. I toured every table and gan bei'd with various women and bosses much to their delight, before managing to tuck in to some rather nice lamb, beef, chicken and finally some rice.


Where the meal took place

I cai ma'd with a few blokes who I'd not met before (increasingly rarer now), and was immediately accepted as family as I was able to explain that my wife was from Bangxu, that the food was good, and that I knew they were from Bangxu too, all in the Bangxu language. But I got to the stage where although hardly light-headed I could not drink more fizz, so I went for a walk by the road in the particularly beautiful countryside so prevalent in Guangxi. I'd asked to go home at 2pm but we were apparently waiting for someone to go with us. This person didn't turn up so 2-1 eventually got A Wu's keys (luckily meaning A Wu wouldn't drive but I hate to think of the amount of inebriated people who did drive back that afternoon).


Some of the folks I ate with. Boss Yellow is the one wearing the pink top (obviously).


Afterwards I had a bit of a saw head


Typical road scene in Guangxi

2-1 got me back by three and I managed an hour an a bit's kip before going to pick up the brats. Xixi was fine again despite pulling a tantrum in the morning as I left. She will get used to it. I found out that Tan and A Ni had got back and that they were doing their hair or something. I took the kids to the old people's leisure place where I played a little table tennis with a couple of them. But it was hard as both the kids wanted to play too. So I gave up and went home. We went out with Chuan Chuan and Qiqi (Er Jie's kids) for some fried noodles and ducks' tongues outside our house and unusually both Leilei and Xixi ate well. It took a while for them to get to sleep after the excitement of having Qiqi around but finally Leilei dropped off, then Tan came back and gave me a reward for being a good baba.

I watched the second half of the Paraguay - Japan match with Er Jie's bloke Lao Pan. I know he is the father of their second child but I'm not sure they're married and I was embarrassed to ask. Anyway I got a text from Tan during the match to STFU as Lao Pan was being noisy (he does have a very funny high-pitched laugh for a bloke with a deep voice). So when it was 0-0 after 90 minutes I asked if he fancied going outside to watch extra time. He didn't as he was watching currency movements on his laptop. Since I set up wifi in the house he is now able to connect from any room, which he really appreciates. Although his laptop is only a year old there is a problem with the internal wifi (as far as I can fathom with a Chinese OS and having no luck installing updated drivers), so I happened to bring a USB wifi stick that I've installed so he can be online to keep his eye on whatever currency he likes. For what ends I don't know, but Er Jie has a beautiful Mitsubishi jeep that if I understand correctly cost around 40 grand in UK money.

Anyway I stepped outside to watch extra time at my local outside eatery with the big screen. As soon as I tried to order a beer at a table by myself I was invited to sit with the people at the neighbouring table. Well, what could I do? I sat down with them and gan bei'd a little and cai ma'd a little while ooing and ahhing at the footy. We were having a really nice time when Tan rang me to ask what I was doing in the second period of extra time. I explained I was watching the last few minutes of footy and she said Leilei needed to go for a wee as if it was my fault. I mean she complained about me watching the game indoors and now she was complaining about me being outside. She also asked who I was with as if I knew. Maybe she was being protective but certainly too much so. I've been here long enough to know who are ok people to sit down with and share a beer. Five minutes later, during the penalties she rang me again! Bloody hell dear, I said I'd only be a few minutes. Last night she said she was just going out to pick up a book at 9pm and didn't come back till midnight as she decided to go for barbeque without telling me...let's put things in perspective here. Anyway Japan lost unfortunately as they'd been the more entertaining team in my opinion.

2-1

Got a call from Boss Yang to go for a late breakfast at around 10.30am. A colleague of his picked me up. On the way to the International Hotel I was asking his name so I could put it in my phone. He said 2-1, and I said I already had his phone number as he had already rung me, I just wanted his name. So he started again, 2-1. I thought my Chinese may not be good enough so I read out to him his own number, then I said "my name is Peng Duoming, what is your name?" (in Chinese) and he started again: 2-1. I was a little bit embarrassed to find out that his name (or least what he is called) is "er yi", i.e. "two one". Don't ask me why.


Me and 2-1 having breakfast at the International Hotel. Too early for the chicken claws for me but the dumplings were ok

A Ni had had an argument with A Wu last night for some reason so her and Tan went to Nanning as ladies do. At least she took the kids to school first. So for the first time in a long time I actually had some time to myself till 5pm, which I pleasantly spent catching up on news online, and a little sleep in the afternoon. Although we gave most of the booze away as presents, I kept a bottle of gin for such pursuits (and it wouldn't be the done thing to give a plastic bottle as a present). It mixes ok with the "shui bi" lemonade but I'd love to find somewhere that sells tonic water. I had to go to the supermarket after dropping off the kids at school as Xixi needed a pillow and a cup, plus a blanket that I took from home. I have found that the local supermarket now sells Gordon's gin plus Smirnoff vodka at around a tenner each for 75cl. Ok it's not particularly cheap (though it is the stronger imported stuff), but it's still a sign of where this place is going. Two years' ago I saw locally produced "Finnish" vodka for sale for the first time, as well as Coca Cola Zero, which meant I had more than one choice of palatable alcoholic beverage for the first time since I've been coming here in 2003 (the wine does not count as palatable). There was one specialist alcohol shop that carried a couple of bottles of western vodka but at highly inflated prices and I don't really like vodka anyway (can only do with sugar-free Coke). I asked the woman in the supermarket if they sold "kui ning shui" (tonic water, literally "quinine water") and she said "no" obviously, but that I may be able to get it in Nanning.... I will go there this weekend.

In the evening I got a call from A Wu to go for a meal with more bosses...a bit tiresome but as Tan was out and I was with the kids we went with him. Not a great idea. Leilei was behaving badly and I warned him a couple of times that we would go home if continued to do so. He did so once more so I thought I'd better be true to my word and marched him and Xixi out to get a san lun che back home. He was sullen and rude all the way back but unless he knows that I mean what I say he will continue the same way in the future. "I hate you, I hate you!" is a horrible thing to hear but I told him I loved him very much but we just need to behave nicely.

Waipo was home and I left them both with her and went back on the moped. I was glad the kids weren't there as not only was it rather smokey, the blokes were all drinking an insipid yellowy alcoholic drink that tasted horrible and was 22%. I said I'd only drink weak beer so that was forthcoming. But they were quickly trolleyed and I didn't have much interest in staying there. We were in the middle of a long photoshoot with the camera I gave A Wu four years' ago when we stayed at his house for three months, when one of the more pissed-looking men grabbed me and moved me out of the room in a very rough manner. A bottle of beer had been pushed into my hand and he grabbed it and shoved it into the waitress as we left the room. He bid me to go down the stairs and get out, and I realised he'd seen that I wasn't comfortable and that the others were really caned; he was doing it more for my own safety and I really appreciate that.

Back home I got the kids to sleep by 11pm then watched some of the footy with Er Jie's husband (the father of her second child). They all came back yesterday as their son Pan Qi has finished school for the summer. It was all unannounced so once again the house is pretty full.