Fixing locks with magic dust

Although up at 8am I didn't go for badminton, opting to have a more relaxing morning with a Carte Noire decaf and a sticky rice crispy style cake. Tan did the same a little later when she got up. As is becoming perfunctory when the kids sleep at Waipo's, I went to pick them up around 11am only to be told they'd already eaten. Fair enough but I bet they hadn't had breakfast. Anyway we went to my favourite supermarket where I have my nectar card for, and spent some time buying a couple of personalised items for the kids such as straw cups (they don't seem to lose their appeal until you're in your 20s) plus "normal" cups and a bowl each. I didn't mind about getting them this as I secretly hoped it would encourage them to eat what I put in it.

On the way back home we picked up some jiao zi and bao zi and I was moderately successful in getting them to eat these out of their new bowls, especially Leilei as his bowl was the same as mine - a 16cm metal bowl with no picture on, but he ate all his bao zi plus one of my jiao zi. Xixi was harder to get full, despite her Xi Yang Yang bowl (Xi Yang Yang is a popular sheep cartoon character who is omnipresent in one of the many children's tv channels here).

Tan was home, and as I said I needed a sleep she took them out after threatening to leave them with me as I should have taken them to school. I got a good two hours kip till about 5pm when Leilei called me to go to eat at Waipo's. This is becoming a bit of a pattern too, and I don't mind it; eating in a house instead of a restaurant. It's definitely become more like this this year than other recent years. Having said that I do slightly miss the big meals with the revolving tables.

After eating I took the kids out on the dian dong che. I decided to visit the tea place I've known for several years, but last year was never open when I turned up. This time it was open and of course the bloke remembered me. We were immediately ushered to sit down and I drank an absolutely lovely red tea, from 1997 apparently. If they treated their wine like they do their tea they really could be onto something here.

I talked to the owner about work and stuff, and how we didn't meet last year. He said it was because he had been very busy with his rabbit business. I never knew about that, assuming somehow that he made his money by selling tea. Oh no, he has a place a few km outside the town where he rears rabbits for meat and skin. It was nice to finally have an explanation for how some of these tea shops really make their money. The owner also said that today was the first day of the Olympics and that they'd be watching the GBR women's football game against New Zealand later, and that I was welcome to come. The kids weren't so interested in this though, so we left to go for a ride in the market.

As we parked the bike I got an angry call from Tan: "how the f did you close the front door of the house? I've been trying to get in for nearly half an hour". I told her to calm the f down, I closed it as I always did, try ringing Ling Ming in case he accidentally locked it from the inside. Half an hour? I'd have called within one minute if I couldn't get in. I decided to give her a couple of minutes to simmer down, during which time I went to one of the places that fixes locks. Tan had at least reminded me that I needed to get something to ease the entry of the key into the door lock, as it had become rather stiff this year. In England this would have been a can of WD40 but not here. I remembered a couple of years ago I'd had a similar problem with the lock for the dian dong che. A woman from such a lock shop had sprinkled some magic black dust on my key then put it in and it worked like a charm. I was hopeful for the same when I showed the bloke my key. He went to the back of his area and searched for a small box containing tiny plastic pouches like the ones I imagine drug peddlers use. He opened the pouch to inspect the contents and seemed ok with it. From the outside you would not have guessed there was anything inside, but I was excited about it being magic dust and eagerly paid the 1 kuai.

Before going home I had an experience that is becoming more and more common. One of the blokes on a market stall called over to me and asked if I remembered drinking with him. As I've done so with half the male population over 16 it was difficult to be sure so I used my normal "I recognise your face, but can't remember the name". It transpired that we'd had a meal together some years ago, and he offered me some long yen fruit. Well I couldn't turn down one of my favourites - I though we'd have to wait till August for them but he said they'd just come out. It may have been an early crop but they were still delicious and I bought one jin (about a pound) for 12 kuai.

We got home and before entering I tried the bag of magic dust. I dipped the key into it and indeed there was some there. Tentatively I put the key into the lock and it penetrated it like a well lubricated, err, like a straw into a mango sorbet. The lock turned easily and we gained entry. Tan had just finished a shower and was going to go out but not before I made her try again. She did the same as me, turn the lock a couple of times then just was not able to make the last quarter turn. I told her to slightly nudge the door as she turned the key and it opened easily.

Maybe because she was thankful Tan took the kids to Waipo's and I had some time to myself. I was actually more interested than I should have been in the women's football, but not as interested as I became in the thought of another head wash. I rang A Wu, who said he was on his way back from Nanning, and just entering Pingguo, but wanted to go for a haircut first. No problem, just call me when ready. So I tried a little gin with "apple vinegar" which was as bad as it seemed, before going back to sugary lemonade. Note that the apple vinegar was sold as a canned drink, not a cooking supplement, so I had hopes it mightn't be so sweet.

Not waiting for A Wu, I left our house at about 9.30pm only to hear beeping as I got out in front of our building. It was him in his car outside the tea and alcohol shop. He was in his car talking on his phone and after a minute I said I was going, so he said he'd follow me to the head wash place.

Needless to say this was an exquisite 50 minutes of sheer delight, but I took some time to talk to my young lady about her career etc. Partly I did this as the lady having her head done next to me kept talking to me about how she wanted to learn English from me (and I didn't have the time or inclination). My masseuse was from Baise, an hour or so up the road, and was 22, which I thought rather old for this sort of job. I asked her how long she'd been doing it for and she said one year. When I asked her how much longer she envisaged doing it for she said she was about to finish. So I asked her what she wanted to do afterwards and she said she'd think about it. I pushed her and she said her dream would be to have her own shop selling drinks. Maybe I missed something but that is not the wildest dream I've heard of. Anyway she did a great job and felt a little sorry that I probably would not have her as a masseuse again.

She did mention that a few months ago she'd done a foreign lady. By "done" I mean the same as me - head wash, wet massage, dry massage etc. I think I've seen this person - I've heard there is an American family here with a son and daughter. In fact I've seen a Western bloke with a young fair haired daughter so I gather it must be them. I'll probably bump into them at some time. Grr...yet again I'm not the only gay in the village.

After our head wash A Wu and I went to the tea place I'd been to before. I thought the game would start at 10pm but I had got my BST mixed up and it wasn't till 11pm local time. A Wu had a couple of cups of tea, as he too knew the owner. Then we went to a coffee house down by the river. It was only A Wu and I, as we were waiting for some mate to come, and it was rather boring to be honest, especially when Tan rang up to say that her and her mates were at the guangchang having bbq and invited me over. I said I'd try to be over there in half an hour or so.

A Wu's mate came but they were talking business so I didn't have too much to say and munched on some beef and fried sweet corn and fruit. Eventually Tan rang again to say they'd finished eating and Ling Hong had invited her to a school reunion at a karaoke place, and could I pick up the kids from Waipo's as she was tired and they weren't sleeping? At least that gave me the opportunity to leave, and when I got home with the kids Tan was surprisingly there too. Or maybe nothing is surprising here; she'd decided it was too late to go to see her ex-classmates so came home.

Despite the long hours awake, the kids didn't get to sleep till about 1am so I had no chance to see GBR women beat NZ 1-0 in the Olympic football, in what should be their easiest game. I have been tempted to fly to Beijing to watch Man City play Arsenal on Friday. It wouldn't be cheap, but what an experience. Maybe if it was a little bit closer....

Two days after we arrived Ling Ming had this running machine delivered - in the 10 days since it's been here it's been used once

Much ping pang and no trip to Tian Ping

Woke up after five hours' sleep, which I didn't mind too much as I now have sporty and siesta-y plans for early awakenings. I dressed in my swimming shorts, an old Man City top, white ankle socks and my Nike Air trainers bought in Cleveland, Ohio for $25, packed my bag with two bottles of water, a towel, a smaller bag containing my table tennis bat, two balls, my keys and some money, and finally Ling Ming's badminton raquet.

I walked to where I've now played badminton twice but to my dismay my friends were not there. I'd also noticed that the old people's leisure centre had no-one playing ping pong. With my big bag it was not practical to run so I sat down for a couple of minutes to contemplate the elders doing tai chi with swords. I went for a walk around the guangchang anyway and by the time I got back I saw a couple of people playing ping pong in the old people's leisure centre so I popped in. I soon found myself playing a woman in her 60s who was actually quite possibly worse than me. We played for about half an hour until Mr Table Tennis walked in and grinned like Mr Mischief. He motioned for the woman to sit down and relax as he started practising with me. That lasted all of 10 rallies until he said "five games". Oh dear not this again. Although he beat me 5-0 I had the moral victory that this time at least he played right-handed in every game, and I once got up to seven points. He made it easier by not spinning his serves when he was leading by five or more points.

Some Tai chi in the guang chang while I was pondering on what to do next

Normally it's winner stays on but here it's more like "foreigner stays on" so another bloke came and I nearly won the first game, losing 11-8. But I lost the next two more convincingly and apparently this time it was only three games. Then, the woman I'd been practising with challenged me and finally I was victorious 2-1 in games. It was a bit unfair as by then I'd got back into the habit of doing backhand smashes that even the locals appreciate.

I made my excuses at 9.15 as needed to take the kids to school, but when I got home I found that Ling Ming had already taken them to Waipo's house. So off I went to find they'd had breakfast, but Er Jie was still there and insisted that they didn't go to school, reasoning that they'd already spent a year in school and should relax. She sort of had a point but I like them learning some of their culture so we made a sort of compromise: they would go back to school when A Da and Nong Kaicheng were back from Beijing in a couple of days.

But the kids didn't want to stay at Waipo's so we went to Ma Laoban's computer shop where I let them play silly flash games for a bit. Ma Laoban's wife came in (she loves Xixi) and invited us to go to Tian Ping (?), in the countryside where her parents live about 10 km outside Pingguo, which apparently takes 10 minutes. My reaction was to not go but thought it might be interesting so asked them when they were going. "Zhun bei zou le", was the reply "we're ready to go". It was not yet 11am and I suspected a little oriental time-mongering going on. I said that would be good but I'd need to get back early as I'd had little sleep and needed a siesta - no problem we'd be back when I wanted. Half and hour later it was 11.20 and nothing had happened. Another 25 minutes and Ma Laoban arrived with a couple of blokes who seemed interested in buying computers. Another 10 minutes later there were a few blokes drinking tea and Leilei said he wanted to go home. I looked for Ma Laoban's wife but she was nowhere to be seen so told Ma Laoban I needed to take the kids home and he apologised for being busy. I said no problem at all and was relieved as I suspected had we waited for them all to go to it would have been another half an hour, not getting back till 5pm and I was already pretty shattered.

So I took the kids back home but before going in we walked to the place that does the lovely jiao zi and bao zi and bought two portions of the former and one of the latter. Surprisingly the kids ate just about everything I gave them - not bad, three of us stuffed for just over a quid. I had also bought a case of beer, something I haven't done for a long time, maybe two years. I only bought them as I wanted to know what the price was, and surprisingly it was the same as the last time I bought some: 33 kuai, or about 38p for a 595ml bottle. It would have been rude not to try one so I did that with our food. I was ready to try a siesta and Tan was ready to go out but she wasn't taking the kids as she had some sort of heat blisters and she wanted to go to the hospital to treat them. This meant I had the kids and although they were due a siesta they were not in the mood. I wouldn't have minded as they have their own rooms and I was just settling down when Tan called to say Ling Ming was coming with a delivery of some sort of low sink for the balcony so it would be more practical to wash the floor. Fair enough I suppose but it could have been better timed.

Ling Ming and the sink bloke came and he installed it on our balcony but he couldn't manage to fit the plug unit without it leaking. So after half an hour he had to go back to find some material to fix it. He did this by about 2pm, by which time the kids were not at all interested in sleeping so I threatened them with going with Ling Ming to Waipo's house. In fact this threat was not a threat at all as Ling Ming said he'd take them to Yi Xiao too on his way to work.

Finally, by 2.15pm I had the house to myself and tried to settle down for a sleep, which I finally managed with minor help from Gordon, until 6pm. Only eight missed calls this time, four each from Ma Laoban and Tan. I thought I'd better call Tan first and she unsurprisingly told me that everyone was waiting for me to eat at Waipo's house. So I got on the bike as it was starting to rain and luckily this time by the time I arrived I was still fairly dry as it didn't deluge. I called Ma Laoban as I was approaching Waipo's and he too was inviting me to eat at his place. I explained my predicament and he understood ok.

In fact at Waipo's most people were just watching tv, and continued to do so for a few more minutes before we were called to eat. The food was quite nice and simple and the kids didn't join us. I found out a bit later that this was because Chuan Chuan was taking them out to the new place I'd had pizza at a few days ago. So that left Waipo, Er Jie, Tan and me watching some drama on tv that wasn't as interesting as many things I can imagine so Tan and I went home. The rain was still falling, but not at a level that would soak us on the dian dong che on the way home and we managed the three minute journey without getting too wet, except for my bum as the seat is torn and soaks up water at the back. If only I'd listened to Tan and let her sit at the back like most ladies do when with their man on a bike. The problem is I'm taller than most men and if I sit in front my knees stick out like wings.

As if the morning exercise wasn't enough, a little later I decided to go to the old people's leisure centre once more, as Tan had decided to stay in for the evening. I thought I saw Yang Haiwei's car outside so called him to find he was upstairs. I saw a couple of blokes I hadn't seen since last year and we caught up on old times while the maestros played on. Then it was my turn to play Lao Ma. I actually did ok until it was time to play a game and then lost 3-0 but not before getting a fair few points past him. Then Haiwei announced that we'd go to the government building on the other side of the guangchang to play as there were too many people here. So we drove there under the ever-increasing rain. There were two tables, and one bloke waiting for us, so Haiwei and I practised for a bit before I lost 3-0 in games again. Getting a bit predictable, this, but I'm hoping it's for the better of my game.

While Haiwei was playing the other bloke, another bloke came along to play with me - he was more my level, or worse, but for some reason we didn't actually play for points. Tan had rung before 10pm to ask me to get 10 chicken feet and 10 pig intestines as you do, so by quarter past I made my excuses and walked to the bbq place through the rain-sodden guangchang. I'd never seen it so empty at night. For once I didn't make an effort to talk with others while waiting for the bbq - the normal place hadn't even opened so I was elsewhere, but even there it lacked the usual jovial atmosphere. I added an order of five duck tongues and some Chinese leek for me and 20 minutes later paid my 49 kuai and for once the bloke who brought it over accepted a 1 kuai tip with a smile.

Five minutes later Tan was tucking into her feet and I was chatting to Ma and Cat on Skype, or rather trying to as the connection was dreadful. I feared that it was my connection - worried that work meetings might be affected, but when Cat reconnected via tethering to her phone it worked a charm...time to get a new ISP Ma....

Browsing the web, it looks like we are suffering from the effects of Typhoon Vicente, which caused minor chaos in Hong Kong yesterday and is now on the warpath from Guangdong to Guangxi. However, it has probably calmed down somewhat due to being inland and although the rain is still falling quite heavily the wind has assuaged somewhat.

Ling Ming came in some time after 1am and we shared a single bottle of beer. He explained that he was hoping to get a new car in a couple of weeks for his birthday. He's going to get a Chinese brand, a Chang Cheng M2, which is a sort of mini people carrier (or SUV as the Americanism holds here). It looks ok to me: http://auto.china.com/zh_cn/mill/changcheng/M2/ except he wants the white version. I also found out why I haven't seen Xiao Nong's MG 3 on the road before. It's an Anglo-Sino design/build and was only available in China from 2011, becoming available in the UK some time in 2012 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MG_3

Knackered by 2am but remembered I hadn't put out the washing to dry, and didn't want it to become stinky for tomorrow, so tiredly did it, taking sure not to drop any clothes through the rails to 13 floors below. I did last week with a pair of Ling Ming's underpants and although it was 3am I still went downstairs to look for them in the rain. Strangely they were nowhere to be seen and I must have looked a wally searching by the light of my mobile at that time. I reckon they must have landed in someone else's balcony - oh well, Ling Ming's loss, someone else's gain. I should have told him though.

Setting up the Wii and huge storm at the seafood place

Indeed despite a couple of toilet breaks I managed to sleep till 9.45am. Too late for jogging or badminton but who cares? The fitness afforded by sleep is sometimes far more important. The kids weren't to go to school today as A Da is still in Beijing with Nong Kaicheng, so I went to pick them up. A Wu called to meet up in the tea place opposite our building so the three of us went for a few minutes, but it's not the most interesting place for kids, so we decided to go for lunch at the wooden bucket place.

The kids opted for the old dian dong che rather than A Wu's Toyota, as it's so much more fun with the wind in your hair. They would be an excellent excuse to get a convertible car in the UK as they go mad enough just having the back windows down. A good excuse but not good enough when our old faithful Peugeot 406 keeps passing MoTs.

Again I had the problem of encouraging them to eat and had to resort to spoon feeding both of them a bit. At least Leilei liked the sliced fragrant sausage but the portion of egg fried rice went mostly to waste. When we were finished we went back to Waipo's and I left them there for a little bit as I had boring electronic paperwork to do.

As well as the paperwork I think I finally sorted out the Wii so we can play games now, not that there has been that much chance to up to now. But I blooming well left it here last year so I will blooming well ensure that it is used.

I forgot that I had slept in so necked a couple of qi du while working, then went to bed before realising the reason I couldn't fall asleep was that I only got up five hours ago. So I went back to the desk and tried to sort out creating a VPN server on my laptop in London as you do.

Leilei called me from Waipo's to say he wanted to come home, which was fair enough. When I got there both had eaten apparently so we grabbed a couple of toys and got on the dian dong che to drive around for a bit. It was gone 8pm and dark now, so we stopped off by the guangchang and I got them some zheng zhu nai cha each (cold milk tea with squidgy sweets inside) and we went for a walk. While kicking a football about in the guangchang I got a call from a Huang Chang. I recognised the surname but not the first name. I recognised his voice but couldn't match it to a face, and I hadn't put a mugshot in my phone so his picture didn't show up (as I have done for others). He asked me to go with him to have a beer and eat something. I said I was with the kids but that didn't put him off and he said he'd come to pick us up. I had a good opportunity to say no as I was tired/needed to sort the kids etc., but I sort of like it when these things happen as there's an air of excitement about not knowing what's around the corner.

I thought it might be difficult, waiting for someone you will probably recognise, but who you don't know is the right person. So we played a guessing game for the next five minutes wondering if this car or that car might be Huang Chang. Inevitably I got a call a couple of minutes later asking where we were. It took some explaining because the guangchang is a huge place and there is no one entrance as such. Eventually we both agreed he must be near the old people's leisure centre and we saw a badly parked car with the engine on. I barked out the numberplate to him on the phone and he said "dui dui dui!", which means "yes" and "correct" at the same time.

Rather than open the back door I thought I'd be a little rude and open the driver's door so I could see who my friend was. If it was rude I could always joke that I thought it was the passenger door (I've used that one before and it works). Ah...it was the boss of the sea food place down the way who we'd seen for all of 15 minutes a couple of days ago but had to leave due to kids. This was apparently his new car. It was a VW something. Needless to say it was a black saloon with blacked out windows so it basically looked the same as 50% of all the cars in Pingguo. But it was comfortable and air conditioned, despite the fact that it seemed to keep jumping out of second gear. I daren't ask if it was brand new as a negative answer may have meant losing face. But he must have liked his car as rather than do a U-turn to head back to his place he did a tour of the guangchang before taking the road that leads to Nanning.

There was a two year old boy sitting in the front passenger seat who was apparently there for the ride, and we were all in the back sans seatbelts. Suddenly we were going about 50mph and I had to ask where we were going. "Nowhere", was the reply. He was sort of right as a couple of minutes later we did another U-turn and drove back into Pingguo and to his seafood place. I think the purpose of that mini trip was to show off his car, but who knows?

We got to his seafood place and he set us out a table saying he'd be back in a bit. During the meanwhile one of his blokes came to take our order. Well, I wasn't really ready to order despite being a bit hungry as Huang Chang wasn't there, so I got a can of lemonade for the kids and a beer for me. With the kids sorted I'd barely had a sip of beer before Xixi decided she wanted the toilet. She's actually good at using the key-shaped holes in the ground, and doesn't get her knickers wet, but she needs me for moral support, and sometimes physical support if her feet start slipping apart. Then it was Leilei's turn but I'm glad to say he doesn't need me any more. Then it was Xixi's turn again as she needed a poo poo for the second time today. This time it was of the less dry variety and it bloody stank but ho hum. This time when we finally got out I saw Boss Yang (one from a few years back), who was at another table. He bade me sit down and I didn't refuse. The kids amused themselves with hide-and-seek to my relief and I had a couple of gan bei's with some blokes I recognised from years gone by. The boss popped his head around again to apologise but he was busy. I couldn't help thinking that he would have been slightly less busy if he hadn't taken us on a pointless car ride outside Pingguo.

Leilei said it was going to rain and within five minutes there was a familiar pitter patter which lasted all of 30 seconds before it became more of a roar accompanied by a fairly strong wind. The deluge that ensued was quite interesting for the kids and me as we saw a delightful lightning performance to the sound of never-ending thunder. It wasn't good for business though as even the covers they'd put out were not sufficient due to the wind. Boss Yang took the kids one by one to his car under and umbrella and gave us a lift back home. We thanked him and said we'd see him again.

Of course I'd left the dian dong che at the bbq place by the guangchang but there was no getting it now. Tan wasn't in so I got the kids showered and toothbrushed and in to bed. Getting them to sleep was another matter and it was midnight by the time they were. Tan came back one-ish from who knows where? I was pretty shattered and fell asleep at 1.40am after having gone back to pick up the dian dong che and then going for a 10 minute ride around town just to wear out the last of the battery before recharging and because the post-rain air was refreshing.

Early badminton and late table-hopping

Another virtually sleepless night - just patches where dreams would start and get rudely revoked after a minute or so. In truth I probably got over an hour's kip but it didn't feel like it. So at 6.30 I got up and thought at least I could do some badminton. I crept about, trying not to wake Tan, who also had not got to sleep until nearly 3am, and found some clothes except for my shorts. Then I remembered I hadn't dried the clothes last night and I had three pairs in the washing machine. Well as they would be sopping wet with a few minutes anyway I put one pair aside while I hung out the rest of the clothes to dry.

I walked to the same place I played in the guangchang a couple of days ago. There were about six people there, not all the same as last time, but enough to recognise me and invite me to play. As there was already a game on one of the blokes saw two girls playing on an adjoining court and just moved on to play with them without really giving them an option. So I found myself with a rather chubby partner who wasn't very good, but it was a good warm-up exercise. Within 10 minutes a grey-haired, but sprightly old lady pushed out the young lady on the other side of the court and proceeded to play with the bloke against me and chubby. The young lady didn't seem to mind. I wonder if seniority allows for this imposing of oneself like this.

After half an hour we were called over to the other court and I played three games of doubles with much better players, more my age too. We actually won one of the games but I was more glad of the fitness practice I was getting - I didn't feel sick this time.

As I was walking home Tan called to say that the kids were arguing, as if to say "can you take them out as I need more sleep?". I was coming to take them to eat anyway so no problem there. Breakfast was at the dou jiang place again and we had eggs, a sweetcorn pancake, eight jiao zi, four bao zi and two cups of dou jiang, which all came to 10 kuai. We couldn't even finish all of that, and then I took the kids to Waipo's to play, explaining that I really needed to get some shuteye.

Back home Tan was still asleep but awoke nearer lunch time. She'd had a bad neck and Waipo had given her some herbs to...I think steam or something. I heard her pop them in the microwave for a minute or so before putting them in a plastic bag. Then she opened another plastic bag and put it on the pillow before putting the bag with the herbs on top of that and then lying with her neck on that for the next 45 minutes. It did pong a bit and I still couldn't sleep. So about an hour later I popped down to get some jiao zi and bao zi and brought them back up to share with Ling Ming. That, together with a couple of beers did the trick and I finally fell asleep from about 3.30 - 6.30. Even at 6.30 I could hardly get up and snoozed for another hour.

I decided not to eat at Waipo's although she'd rung to invite me around, as I wanted to have an evening out for myself tonight after having had the kids for the last two nights. After geeking about for a bit setting up the Wii with the tv and the Internet and trying, but mainly failing to watch the German grand prix I went to Ma Laoban's to pick up a USB hub and Ethernet cable. It was only a few minutes before closing but I found him and his wife and a couple of mates sitting at the back of the shop drinking tea, so joined them for nearly an hour, while getting decidedly hungry. Although I wanted to go, they all seemed so interested about life in England, and how I met Tan etc., and we were having quite a good laugh. Luckily Tan called to ask me to get her some bbq, so that was a good reason to leave, even though she just meant to bring it home with me later that night.

I drove to the guangchang A Yi bbq place and just as I was about to order I heard Ling Ming and Xiao Nong call me over to have a bite and a beer with them. Whyever not? We sat and ate and chatted for a bit until I noticed Yang Haiwei at another table with a load of mates. I said I'd say a quick hello with them, which was indeed fairly quick, but involved a number of gan beis. Then eventually A Wu came, and then Yang Haiwei's wife came over with their son and eventually I table-hopped to Haiwei's table where I cai ma'd with some of the blokes and beat most of them too).

I didn't forget my errand and ordered Tan's bbq from a different place as A Yi had stopped cooking by now. Back at Ling Ming's table they had already paid for theirs and the five duck tongues, fat-beef and pork strips I'd ordered too. It wasn't even worth protesting. On the way back I suddenly remembered I'd taken the dian dong che there so sheepishly had to walk back to pick it up and take it home.

Back home Tan was already there but the kids were staying at Waipo's. As she ate, I did a bit more setting up of the Wii, though was getting so tired I called it a day and went to bed insistent that I would not wake up within one hour.

Delicious light lunch and Hello Kitty car

Despite a broken night's sleep, with Leilei coming in to our room half way through, I didn't properly get up until 9.45 although was tempted three hours earlier to do something sporty. That meant I had to plan my day without a siesta for the first time this year. Ling Ming said he was taking the kids swimming in the afternoon and was I coming? Indeed that seemed like a suitable alternative to a sleep, and I haven't been swimming at all this year yet, let alone with the kids.

But lunch was before that - Xiao Nong came around soon after midday to take us all somewhere where they had liang fen. I still don't know what exactly this is but it includes tofu and sugar, and there are street sellers who pedal about tricycles with a small loudspeaker blaring "dofu hua, liang fen" and it is a cosy background sound I actually quite miss when I'm not here. On a couple of tables I saw trays with an array of small bowls of various vegetarian goodness, together with mini thin pancakes as for Beijing Roast Duck, and decided I wanted some of that. Leilei too wanted some and for some reason they ordered a portion for each of us. Tan and Xiao Nong had some flat noodles, and Ling Ming had some "normal" noodles. The table was covered with food and even Leilei ate some of Tan's noodles before eating some pancakes with like a single bead of sweetcorn inside.

Ling Ming, his fiancée Xiao Nong and Tan tucking in to noodles. The tray in the middle contains various roots/leaves/shoots that you put into a little pancake as Tan is showing. Delicious and light. 

But it was delightful, topped off with the most delicious mango sorbet. It was only pure mango crushed with ice and some sugar added but I ate it so quickly I got a freeze headache in my temple so severe I couldn't talk or open my eyes for a minute. Stupidly, I didn't learn from this lesson and did the same thing five minutes later due to how gorgeous it tasted. I couldn't eat anything after that, although I wasn't stuffed - anything else would have pailed in comparison.

After lunch Tan went to A Xia's shop and Xiao Nong took Leilei and I back home. Leilei played on computer games for half the afternoon as I did some drying of clothes and other chores until 4pm when Ling Ming called us to tell us he'd be there in five minutes to pick us up. That was a bit more considerate than people who call you to say they're waiting downstairs for you "hurry up".

Xiao Nong was driving in her MG 3 - I hadn't even heard of that before. It was white, and inside was adorned with Hello Kitty memorabilia and Xixi was in heaven. Had it been England I'd have been too embarrassed to enter such a vehicle. We went to the same pool a couple of k outside Pingguo as I had last year with Yang Haiwei. It was a lot harder with kids, but at least Chuan Chuan, A Heng and Qiqi were there too. I did manage four lengths without kids so my exercise-infiltrated days has now been extended to four.

Hanged Hello Kitties

A trifecta of Hello Kitties

The pool we all went to - the deep end is separated by a metal gate but I didn't get much chance to go there...

Tea was at Waipo's but I didn't eat that much mainly because I was hoping to get out later in the evening and have some bbq or something. I did ask if it would be possible to borrow a tv as we had done last year. She pointed at one in one of the bedrooms and said that nobody used it and we could take it back with us. I had seen A Heng sleeping in that room yesterday morning and said surely it was in use, but Waipo said it was her bedroom and that she only watched tv in the living room. I could have argued stronger, especially considering the ashtray on the floor by the side of the bed, but thought better of it, and quite fancied setting up the Wii again, so Ling Ming unplugged it and took it back with us. But the kids wanted to come back with me, which was fair enough as they haven't seen me that much recently, so I took them home where we found Tan, who promptly took out Xixi to get her toenails done (Tan's, not Xixi's).

Leilei and I went for a wee ride to Yi Xiao. Until this year I actually thought that this was the name of a street with a couple of toy shops that he loves. Apparently Yi Xiao is the name of a school "Number One Primary School", and it just happens to be the place where there are a few toy shops. But I'd promised to get him a plastic sword to replace one he'd broken earlier in the week. By just pointing at one the owner reduced the price from 5.7 kuai to 4, and then I said he could have another one, an axe, for 3 kuai. On the way back we stopped off in the centre and for the first time since I have been coming here there was no longer the clock saying a quarter to three.

We went inside the new department store and it felt like we had been transported to a different city; downstairs was like a Debenhams with all the perfumes and jewelry and electrical goods. Upstairs was a huge supermarket which gave me hope for fizzy water. I did ask, and despite being told "yes" at first it transpired the answer was "no". I got the kids a couple of cartons of coconut juice anyway before we left. Good old consumerism is officially here to stay. It wasn't just this department store, but the roads are chock a block with expensive foreign imports and iphone 4s are commonplace. There is an embarrassment of riches and it seems that a certain percentage of people just don't know what to do with their money other than flaunt it. I suspect this is common to all countries coming in to new found wealth. Thankfully the price of living in many other ways has not gone up that much, and things like food are still relatively cheap.

Leilei and I were setting up the tv when Tan called to say that Xixi was bored with Tan's nailjob, which was another way of asking if I could pick her up (Xixi, not Tan). I said we'd be 20 minutes or so, which we were but we did sort out the tv and got the Wii working, if not yet playing any games). So after a ride around the town the three of us got back and I finally managed to get them showered and ready for bed by 11pm. Getting them to sleep was another matter as Leilei was reading and Xixi just wanted to have fun. With lights out and finally closed eyes I made my way out of their room only for Leilei to ask where I was going and Xixi to spring up again. Oh well, another 10 mins and they were finally out for the count, and hopefully won't be up too early tomorrow.

Badminton x 2 and huge lunch with Ma Laoban

It was a night of in and out of sleep and I decided I'd be better off out of bed by 7am. My headache had subsided a little and I thought I'd at least try to maintain my recent efforts at keeping fit - healthy body, healthy mind kind of thing. So I filled up with water and took my bat and towel to the old people's leisure centre but to my dismay there was no-one there playing table tennis. When I asked one of the people there why not he just said he didn't know. Although it might not seem like a big thing, this admission of not knowing, rather than giving a possible explanation was very refreshing.

So I decided to go for a walk in the guangchang to see what I could see, as I didn't fancy jogging with a bag on me. I came across a group of men chatting, which didn't seem odd in itself, but I also heard a very noticeable chorus of birdsong, which is notable by its absence here. I worked out that they must have taken out their birds for a, um, sing? There were brown cages dotted around the place, some hanging from trees, some placed on the ground, and the birds were communicating with each other. I understand from Lu Hai that these are fighting birds, and if he is anything to go by the owners sometimes expose the males to the females voices to make them aggressive for fighting. I didn't stay long enough to see any such thing, but I'd like to know what bird this is - maybe Andrew can help here.

Name that tune, name that bird

After walking past an old man singing from a sheet into a microphone attached to a loudspeaker sat on his bicycle for a reason I have yet to fathom, I happened upon a group of people my age or a little older playing badminton. I heard "lao wei lai le" (a foreigner is coming) so I waved and said "hello" to them as I came to watch. It transpired that a couple of them could speak some English, including one who said he was an English teacher, and within a minute I was being asked to join in. I was more than happy to and my level was not far off theirs. My partner and I lost the first game 21-19 to two ladies, but were asked to stay on for another game. This time we beat two other ladies 21-19 as I was more warmed up. By now it was 8.30am and I knew I needed to take the kids to school. I explained this to the group and they told me to come back as they meet every morning at 7am. I intend to do so.

After a shower I got to Waipo's soon after 9am but the kids were still asleep; Leilei with Er Jie and Xixi on the floor with Chuan Chuan. It took a while to get them washed clothed and breakfasted but we got to school around 10am so it wasn't too bad. Back home I pottered about a bit until nearly midday. I was going to pop around to get some jiao zi for lunch and eat at home but I thought better of that idea and gave a couple of friends a ring. Uncle Yellow didn't answer and Zhang Hongping's phone was off, but Ma Laoban was around. He was just about to go and eat at home so I asked him if he wanted to eat with me. He was all for it so I drove down to his computer shop and a few minutes later I was in his car with his wife. I was going to suggest the soup place I like but I didn't know the name of the road, so Ma Laoban suggested a new place that he hadn't been to yet.

This place is near A Xia's shop, and in the baking sun we parked in the shadiest part of the car park, that barely covered the headlights. The restaurant was rather tastefully decorated and specialised in pizza, which wasn't something I was particularly aching for. However, we ordered a 12" cheese pizza and some ham and fruit salad that wasn't my idea. What I hadn't really realised was that we'd also ordered a steak and a portion of noodles too. The noodles were for Ma Laoban's wife, and she got three small bowls and shared it into three portions, then Ma Laoban chopped up his steak into chopstickable portions and we all shared that too. Then the "salad" arrived, which was a huge mound of reformulated diced ham, banana and some other stuff I couldn't recognise. It had an interesting taste and was actually quite nice, if filling. By now I was quite full, but a portion of six mini sausages wrapped in bacon arrived. I guessed we must have not ordered the pizza so bravely ate my two pigs in a blanket and had a sup of my beer.

Then, after a bit of shouting at the waitress, a 12" pizza appeared on our table, complete with three clear gloves like the ones you get at petrol stations for diesel. To be fair it looked ok, although they hadn't cut it properly. I forced myself to eat a slice, which had loads of cheese on it, using one hand in a glove and the other with chopsticks. Unfortunately the glove did not keep out the heat and I kept dropping it into my small bowl, thus disfiguring the shape of the pizza. Although the air-con was working fine I started to sweat now, but there was still three quarters of a pizza to go. We did laugh about how we were stuffed, but then Ma Laoban proceeded to pick up two slices together with his chopsticks and fold them over before putting in my bowl. Of course all the cheese in-between just fell out and went straight into the bottom of the bowl, and I had the choice of eating bread or cheese. I nibbled away at both but had no chance of getting through it. Ma Laoban served himself a slice in order to help me, but his wife wouldn't touch any more. Well we used the time to chat a lot as there was nothing else I could do, until eventually we decided to call it a lunch hour and bagged the last two slices of pizza and mostly uneaten "salad" and go back to his shop. They wouldn't let me pay (and it wasn't cheap - something like 250 kuai) even though I insisted that it was me who invited them....

I refused the invitation to drink tea at his shop, so we just chatted for the next half an hour before I let out a yawn I could hardly stifle, and made my excuses and way home where I had a small digestif before getting some kip. It was not a good sleep though as I kept waking up with heartburn. I don't think I'll be trying any more pizza this year in China.

I had 14 missed calls by the time I got up at 5.45pm. Six were from Yang Haiwei but his phone was busy so I next called A Wu who'd only tried four times. He was with Buss Hu at Hu's company and asked me to come down. I said I would as I'd called Boss Hu yesterday to see how he was. So I drove the seven minutes in the dian dong che, only slowed down by a couple of calls to "hurry up", and met up for a few more cuppas. A Wu had arranged to go to play badminton so I was prepared with my swimming shorts and a change of top. Boss Hu invited us and A Wu's family to eat with his family at a time of our choosing within the next couple of days, which was nice. But we had to leave to go to the leisure centre, so back on the dian dong che and up to the non air-conditioned courts. I kept score while A Wu played, and lost, to some other bloke I didn't know. Then I played the bloke and lost much worse. Then a short, rotund bloke appeared, who seemed to know A Wu and the other bloke, and I was asked to warm up with him. I like playing warm up because there are no scores and you're just hitting it nicely. But that lasted all of three minutes before he told me to "kai shi" (start). I was sopping wet from the previous game and warm up but started anyway. The only good thing about losing 21-6 is that it's not as long as losing 21-(6-x). But going against my better judgement I did play a second game and I did lose 21-8.

Even my portly opponent (who was as sprightly as a spring hare), did not request me to play again. I felt too tired and achy to sit down so slowly paced the circumference of the part of the hall that was not being used for the next few minutes while sipping through my bottle of water. My only break from this routing was to go and get a second bottle and sip through that too. After about ten slow laps I'd regained some consciousness but was glad to see that the others were getting ready to go. As if to seal this I went over to the counter and paid for the water and the court time. 20 kuai for an hour is very decent even for China, despite the lack of air-con. Looking on the positive side, the extra sweat produced was probably a good thing for tummies.

We were to go straightaway to eat duck, so I took the dian dong che while A Wu sorted himself out. A Ni was there with a friend, and I managed a few mouthfuls of duck breast and some lovely greens before A Wu turned up. I was in dire need of a shower so didn't wait for everyone to finish. They didn't seem to mind me leaving the table early.

Once showered for the second badminton reason of the day I went to Waipo's house to see the kids. I decided to take Leilei out by myself as Xixi was being taken out later. We went to a tea house opposite our place for a bit, and A Wu turned up too. As it was a tad boring we drove the 100 yards to the guangchang to go for a walk. I was charged 1 kuai for the privilege of parking the bike and nearly turned away to park on the other side of the road for free before deciding that would look a bit cheap.

Last year I don't think I ever visited the guangchang in the evening once, but it hasn't changed that much except to become even more popular with the locals for dancing, exercising etc. I got Leilei a helicopter type thing that you fling in the air and has a blue and red light on it that you can see as it hovers down. It cost 3 kuai, which I'm sure is three times more than two years ago.

We weren't that interested in the guangchang so I said we'd go down to the seafood place that I went to a lot over the last couple of years. The boss was there, happy as ever to see me and immediately grabbed a couple of stools for us and sat us down with some friends. A large bottle of lemonade was brought for Leilei and of course beer for the men. I had a quick gan bei with each of the five blokes, and a bite to eat, but as I was with Leilei, and he wasn't particularly interested, we only stayed 10 minutes before I promised to come back soon (hopefully they didn't think later that evening).

I took Leilei home and we got washed and ready for bed. It was nice to see him choose to do some reading himself (Diary of a Wimpy Kid) while I caught up on the news and the cricket. He fell asleep at 11 and I think I did so myself for a few minutes as I hit dreamland before realising I had stuff to do at 11.15.

Tan came home after having had a meal with all her friends in the Ming Dian hotel, and although I should have been more tired we didn't sleep till 3am in the end.

Table tennis excess and boss lunch

I was awoken at 6am by Tan telling me not to snore. I couldn't sleep after that so decided to go for a jog again at 7.30. But when I had just started I noticed some movement in the old folks' leisure centre and went to have a look, and noticed there were a couple of people playing table tennis. I was invited to play but didn't have my bat so I popped home and picked it up, together with two bottles of water and a towel. I'd never played in the morning before but it made sense as it was a little cooler. However I was rather out of practice, so caught up with a 62 year old who wasn't actually that much better than me. When thoroughly drenched with sweat (and I was topless), another bloke came along and after two minutes challenged me to five games.

I hoped he had meant best of five but thought better of trying to work this out by asking as I'd find out soon enough anyway. Indeed it was five games up to 11 points, and I lost every one, though by slightly better margins each time. Then before I had the time to gulp some more water another, rather portly chap, came to play me. Barely a rally was played before he told me to start the first of five games again. I was caned 11-3 in the first game but lost the second by only two points. I had noticed he was left-handed so changed my approach and won the next two games to my surprise. At every single point, win or lose, this man let out a huge guffaw in the manor that only Roger Hargreaves could illustrate. However, Mr Table Tennis beat me in the next game and I walked over to shake his hand. Then he said "hai you yi ge" and I realised it was only 2-2 in games. I must have totally imagined I lost the second game as we'd changed sides after every game and I indeed was on the same side I had started on. Despite my best efforts I was somewhat tiring and I lost the finale by two points.

Shattered, I flopped down on the bench and supped the rest of my water while watching Mr Table Tennis proceed to wallop the next bloke who was five times better than me. And then I noticed he was playing with his right hand. The clever bastard had used his weaker hand to beat me and I hadn't noticed. I need to practise.

I didn't get a photo of Mr Table Tennis but he looked rather like this

It was now 9.30am but instead of leaving straight away I found myself embroiled in conversation with a few of the locals. One of the blokes had a northern accent and I found out he'd come to Pingguo in 1992 from the North East to work in the aluminium company and stayed there since. He was now retired but I found out he was only 56...oh what a lovely thought.... The other people were very nice and very positive about me having two kids, especially one of each.

As it was gone 10 I made my excuses and went home, promising to come back soon. I grabbed a shower and tried to grab some rest but couldn't sleep so soon after exercise. Tan woke up a bit later and asked when I'd taken the kids to school. Shit, I'd forgotten about that. I called Waipo, where both had slept last night and indeed they were still at home playing. I went round to see them and Er Jie was there saying "bu gei tamen qu xue xiao" (don't let them get to school). I conferred with Tan on the phone and because Er Jie won't be here for much longer we agreed they didn't have to go it today and Er Jie could take them out to play.

I got a call from Yang Heiwei at 11.30 to ask me to come around to eat. For some reason Tan doesn't like me eating with him so I told her generically that I was going out to eat lunch. He picked me up from outside the house and we went straight to his office where I met up with Boss Huang and a couple of other bosses I recognised from the last couple of years, plus A Wu was there. We spent the next 45 minutes drinking tea as one does when one is a boss, before ordering some food from the restaurant downstairs and then going down there to eat. I was rather hungry and noshed on pig liver with bitter greens, lamb, more pork, and plenty of greens. As one boss left, another came, then A Ni came and said Tan would be coming too, which she did half an hour later, so all in all a fairly long and fairly simple meal.

I got home before 2pm and managed a siesta yet again until 5pm when Tan called me to hurry to Waipo's for food. When I got there she texted to say to not wait for her as she was having her hair done...what a cheek. I'm beginning to think that "kuai yi dian" (hurry up) means more like a simple "ok?" at the end of a sentence rather than anything to make you actually hurry up - certainly I now ignore the hurrying nature of it when told to "kuai yi dian".

As I'd eaten so much at lunchtime and had just got up I didn't have an appetite, but I forced a little down so as not to disappoint Waipo too much. Then I played with the kids as I haven't had that much time with them over the last few days. They were taken out a tad later but I didn't really mind as I was feeling a bit queezy, so I went home to relax.

I found that one of the cute goldfish was lying on the floor slightly floundering and I noticed its stomach was eaten away. Despite the fact we'd fed them it seemed that one of them had started devouring the other - what a piece of shit. After flushing away stomach-less I lay down and I nearly fell asleep again but was almost having minor hallucinations so stayed till Tan came home after midnight and had a bit of the bbq she brought home.

Early morning jog and early evening grub at Jie Jie's

Although I only got to sleep at 1.30am I inexplicably woke up at 3.30am. Try as I might, even counting in German I couldn't get myself back to sleep. I managed 100 in German and Chinese so descended into French where I reached 269 before accepting defeat. Come 6am I decided to make the most of it and go for a jog. I left my phone and only brought my keys with me as I walked out to the guangchang. Despite the early hour, there were a few people with the same idea, and elders just out for the walk clapping their hands together as a means of helping circulation. I haven't jogged for ages but it wasn't hard to remember what to do. I caught up with several people before I realised I was getting very hot and sweaty and tired. I couldn't slow down and let the people I'd overtaken catch up, so I soldiered on until I could see they had taken a different path, then I calmed it down a bit and finished the lap of the guangchang. During the lap I saw some people with personal radios or mp3 players but the main difference was that no-one was using headphones; they all had mini loudspeakers, so I had a little entertainment myself. I forced myself to do a second lap at a slower pace and although I was drenched by the time I got back had a really good feeling about having made it.

After a shower I got the kids up at 8am as for once they had both stayed at home after the karaoke. I took them for breakfast at the dou jiang place we have frequented for the last couple of years where we shared some egg, jiao zi, bao zi, sweetcorn pancake and they drank a warm glass of dou jiang. Ling Ming came to join us as he was going to work, and then Xiao Nong came to pick him up and I took the kids to school.

Outside the breakfast place the kids noticed this cute kitten, and then the lead it was being kept on wrapped around the tree

I was quite tired but stayed awake till 11.30 at which time I rang A Wu and asked if he fancied an early lunch as I was going to have an enforced siesta soon. He told me to wait outside our building and he'd pick me up to go and have noodles. A couple of minutes later I saw the black saloon as it bibbed and pulled up beside me. I opened the door and put my wet foot inside making a dirty stain before realising that it was not A Wu and in fact not even his car. I was rather embarrassed but the driver said it didn't matter. In the meantime A Wu had pulled up behind and seen the whole thing so we had something to laugh about.

So much for noodles - we went to a nice simple place where I ordered sliced fragrant sausage with greens and a fried egg on rice accompanied by a beer to help with the siesta. Then A Wu didn't order because he'd already eaten. Oh well, it was a great meal and the accompanying soup was nice too. The rice was served in a "mu tong" (wooden bucket) and as A Wu explained this to me I asked him if the "tong" was the same as in "ma tong" (western style toilet) and he said that was a disgusting question to ask when talking about food, but that I was correct! The meal and the beer did the trick as back home I managed a sleep till 5pm, by which time I had four missed calls (I never forget to put my phone on silent). I called Tan back and she asked me to dry the clothes before going to a Jie Jie's house near where Waipo lives.

Expecting to take the dian dong che to Jie Jie's I got downstairs after two calls to hurry up, only to find Tan in A Xia's car waiting to take me - could have made that a bit clearer darling.... At Jie Jie's house the air conditioning wasn't working which was a bit annoying as although the rain of the last couple of days had abated, it was still humid and getting hotter. I was still tired and nearly fell asleep sitting on one of the sofas until Tan told me off and Xixi climbed on me. So I went to take a look at the house. It took up the top two floors of the block of flats and the upstairs was even plusher than downstairs, with yet another living room resplendent with huge flat screen tv. The husband of the manor then came in in his police clothes and I gathered he was Treasurer of the police force here. It took another 20 minutes before food was ready when we all piled into the large kitchen (men at one table, ladies at the other) except for the kids and a couple of girls who stayed in the living room.

Two boxes of red wine imported from South Africa were brought out and at least three bottles cracked open. I took one sniff of A Wu's glass and insisted on drinking beer. However, the husband counter-insisted that I have some home made suan mei jiu (prune alcohol) as well which seemed fair enough. I asked him how strong it was and he said 22 degrees. I still don't know what that means really. I know he thought it meant 22%, as others have called Er Gou Tou 56 degrees when they meant 56%, but the most common beer here is qi du, which means 7 degrees, and that is clearly 3.1%. Do degrees equal percentage after a certain strength? I wasn't going to start that conversation at that time. Actually the suan mei jiu was quite nice but I didn't want to start gan bei'ing with it. Unfortunately, during the course of the meal sufficient quantities of beer, wine, and suan mei were imbibed to the extent that even I felt the effects. I once again used Xixi as an excuse for a bit of a pause, and during that time the husband came out and showed me one of the spare rooms where he kept all his home made alcohol, and there were absolutely loads of different types in varying sizes of demijohns.

The ladies having fun (and beer) at Jie Jie's house 

Gan bei'ing at Jie Jie's house with prune alcohol

I got out a little early with the excuse of taking Xixi to Waipo's, then got home soon after 10pm. As I got into the lift I met one of the neighbours with whom I'd briefly chatted recently and said I'd go for a beer with. He asked me to go with him to sing song so I tipsily said I would a bit later and exchanged phone numbers. Upstairs, three minutes later, I got a phone call asking where I was and I realised I must have agreed to go with him there and then. Not wishing any losing of face I put on some long trousers and a shirt and went downstairs where he was waiting outside a car for me. I got in and the driver introduced himself as A Chang, who was a classmate of Tan's in primary school.

I hoped the karaoke place would be close, as in walking distance from home, but it was the one a bit outside town near a lorry park that I'd been to a few years ago and didn't really like. Worse was that the room was empty, and it was now 10.40pm, and I had hoped to just pop in and show my face for a bit. So two of us sat there for a bit while the other arranged his friends. During that time we had a couple of small beers and I sang a couple of songs in a slightly weird atmosphere. Thankfully, within 15 minutes the room had filled up and I only had to re-sing a couple of songs and do a bit of cai mai. I don't particularly like to see women in a drunken state (at least in public) so when the evening fell into a disco state I told A Chang I'd need to leave after having a little dance with the kids. A Chang said he'd take me and that he had to go too. I hoped the latter was true and that this wasn't just to make me feel better, and I got home not that long after midnight.

Registering ourselves and KTV

Though I was bitterly tired I didn't get a wink of sleep during the night, which is not conducive to a good morning. However, I battled through till nearly 8 o'clock when I remembered I needed to register us with the local police. I drove up to the place by the guangchang to find the policeman I have registered with the last few years just starting to open up. When he finished his cigarette he explained something to me that I didn't quite understand - something about how I needed to get some info from the owner of the house we were staying in. I said Tan was the owner but he mentioned something about my mother- or father-in-law. So I got him to write it down on paper. One thing was for sure - I needed to go elsewhere first to get some paperwork before returning.

As it was nearly time for school I drove to Waipo's to find Xixi and get her ready and Waipo gave us a large bag of baby mangoes to take home. Once home I explained to Tan about the paperwork and she said she wasn't sure but that A Xia would help me out. A Xia then popped around in her new MG car to take Xixi to school with me. On the way back she checked out the paper the policeman had written on but didn't know where she should go, so she called her husband, who also didn't know. Then I called A Wu, who did seem to know but put me through to a girl who could speak English ok for some reason.

We finally made it to the police station by the river and as we arrived A Xia said it would rain. Fair enough, there were pregnant clounds above us and I hoped it would wait for a bit. Inside, I explained what I needed and the policewoman in charge let one of the un-uniformed young ladies help me. It took about half an hour to input my information on the new computerised form, not helped by the fact this was obviously her first time. When she finally printed it out I noticed a couple of mistakes but thought better than to mention it. For some reason Leilei and Xixi's forms were far quicker to do as a lot of information was pre-filled. I'm guessing that the system now is actually linked to the visa-issuing system, hence details like their Chinese names etc were already there. But if that was the case why wasn't my information there?

As the process was taking some time I told A Xia to leave and not wait for me. Although it was the decent thing to do I half wished I hadn't when the heavens well and truly split open and let rip a torrential downpour. I finally had my three sheets of paper and asked if I needed anything else. I was answered in the negative, but when I showed placeholders for photos they said I would need photos. "Oh, but it will be too late!", said one of the girls for some reason, thinking I'd need to do the photos before 12pm. Well, luckily I am fairly well prepared for such eventualities and after hailing a san lun che went home and found three passport photos of us (forgetting that the kids' ones were from quite a long time ago - in fact I think Leilei's photo for his visa was from when he was 4).

I got back to the guangchang police station on the dian dong che as the rain had eased down and I was in a bit of a rush as I had a meeting at midday. I got the paperwork done successfully but not until after most of the printed information was copied out by hand on a second set of paperwork....

I made my meeting in time and had finished by 12.30pm. I was shattered, but needed to eat so called A Wu and asked if he wanted to eat something quickly. He did so we went to the duck and goose place and this time had goose and greens with his driver. By 1.30 I was full and home, and as I'd had a reasonably profitable morning I treated myself to a gin and lemonade before having a well overdue sleep till 6pm.

I only had four missed calls, all from Tan asking me to go to Waipo's for tea. This I did before going out again for another round of pool with A Wu. We played 30 kuai for the winner and this time I stupidly lost 4-1. A Wu said he was embarrassed he still owed me 10 kuai as he didn't have change. He said that the amount wasn't important, but the principle! Nice to know some things are like that. I then got a phone call from Tan stating that Ling Ming had invited the family out to karaoke to introduce us to his fiancee (actually officially his wife as they have already signed the papers). It happened to be the KTV which is part of the establishment with the snooker hall, so we wandered over there. When I rang up to see where they were A Wu walked out and up the stairs to the badminton bidding me to follow him. When I caught up he explained it was bad style to turn up before the people had invited you, and he was ashamed! So he played badminton in his trousers for a few minutes until I got the call that they were there.

Er Jie's powerful ending of a modern Chinese classic

It really was a family affair and when I got there Er Jie was in full swing. She has a powerful voice to say the least but can also control it. I managed to record the ending of one of the songs she sang. Most of the adults took the kids home at 11pm and there was only Ling Ming, his fiancee Xiao Nong, and me left. It was like being an anti-gooseberry as they actually wanted me to stay with them and drink beer and sing some English songs, so I did so as not to be rude, though I really could have done with going home - it's not the same doing karaoke in a mostly empty room.

Leilei sporting a sporty new haircut and Xixi doing her best to look...err? 

Four men don't fit on a bike

We had a slight logistics problem at 9am as I couldn't physically get the three boys on the dian dong che. Then Nong Kaicheng said he needed to go to his mum's for an English lesson anyway, so I took him there and told Leilei and A Da to get a san lun che to school. That worked out pretty well as I needed to go and pick up Xixi and take her from Waipo's house. They are not a quarter as clingy at school as they were last year so I was able to leave them without too much fuss but not before I blew Xixi the biggest red balloon in the class.

I wasn't feeling particularly well and decided to go back to bed, but unfortunately I didn't get to sleep till gone 2pm and then didn't get up till nearly 6pm. That did the trick a bit, and set me up for the evening which was necessary because I ended up working till 2am. It's a small price to pay for the privilege of being able to spend so much time here.

Two cute little goldfish living in water oxygenated by the roots of a plant? 

Meal with teachers

We've only been here two full days but it feels like a week already.

Woke up at 8am and later took Xixi over to Waipo's. Leilei had apparently gone to school with his two mates so I had a fairly relaxing morning, and went out to buy some jiao zi. At 37p that will be one of my cheapest, and probably most common meals this summer at least when I'm working. I conjured up my sleeping powers and managed a brief siesta until A Wu called me to play "snooker" again. I asked if we were going to play badminton too and he said no as we were going for a meal with A Da's headteacher afterwards.

Unfortunately, for some reason I just couldn't aim while playing pool, and A Wu had realised that smacking the balls around wasn't conducive to winning, so was taking tamer and more accurate shots. I only lost 2-1 because of a couple of huge flukes on A Wu's part, or "fate" as he'd probably call it...I can see why this version of the rules is popular here as there is a lot more room for luck.

I had a blue three-fingered glove on my right and a black one on my left. Ronnie O'Sullivan eat your heart out.

We had to leave at 5.15pm as A Wu had invited the teachers and as such you have to ensure you're at the restaurant half an hour before anyone else. As it was this was a good move because they'd forgotten to turn on the air conditioning in our large private room - a cardinal sin here.

By 6.15pm the headteacher, A Da's teacher for next year and a couple of other blokes had arrived, as well as Tan, A Ni, and our kids. There looked to be too many places laid and chairs set up so about five were moved to the side so it wouldn't look too empty. When two more blokes came we were hungry enough to ask the main waitress to serve our soups. This quickly descended into starting on everything else on the electric revolving table, and over the next 20 mins or so a few more blokes came in, including the Nanning blokes.

Eventually, when the initial pangs of hunger were sated, beer and white alcohol were served (you either drink one or t'other - no mixing). Although you might expect teachers in front of their pupils' parents to go easy on the bottle it was quite the opposite. I should have known as I met the headteacher to "drink tea" last year where they were guzzling cold red wine with ice cubes. What followed was a lot of gan bei'ing, as every bloke had to do it with every other bloke, and the only women were Tan, A Ni, and A Da's teacher. Of course with so many blokes, people lose count of who they've gan bei'd with, so you get repeats. I thought better of telling the first bloke who double-gan bei'd me that he'd already done so as I didn't want to induce any losing of face.

Having a meal with A Da's headmaster and various others

Being the foreigner I think I got more of my share of gan beis, so I needed a plan for a pause if only to let the bubbles settle. Not for the first time I used the kids. I mentioned swimming and within a few minutes all three of them decided they wanted to go. That gave me the chance to take them to Waipo's house across the way and I eked out 15 minutes of relaxation.

But I didn't want to be too unsociable so I made my way back to the restaurant and found the blokes in full swing playing cai ma. The bloke on my right had apparently started on the bloke on my left (the headteacher) with four rounds of first-to-four. By the time I got there and worked out what was going on he was three people away from finishing the table. He promptly did this and I found out he'd beaten every single person and only I was left. I was glad I'd had my break as he walloped me 4-0 on the first round. I protested that I wasn't used to playing in Mandarin and he said fine we'll play in Bai Hua (Guangxi Cantonese with a bit of local language mixed in). To the delight of the whole table I won the second round 4-2 and received a round of applause! But miracles were not to happen and I lost the last two heavily. I am still trying to work out just how some people can be so much better, so regularly, than others. I'm quite good as I can be fairly random, but to move up the ranks I'm going to have to quickly identify patterns in others, then perform fake patterns myself to lull my opponent into a false sense of security. All this sounds a lot easier when you're 100% sober.

Eventually, when things showed no signs of letting up, I made my excuses and said I'd have to leave. This was accepted, but not before just about everyone left gan bei'd me again. I'm not sure I'd have drunk more if I'd stayed. But it was nice to get out into fresh air, and I walked home before realising it was only 9.30pm and I'd committed the sin of not going for a headwash within two days of arriving! With the wife and kids taken care of I unguiltily took the dian dong che to the place I've frequented with A Wu many times in the past. They all remembered me there and immediately got a young lady to settle me down. The next 50 minutes would have been total bliss if A Wu hadn't started calling about half way through. I told him to come around and he said he would but he didn't, so I said I'd see him later. I was so comfortable I took the most expensive 35 kuai shampoo (there was 25 and 20 too) and even let the girl crack my neck. I still can't believe that you are supposedly paying for the shampoo and not someone's time. I left relaxed and soberer and made my way home, where I found A Ni and A Wu, the latter a bit the worse for wear.

I'd given A Wu three bottles of duty free earlier in the day and he insisted on giving me 1000 kuai for them. Firstly I insisted they were presents, and then that they were only worth about 300 anyway. He was having none of it and explaining that he would give them to other bosses, who in turn would do business deals with him, and therefore he would make more money. I've never heard him be so explicit about something so obvious.

I made him drink some cold lemonade with ice cubes (using up the only mixer I currently have for the Gordons), and he seemed to enjoy that, before lying down on our sofa. I called A Ni to take him home which she did at midnight finally.

A Da and Nong Kaicheng came over to stay the night for a change, which must be Leilei's first night here since we arrived. They looked cozy together but will probably not want to see the picture of themselves in the future.

Three boys sideways in a bed

I stayed up later than I should and found I had an email from work asking me to work tomorrow. Oh well, half expected really.

Badminton, pool, KTV, bbq...

Got up at 8am due to the noise. It's not just the traffic noise that gets through, it's more the beeping and occasional loud speakers playing music from cars advertising things. But you can get used to that - today it was the sound of drilling from not far away. Even though our place was opened two years ago, not all the flats are decorated yet, and here decorating means a lot of infrastructural work like doing the plumbing. I had hoped this wouldn't be the case as this year, unlike last, the lifts have had their protective wooden boards removed from the walls and floor, meaning that it is not expected to be bringing building materials inside. But I've noticed that one of the flats next door has yet to be decorated, as is the same for a few more around us.

Leilei had slept at A Da's place last night, so was not to be seen. Tan pottered about with Xixi and I was able to fall asleep again, despite the noise, till 11am...luxury. Then I took Xixi to Waipo's to have lunch. She would hardly touch her zhou, even though Waipo poured sugar into it, so I took her and Leilei out to a place I know that does a nice sliced sausage with greens and bamboo on rice, and offers free warm tea to customers. Neither of them seemed that interested in eating so I only ordered one portion and bought them a can of sweet tea each. Eventually Leilei had some sausage and rice, and Xixi a bowl of soup. I'm not one for forcing kids to eat - they will eat when they are hungry and I don't want them to associate eating with being told off. I think I'll be fighting a losing battle with that one - if they had their way they'd only eat sweets, but actually that might be ok in a way as we lose our first set of teeth anyway so maybe that's how we evolved.

I needed to register our presence in Pingguo so we picked up our passports and drove to the police station. As we were arriving (and noticed it was closed) Lin Hong rang me to tell me to bring the kids around to her house and play with Tian Tian and Pei Pei "big sisters". I duly did, but Leilei didn't want to play with the girls which is fair enough, so we went home. It didn't take long before A Da called me to ask where Leilei was. I said he was here and that he could come around if he liked. However, I had started to get a feeling in my bottom I'm only too familiar with and left my phone with Leilei and quickly made a move to the toilet. In the few minutes I was there A Da had called again, and Leilei had let him and Nong Kaicheng in. It was good to see the boys playing so nicely, even if it was just silly computer games on the Internet.

A Da, Nong Kaicheng and Leilei being a bit geeky and looking very silly

I conjured up my newly found dozing skills and managed forty winks or so while the lads played in the living room. One of the ways I sometimes manage to let myself fall into the arms of morpheus is to count each exhalation of breath in German. Not that I can speak it but counting is ok. And the fact that it is not a language I speak I suppose makes my brain concentrate on it rather than more exciting things. I find I can rarely get beyond 25 before either I forget where I am or I nod off. My one concern is that I become so familiar with counting in German that it no longer requires brain work. But I am prepared...I will just have to learn to count in another language. Logically that will run out too but if I become insomniacal in the future at least I'll know I can count to 25 in 200 languages.

My office (that bloody balloon has travelled all the way from London)

Tan called me to ask to bring the kids around to eat at A Hua's at 5pm. This I duly did and it was nice to see the house we lived in four years ago when we were here for three months. A Hua and her family are now living here full time and have done it up a bit more and it looks really nice. I said goodbye to the kids and then Tan asked why I was leaving. Apparently A Hua had invited all of us, not just the kids, though Tan hadn't explained that part to me. I said I'd arranged to play badminton (in English, so as not to embarrass A Hua, and also because I remembered it was Saturday). Tan asked me who I was playing with and I nearly said A Wu, but remembered that A Wu had gone to play with A Dong who is A Xia's husband, and I thought that would go down better. When I told her she changed her mind and told me to go and play badminton instead. Cool.

I got to the badminton place by the guangchang and went upstairs. It was like before but now instead of painted lines on the wooden floor they had laid special badminton court-rugs. I played a couple of games with A Wu, who has been practising for the last few years and lost 21-10 and 21-12, and then had to play the maestro A Dong. I was sopping sweating wet and tired due to lack of exercise but forced myself anyway. At 13-0 down I was in danger of being whitewashed but I clawed back to lose 21-3. The only moral victory was getting back to the bench in one piece to finish my water. A Wu wanted to go to play "snooker" but I said I needed a shower first, which he didn't look too happy about. But I took the one minute journey home and grabbed myself one anyway. When I got to the security man at the gate of our block he asked me if I'd been drinking alcohol, and I realised my face must have beed that red after the exercise. When I got out of the shower I had a missed call and a text from A Wu telling me he'd decided to do the same and would pick me up in a bit to go and eat duck.

We drove to another place we frequented last year that specialises in duck and goose, and ordered a half of the former and some greens. Surprisingly this was a simple meal with just us two and no private rooms. That was until we realised we'd never finish the huge portion of duck so we invited the Nanning blokes around. Well they'd actually eaten so we bagged the quarter duck that was left and drove to the snooker hall.

Snooker was actually pool, despite all the pictures of snooker players in the hall. I'd played last year and remembered to bring back the VIP card A Wu had given me then. There are about 20 tables each about 8' long and they are very fast. A Wu wanted to play for money - 20 kuai to the winner, so I said make it 30. Then I thought I'd better check the rules...well actually I ended up picking them up as I went along, which was a bit of an advantage to A Wu. It's similar to British pool except if you foul you have to take one of your balls out of a pocket and put it on the black spot. If there are already balls there you just push them down a bit until your ball goes on the spot (I suspect that is an A Wu rule). Instead of reds and yellows it's 1-7s spots and 9-15s stripes with 8 being the black. There is no 'D' so when the white goes in it has its own spot, and you can only shoot down the table.

I learnt just about all of these rules during one shot; A Wu had fouled but the black had come up the table to just below the white spot. As there was no 'D' I had no choice but to hit the black and foul straight back. But I got my own back; A Wu's only ball was on the black spot (the one he'd just had to replace due to sinking the white) so I left the white just above the black spot. He would have had a relatively easy shot but of course I had fouled, so had to retrieve one of my balls and place it neatly in-between the white and his ball, thus snookering him. I got the last laugh as he fouled his next shot and I ended up winning the game.

He didn't like my thoughtful approach to the game and leaving balls hanging over pockets - his idea was to just whack the easiest ball and if it doesn't go in hopefully it would go in another pocket. However, the same kept happening to the white too, so although he was down to the black he ended up with about five balls on the table by the end of the game. Having said that he fluked the next game before we started the third. I then got a call from Li Kun, whom I'd called earlier in the day to let know I was in town. He had said he'd meet me later but I wasn't expecting to go just then so I said I'd be about 10 minutes. What happened then was the longest bloody pool game in history. I didn't want to keep Li Kun waiting so I tried to see off A Wu quickly, but it was a case of more haste, less speed. So I tried a different approach of trying to lose, but couldn't play as badly as my opponent. I had another call from Li Kun asking where I was but A Wu said not to worry he could wait. Finally I beat him and rang Li Kun to tell him I was on my way. A Wu stayed in the snooker hall so I walked the five minutes to Old Tree cafe where Li Kun was waiting outside.

I hadn't realised he was going to book a whole booth, or that his wife, daughter, brother, sister-in-law and their daughter would be there and I'd held them up from ordering. Actually I should have expected that. Anyway we had some nice nibbles and a few Li Quan qi du beers before I got a phone call from Tian Tian saying Xixi wanted to go home. I told her to bring her to Old Tree and I would look after her. Xixi was a bit cold to Li Kun's two year old, and the other 10 year old girl at first, but eventually started talking to the latter about the menu before announcing she wanted the purple juice drink. I still don't know what it was, but she liked it before putting ice cubes in it and announcing it was too cold. Then, as kids sometimes do with cups with straws, she tilted it as she was drinking and I had a nice big purple cold spillage down my shorts.

At least she went off to play with the others for a bit while the dads talked and the women smiled. Not that long after though she refused to ask where the toilets were and the consequences were more see-through than purple and less fragrant. That marked the end of the evening, which, being 11.30pm was not such a bad thing. We said our thank yous and goodbyes and walked the two minute walk home for a shower.

As Xixi wasn't too tired I took her to the Ming Dian hotel where A Dong, the bloke who killed me at badminton, was having his birthday party. It was a busy affair with quite a few kids and I didn't really fancy staying. I didn't really fancy going to karaoke either but A Wu had texted me asking me to go as the blokes we met in Nanning were there. So I made my excuses and headed off home where I was picked up by A Wu three minutes later.

We went to the same place we went for Tan's birthday last year (not to be repeated this year I hope). It was incredibly noisy and most of the inhabitants were rather the worse for wear, including one girl who was plastered and could barely sit up. As I was very sober I had to gan bei with everyone with my least favourite beer sold here: 2.5% Pabst Blue Ribbon. And then the old cliché of singing the two songs I know in Chinese, plus Hey Jude (to the accompaniment of the aforementioned girl vomiting on the floor).


I was quite glad to leave but instead of going home we stopped off for some bbq outside the guang chang, which has become our local because the previous favourite, Tian Yang Po no longer works. For some reason I was completely crap at cai ma and had to drink copious amounts of Li Quan until 3am when even I was glad to hear Tan calling me to ask where I was. We all decided to call it a night and the Nanning blokes drove off in their nice new car, as did A Wu in his. I was probably the soberest and insisted on walking the 200 yards back home to find Xixi asleep with Tan in our bed. Apparently Leilei was sleeping at Nong Kaicheng's house so I took his room and went straight to sleep.