Weird day at water cleansing powder factories and dog meal afterwards...was it a dream?

I was up at a ridiculous 5.30am and wide awake for some reason that only looking back on my last 15 years or so here will explain. Good to his word, Haiwei contacted me at 7am to say he was picking me up at 8am and we went to the new police station place to get me registered again this year and it only took 20 minutes despite having a new system that hadn’t saved my details from last time. I saw other foreigners’ names for doing the same thing but thankfully they were all Vietnamese, phew...at least they should look similar to the locals, but I wonder what business they have in Pingguo county.

Becoming registered for the second time this year

By breakfast it was pissing down and I was very, very tired. Haiwei took me to a place to eat after attempting to dodge raindrops, and we didn’t, but arrived somewhere I’d not been to before. It wasn’t just the tiredness, I was feeling positively on another planet. A woman walked in and for some reason I thought she was the prettiest girl on the planet (not sure if the same planet though) despite (looking back on the photo) her not being what I would generally call sexy. I was clearly not in my normal state of mind, but I needed to eat and had what Haiwei ordered for me.

Avoiding the rain on the way to breakfast

I must have had a fever - I thought she was the prettiest girl on the planet for a while

Actual breakfast

Even looking at a tiny mobile phone fixing shop fixated me

Then we started driving. And driving. And it just continued for a long time till I realised we weren’t going to somewhere just outside Pingguo but Tiandong, which was 60+km away. I really wanted to nod off but the music was doing my head in - at one stage “Jingle Bells” came on and I started seriously questioning my sanity. Haiwei was not driving and was in the back seat asleep the lucky bastard. I was too tired to make smalltalk to the driver, whom I’d not met before, and ended up sending some messages to the family WhatsApp group to check I wasn’t dreaming. Thankfully Cat was up in Canada and confirmed I was indeed dreaming.

It really was Jingle Bells

I later found out she was tricking me but I nearly believed it at the time...

Eventually we arrived at a factory, met a few people, donned helmets, then proceeded on a tour. There was a warehouse containing huge revolving cylinders, which were exposed at just one part of the circumference for a few inches, where some sort of dust was pouring off them down a small ramp to be collected on a conveyor belt. Had Haiwei not explained about water-cleansing I would have had no idea what I was looking at, and despite the explanation I still didn’t understand most of what I saw. But the upshot was that this red, dusty material, was being bagged and sold as the water cleanser.

Generating water cleansing powder

Working the water-cleansing powder

We left, but not to go home - we visited another factory where it was pretty much the same thing except this time apparently the quality of the water cleanser was so high you drink the result. Previously the cleaned water was not potable but able to be useful for watering plants. I actually found this quite interesting but it didn’t stifle my tiredness as much as some other subjects might have. Finally we went for lunch, and it was a pretty good huoguo despite the warm weather. Haiwei suggested a couple of beers as he said we could get a sleep afterwards...I was in total agreement but he’d spent most of the journey here asleep already.

It still seems strange seeing European cars in China

Lunch should have given way to sleep...it didn't

But post-lunch there was no bed, just a car to the next factory. Only when we arrived I realised this wasn’t the car I started the morning in; it was the other boss’s, and actually had been since we left the first factory. So was Haiwei’s being left in Tiandong? Should I even bother asking?

Haiwei inspecting something that shouldn't be photographed

We finally got back to Pingguo soon after 4pm to a restaurant with three dead dogs strung up outside it. I was so tired by now it hardly seemed to register, but this was apparently where we were to eat dog later. I said I’d first go back and grab a nap which was met with disagreement and the advice that I should just stay around. But I held firm and insisted so the boss said he’d take me back. It wasn’t happening though so I went for a walk by myself until I got the inevitable call to come back. At least they deigned on bringing me home, but in the hour I spent there I didn’t get so much as a wink of sleep despite lying on the bed all the time.

Er...dinner

I suppose it would be the same if it were any other animal...or maybe not

And at 5.25pm I got the inevitable call to hurry back to the dog restaurant, and at least I could do it under my own steam. I had forgotten this was a working day for me and by now people in Europe were up, so I had to be sending IMs during the meal, for which I apologised, but I needn’t have as it’s pretty much accepted here whether work or not. The meal was very nice, but would still have been without the dog. I still haven’t come up with an appropriate word for dog meat though, but I daresay even if I do it won’t get into the Oxford English Dictionary any time soon.

It looks better cooked (and tastes better)

Aerating the wine

I don’t recall exactly what happened next, but I made an effort in the meal with Haiwei, his wife and second son, and a couple of other bosses, to partake in the wine and the good wishes, and by rights should have collapsed in bed at 8pm. But Advertising friend had pinged me to go to “sing song” and I have this stupid reflex reaction to accept just about any invitation that comes my way, so after I received the location information I made my way soon after 9.30pm. For once it was not a great idea...there are times when going to KTV is not advised and beinge exhausted and becoming ill is one of them. She apologised after a bit as she had to sort out some business for half an hour but during that time I made possibly the only good decision of the day and made my excuses and left. Of course I IM’d her to explain and I guess she was a tad sad but my excuses were genuine, and I hope turning up for a bit was better than not turning up at all.

Toilet humour Chinese style

Unsurprised Luwen and boss meal

Got up at a reasonable 10am considering I was unpacking till nearly 4am last night. After finishing off what was not a great job of packing I went to Luwen’s to surprise them and for lunch. To my chagrin neither his wife nor Luwen were surprised to see me. Happy, yes, but not surprised. And I couldn’t ask them why. I wasn’t due to turn up for another nine months but here I was out of the blue and all they could say was “have you eaten?” Ha, I need to get used to this...they don’t really seem to do surprised here. Still it was a lush meal with only a half portion of fen and extra quail eggs which I love.

Nice lunch

Then I had the slightly mundane tasks of doing some supermarket shopping and going to the Jun Lin Tian Xia service place to pay the service costs for the next year. It was a rather exact 1629.61 yuan and covered four different types of service that I didn’t quite understand, but I called Tan and let her talk to the women as a mistake on my part here could be a bit serious. But it was done and we should have nothing to worry about till next year, except for paying for electricity which is done elsewhere. I also managed to pick up the dian dong che from Jiuma’s but it had hardly any dian so I just about got it back to charge.

I'll have to work out how many km it's done in my absence

Late 2019 view while waiting for lift...will it change much in the next few years?

As it was Tuesday I actually had to be working, so got home and did so. Thankfully Ling Ming’s internet was still working at our house. Back in the summer he had told me that he’d be changing mobile phone provider as his current one was too expensive, and that when he did we’d lose our internet as it was part of the service. Well thankfully he hadn’t. And thankfully Li Kun had put some money in my account so my mobile was also working meaning I should be able to tether if necessary.

And so I worked till it was time to join Haiwei and the bosses for an evening meal at their offices. It was like I’d never left, the only difference being nearly everyone is wearing long sleeves outside even in the day when it’s 20+ degrees. Haiwei was talking about his soon-to-be new line of business, which was industrial water cleansing. He told me that tomorrow we were to go out to see some factories at 8am. I somewhat suspected it wouldn’t happen, and would be a problem for my work, but said ok. I know I went out a bit later but don’t really have a recollection where, but it wasn’t too late as I was in bed soon after midnight.

A good old-fashioned boss meal

Three flights and a taxi to get to Pingguo

I’d been wondering what would happen at Sanya. We were due to fly on from there to Guangzhou, but the flight number was the same. Were we going to sit down on the tarmac for half an hour while a few people got on and a few people got off? I’d had this conversation with Adrian and Andge down the pub just a couple of days ago and they reckoned if you were going to Guangzhou you’d stay on the plane, but if Sanya was your final destination you would get get off - just no-one would get on as it would be a nightmare from a ticketing perspective.

As it was we all had to get off and take our hand luggage with us. Then in a rather unorganised way we were somehow taken through immigration, which made me glad I’d filled in my landing card on the plane, together with Waipo’s address, or should it be Jiuma’s now? That wasn’t too much of a kerfuffle, but then we were obliged to do security again, and they discovered two cans of lemonade I’d appropriated from the lounge in Heathrow. Had I known about a security check (and remembered the drink) I’d have left them in the plane. One for next time…. At least I managed to quaff the last bit of pre-mixed G&L before I got there...the last I had and still two flights to go.

Now we were put in a waiting room, from which we could see the plane from which we deplaned 45 minutes ago. I don’t know what the wait was for but I decided to try to connect to the wifi as my bloody Chinese SIM card, which was working seven weeks ago, no longer was. It was one of those landing pages where you had to put in your phone number to get a text with the code. It was pre-filled with country code 86 for China in very faint numbers. I added my number but it kept saying there was an error but not what the error was. I was frustrated but calmly swapped SIMs, as I’d just done an hour ago in the plane, and tried again with my English one. Ah, this time I found that the faint 86 was actually a drop-down field and you had to specifically choose a country code. The faint 86 was not pre-selected, but just somehow to give an idea - I would have had to actually select 86 from the list to make it valid. What a crap user experience but I doubt it will change any time soon. So at least I managed to ping Li Kun to say where I was.

We eventually got back on the plane and it looked like not a single person had got off at Sanya, so it was purely for immigration - that seems rather a waste of resources as they can do that at Guangzhou...I mean landing and taking off just for this. Quite annoyingly I was due south from Nanning and a flight there would be under an hour from Sanya, but we flew due east to Guangzhou and at least it was fairly turbulence-free. At Guangzhou there was no bloody lounge to sneak a snifter in, but also not much time. I did find a shop that sold beer but I had no bloody cash and my WeChat pay still wasn’t working. In hope I asked the information desk where I could find an ATM and they told me there was one landside. If I’d had a couple of hours till the flight I may well have gone through security again just to get some money and a couple of beers. Another annoyance that won’t happen once crypto becomes the norm. So I took my seat and managed a quick video call to Haiwei and his son before being called to board.

The flight to Nanning was quite calm and totally sober except for single I found in my carry-on at take-off. A Pingguo neighbour had put me in contact with a driver and for the first time in my life when I exited the airport customs there was someone with my name on a piece of card: “彭多明“ I was quite happy to recognise it but he recognised the fact I was the only foreigner first and called over to me. It was 12.30am so not really possible to find a car-pool to Pingguo from the airport so we’d arranged this at 300 kuai - which would have been less than a night’s stay in Nanning plus travel to and from the hotel.

To my sad surprise the driver and I got on a bus. I sincerely hoped it was not a bus to Nanning. Thankfully my fears were quashed when he said he needed to park near to but not at the airport, and the second stop of the bus confirmed that. We got my stuff into the car but there was a bit of a pause as I had picked up a bit of a cold during the three flights and fancied a bit of tonsil paint, as I think they called it in the Wild West, for the journey. It was the usual 90 minutes drive, made slightly easier with the drink and the conversation. I felt I was really back “home” in a weird but welcoming way.

We stopped off at the bank and I got cash for the driver and for the house service until next year. He was grateful and I told him to hurry home to his wife and family, not that they would be up at 2.30am. I dumped off my stuff and walked to the guangchang where I knew there would be something to eat, and indeed there was. It may have been 3am, and there may have been the tiniest chill in the air, enough to consider wearing long sleeves, but there were people, some turning up like me. I treated myself to a dish of lamb and a single bottle of beer. It was a bit sad to be alone this time, but it was good to be home.

Pushing button number 14 and feeling a sense of being home

3am snack...yum

Impromptu trip to Pingguo en route to Bangkok

Well it was rather unexpected but I had to go to Thailand for work from 28-31 Oct and I had hit upon the idea of popping in to Pingguo on the way to “pick up some stuff for the wife”. Actually the quotation marks were not necessary as Tan (before I left) had straightaway asked if I could pick up some stuff if I was going via that way. So it was I found myself at Heathrow on Sunday evening eight days before I was due to meet the new client, and my destination was China, not Thailand. I’d managed to wangle a week in China in order to adjust to the time zone and prepare with a colleague based in Singapore. It made perfect sense really, not to mention the trip in total cost £492 as opposed to a lot more going direct. But it did mean three flights to get to Nanning, and arriving there late. Still, after a bite to eat in the lounge I did manage to sleep a few hours in the first long haul to Sanya.

Back from Hong Kong to UK...just

My own snoring woke me up and Leilei a few times during the night so it was hard to get up at 8am but I managed it and he wasn’t too miffed at getting up when I’d had my shower. It would have been a 12 minute walk to Kowloon station to get the airport express, but the heat would have meant carrying on sweat with us so we took a taxi for a fiver and it was well worth it. We really should have done the same yesterday despite the queues.

I tried to buy two express tickets from the machine but it wanted 210 HKD for two adults. Then I thought I’d better ask someone how old an adult is and that person laughed when I said my son was 14 - oh no of course 11 years old is considered an adult here. I only had 200 HKD so went to the human place prepared to pay by card but the woman told me it was only 150 HKD for two tickets. Sweet. Then just missing the train was no issue as the next one was eight minutes later. Immigration and security were a breeze, but when we got to the lounge we were told it was 32 dollars to get in. I showed my Priority Pass but this was Plaza Plus so apparently a more special lounge. I was tempted until the woman told me it was American dollars, so turned away after she tried to sell me the fact they had premium services. Yeah sure. We headed next door to find there was a queue for the normal Plaza lounge. We assumed it was too busy and they were only letting people in as people left. I considered going to the other lounge by gate 40 but by the time I did I saw that the queue was just for checking people into the lounge. So a couple of minutes later it was our turn and as soon as I’d signed my name we found a table for two by the food counter. I looked around for a while but everywhere else was taken up, almost all by oriental-looking people. I guess this is a demographic of wealth around this area now.

I got myself scrambled eggs and chicken sausages and used a knife and fork for the first time for six weeks, but hadn’t forgotten how to do it. Leilei had nothing but a lemonade as he’d wolfed down almost a whole packet of biscuits we’d bought yesterday. I saw someone getting a beer, and a woman getting a glass of rouge, but it was still not 11am. At 11 I gave in and got a glass of Asahi beer. It was rather refreshing actually as I’m not a morning drinker by any means. Two more later it was time to board and it was done fairly effectively. Naturally we were among the last to get on but there was plenty of space for our bags.

It was a stress-less long-haul back to Europe, and I slept a good half of the journey thanks in part to the beers. We got to Amsterdam with a couple of hours to spare and nothing to do so went to the lounge I’d become ever so familiar with in 2016 while working on a Dutch project. I justified a couple of drinks as I knew that the landing in London City would be at 5 degrees, and therefore harsher than most airports. But it was ok. We got out without too much ado and after getting to Woolwich Arsenal got an Uber back home, and didn’t even get cursed too much.

Do not disturb

Healthy diet at Amsterdam

Coming in to City Airport

Later I found out Hong Kong airport had been closed about an hour after we left due to the protesters. I outwardly expressed relief when I heard this but inside I sort of wouldn’t have minded being kept in for another day or so. Oh well...here’s to next time.

Back in Hong Kong and oldest bottle of gin

Up at 6, then 8.30, then finally some more sleep till 10, when I knew we’d have to sort things out. Apparently we were able to check in at West Kowloon today, including baggage drop, so we ensured we had enough clothes in our hand luggage, had some crappy breakfast, checked out and decided we’d walk to the station. In a way I wish we’d taken a cab as although we missed the rain it was very muggy. But it was more interesting this way, and only took about 10 mins. I had anticipated going through immigration but there was nothing, so we got through security at 12.20 for a 13.49 train which was slightly annoying but hey.

I’d booked first class for some stupid reason, probably thinking it would give us more space for our luggage, but it didn’t, and probably just meant colder A/C. The annoyance started in West Kowloon where I thought we’d be clever and check in our luggage the day before as I’d read you can. It took a bit of asking but we found out this service was actually at Kowloon, not West Kowloon, but you could walk it over walkways in about 10 mins, which is a bit longer with large suitcases, and quite sweaty. And when we finally found the place to check-in we were told that KLM was one of the airlines that didn’t do day-before baggage drop-off. What a bloody pain - I’m sure I’d looked it up but it was probably more like they allow drop off from Kowloon but only same-day. If only I’d double checked. We agreed to get a taxi to the hotel which was only half a mile away but the queues, although not that long, did not have any taxis at the end, so we agreed to walk it. But I had the “good” idea of taking a free hotel shuttle bus to the hotels but although we were told which one to take it ended up taking us further from the hotel than where we already were. Sod it we walked the 15 mins and got there by which time we fancied a relaxing drink, but I had to pick up the laptop I’d left on 22nd July.

We did come across a car that Leilei thought was very cool though...just opposite our hotel...

...and Leilei even deigned to pose in  front of it

Leilei certainly wasn’t interested in coming so I took the tube four stops up to the place and confirmed they had indeed fixed it (a new motherboard at great expense and barely worth it over a new laptop but I do like this one). They only accepted cash so I had to go out to the now raining streets and find a cash machine. Annoyingly a bloke with a gun was standing outside one of them but I realised it was because they were replenishing it, and actually by the time they left I was able to use it after the bloke in front took out 10000 HKD. I needed a bit less but it was still more than Starling bank were allowing me to take out so I needed to send more money to Revolut via online banking so I would have enough. Jeez...crypto can’t become mainstream soon enough.

Back home with my new laptop I put it online and let the various apps update themselves - it was a joy to use after having used my old laptop for the last few months. Nothing against the old one but it’s getting slow and the screen goes off half the time when it’s not plugged in. Perhaps more importantly this one is louder so I can watch and listen to videos while brushing my teeth. But Leilei was hungry and so was I after my first 5% beer for a very long time. We found a really local place where a couple of old women who were eating there said the duck was great, so we ordered goose and pak choi with rice, and a bowl of soup for me. Leilei actually ate more than he usually would. I’ve realised since we’ve been in China he seems to have become my height, though I’m sure he was two inches shorter when we arrived in Hong Kong. When I ordered a beer the woman said “liang ge?” thinking Leilei would want one too. Well luckily he didn’t but that’s the second time he’s been offered one by someone thinking he’s of age. I thought the bill was a bit steep at 195 but didn’t argue, I just wanted to have enough to buy breakfast on the way back and get the airport express tickets tomorrow - that should be the last of the expenses.

But as I went for a wander I noticed an ancient half bottle of Gordon’s gin in the window of a “Wine shop”, so old it didn’t have the % alcohol on it, just 90° proof . I entered and asked how much for a half bottle of gin. The woman didn’t answer so I asked in English and she said 170 HKD. I looked surprised as even in 7/11 a half bottle is 80, and pointed to the front window. Ah, she said - 55. Well...I probably still had enough and the prospect of a couple of gin and lemonades with the City match in an hour or so was rather mouth-watering so I picked it up. The two shopkeepers were chatting all this time and I realised it wasn’t Cantonese and clearly not Mandarin, so I asked them and they said it was Nepalese. I quite felt like asking them about stuff but I had things to do like buying some zero sugar, fibreful Sprite for myself and some Pocari Sweat for Leilei, which reminded me of Japan 2003.

Pretty nice meal in HK

Oldest half bottle of gin in Hong Kong

Back in the hotel I managed to get Leilei to do some maths homework while my laptop finished updating, and found a decent stream albeit in Russian for the match. A really good display from City against a decent Brighton side who went for it. Leilei stayed up till 12.30 by which time I started watching the Liverpool match but before they scored the first of their three goals I was asleep after a knackering day.

Train to Guangzhou, meal with ex-colleague

So much for 8.30, but I forced myself at 9.30 and told Leilei to get up too, which he managed to for the first time this holiday. I faffed too much but did managed to take the dian dong che to Waipo’s house. Unfortunately A Heng, whom we’d visited yesterday to drop off the spare house key and had told us he’d be in, did not open the door. I was about to drop off the dian dong che keys at security when I had the better idea of just throwing them up to the first floor balcony. The first set was fine, but the second got stuck and were clearly visible in case anyone wanted to nick them, but that doesn’t seem to happen here.

Leaving the keys rather visible on the balcony

Finally filled up my charging card for the bike...just in time

Last pic of Pingguo while waiting for the lift

Recycling a load of Leilei's clothes...at least putting to good use

I walked back as the rain started pouring but I didn’t care. My spirits were already dampened by the thoughts of us leaving Pingguo. We really should have left before 10:50 for the 11:26 train. Most people get there an hour early, but I thought I wouldn’t waste that time and would order a didi che. I then found out the didi che section of WeChat is all in Chinese and if it wasn’t that important I’d have given it a go. But it was important so once outside I asked a neighbouring shop what to do and they suggested a san lun che. Well one was waiting, which was good, but there was no way it was taking us plus baggage like the one that picked us up five weeks ago. Except the people from the shop kept insisting one would be sufficient. It was one of those times I had to break in and tell them they were wrong and we’d get a second one (which had just turned up), and sod losing face. Leilei’s one decided to take a different route and we shouted at the driver to come our way, so he did until the next corner when he went his own way again. By now it was gone 11am and I was getting concerned as I remembered there is about a 100m walk after the drop-off point. Leilei had arrived a couple of minutes before me and had paid so I did the same and we got wetter walking to pick up the tickets. If we had had ID cards we’d have picked them up in a minute but I had to queue for nearly 10. Luckily security was quick except the woman singled out my hand luggage with a bottle of water in it. I asked her what the problem was and she said I had to drink a mouthful, and then it was ok. It’s only a bloody train...what about if it had been vodka - would I have had to have a swig at 11.15am? Almost immediately we were sent out to board, and the 4h17 min journey was relatively without issue except for the initial scare of not finding enough space to fit the luggage. I so tried to sleep and maybe I reached level one for a brief moment as for ages I couldn’t count to more than 5 in German.

Chasing Leilei on the way to the station

Guangzhou South station was its usual bustly self and I remembered to go to pick up our tickets to Kowloon for tomorrow. I would have done this in Pingguo if I’d allowed more time. This time we found a different place without a queue at all, so tickets in hand I had hoped to walk to the hotel but I had no idea if that was possible, so decided we’d get a taxi. There were a few touts who as soon as I said “seven hundred metres” turned away. Then I heard shouting and two blokes came running out of some entrance and jumped on another bloke and took him to the floor. Straight after that about a dozen blokes started running in another direction looking very angry. All this time I noticed there was a police building with a couple of officers, outside doing nothing. Rather disconcerting.

The sanitary bags are becoming more sanitary

We queued 10 mins or so for a taxi and when we got to the front of the queue and told the driver where we wanted to go he said no we needed to be on the other side and get a taxi there. Literally no-one was on the other side, so it appears everyone else was going further outside Guangzhou. As we went to the other side a bloke got there before us and put his large suitcase in the boot and got in the back. A moment later he got out and took his suitcase out. Didn’t the driver want to go such a short distance? No, apparently where the bloke wanted to go was covered by the queue we’d just been in. So it wasn’t just a foreigner making such a mistake.

Our taxi drive was fine about it being 700 metres away but didn’t know where to go despite me showing the address, but that was addressed by me giving them a call and letting him shout at them. We had a conversation over the next five minutes, four of which were spent at red lights, and I felt sorry for the 12 kuai fair and gave him 20. Only taxi drivers won’t refuse such a tip here.

We checked in to the serviced apartment and I contacted my ex-colleague to arrange to meet up in a bit for dinner to discuss business. I got some refreshments for us from a shop downstairs and this time when I tried to pay with WeChat I had some warning message I didn’t quite understand so I had to pay in cash.

We were pretty close to the train station...should have braved the walk

Leilei doing what all 14 year-olds would do in a hotel

Then I was contacted by a driver to come out. We descended to where we’d been dropped off a bit earlier but no-one was there. It was another game of trying to find someone without knowing what they look like but at least we should be obvious, and after another phone call and walking to another road we got a shout from a bloke wearing a tie and standing next to a nice looking black Nissan Teana. It seemed to be some sort of upmarket taxi service and during the 20 minute ride we had a nice chat about stuff, and as soon as we arrived and got out he drove away without asking for payment or anything.

It was good to catch up with my ex-colleague and his wife and kid, and the meal was very nice but so civilised compared to Pingguo. They even had two sets of chopsticks for each person; a white pair for taking food from the plates on the table, and a black pair for actually eating. I continually messed up and ate from the white and took food with the black, but it wasn’t an issue - even if I’d done it correctly it is very inconvenient.

I took the opportunity to ask why WeChat pay wasn’t working and he said that it had been decided to add more KYC security and you’d have to send a quick video of yourself saying who you are, as happens with banks here to be fair. But still, I had 206 kuai in my account and I effectively couldn’t use them now until Li Kun used my phone to confirm his identity. If this had happened just 24 hours ago it would have been ok. Yet another argument for cryptocurrencies.

Another bloke popped around too and thankfully his English wasn’t too good so I was able to have a last evening speaking some Mandarin, and we concluded with just a little beer and a discussion of a possible project in the near future. We had a similar service back to the hotel and I saw it would have cost 31 kuai, but it would probably be expensed, as the meal was.

Good to catch up with ex-colleague

Tired, I cracked open a beer and the two of us watched one of the Fast and Furious films...it was so crap but in my state I found it very watchable, but still didn’t get to sleep till threeish.

Boss Zhou meal and Li Kun metal ice cubes

Last proper day in Pingguo this summer. I didn’t want to be sad so got Leilei to come out with me to find something to eat. I had hoped to meet up with someone for a meal but I knew inside I needed the time to pack, so we ended up getting a portion of jiao zi, at least he did - there was only one left so I made do with two boiled eggs.

Boss Zhou had pinged people on a WeChat group to pop around for some food and drink after 7pm, so that gave me a deadline to sort out last minute packing stuff. I decided to leave a load more clothes this time as there is a possibility I will be back in a month or two and they’re summer clothes that I’ve had for multiple years in the UK anyway so are due to be replaced.

Of course the girls had forgotten a few things so I packed them in the space I had saved, then picked up Tan’s jacket from A Xia’s that she’d forgotten and picked up some food for the train journey tomorrow to Guangzhou.

As Leilei wasn’t that hungry I didn’t force any food on him but took him to Boss Zhou’s at 7.30. He was busy cooking for guests though so I said I’d take Leilei to eat elsewhere. This didn’t go down well so people eating at another table invited us for a bite and a drink, which we did, though Leilei ate virtually nothing, probably because he’d just had a cup of zhen zhu nai cha. Then he complained of a stomach upset which sounded like an excuse for going home, but I forced him to stay a few more minutes until Boss Zhou produced a number of dishes, mainly of lamb, but he still wouldn’t touch them. So I begrudgingly took him home knowing he’d be starving a little later.

Back at Boss Zhou’s I contacted Uncle Yellow, who said he was busy with his kid which was fine by me, but texted back later saying he would find some time. Then as per usual more people came and the beer flowed. Someone from another table invited me to go over and cai ma, so I couldn’t possibly refuse. But embarrassingly I beat him five times in a row after he insisted that each time the loser should drink a whole glass. Finally after trying hard I managed to lose, which gave me the right to leave the table and get back to mine. But I had to start the process again with Boss Zhou. He told me he’d wiped the floor with me two days ago which may well have been true, but I won the first four much to everyone’s delight, except me a little as I was getting thirsty.

Pretty decent nosh at Boss Zhou's

Then Li Kun called to tell me my ice cubes had arrived. Normally I can spin a conversation to make it mean I understand to some extent but this time I was flummoxed. He mentioned about the other day and I suddenly had a vague recollection of him having a medium dice-sized metal object in his glass of wine, and of course I wanted a set. Well he’d gone and ordered one for me of course. So I said to come over to Boss Zhou’s but he said no because he’d had too much to drink. I’m not sure that was the reason so agreed to go to his and he invited me to bbq. Now this was a bit awkward as there were still people waiting for me, so I got him to agree to compromise by saying I’d take him to bar 3000 degrees but would pop back first for 10 mins to say my goodbyes.

I was worried that there would not be enough dian in the dian dong che so we took it easy, and we made an order of bbq and beer, and I made an apology to the pretty boss for the other day in case I was in any way lewd after the wedding evening with Chen but she suggested I had not made any faux pas and I decided to agree. Then I got back to Boss Zhou’s only to find he was the only one at the table. Had the others thought I wasn’t coming back? Did they care at all? Well at least I could leave, so after a glass and many hugs with Boss Zhou I left him soon after midnight and got back to Li Kun at 3000 degrees for some nice nosh.

But I was aware Leilei would be hungry now so went up to see him and despite saying he wasn’t he asked for some beef bbq. So I went back down to order and have a couple of drinks with the manager, then back up to Leilei with his bbq at 1am, which he quaffed down, if you can quaff food, then back down for a final half an hour or so. Another goodbye to a good friend with a hug ensued before I forgot I still had to take him home, to his non-tea-drinking place around the corner before I went for a ride to use up the rest of the dian. After taking another friend back home it was gone 3am but I had the wherewithal to go to charge up the bike for a last time. But the bloke I woke up to do it smiled and said it was too late. I was annoyed but didn’t argue, and when I went down to park the bike found that indeed every charging space was taken. I guess he meant I’d arrived too late to find a space rather than too late in terms of time.

I really shouldn’t have had a beer when I got back but I put on a last wash and realised I should wait it out and put the clothes out to dry asap. In fact, I had two as I spoke with Awl for a while until I was just too tired to any more. But I remembered the clothes and made a massive effort to put them out to dry at around 4.30am, knowing I’d have to be up four hours’ later. Twit.

Girls leave and 2019 last supper

Tan and Xixi went back today (Leilei and I are due to go back separately in a couple of days). Predictably Tan had accrued more than she arrived with so she needed to buy a new suitcase to go back. Annoyingly this didn’t fit in A Heng’s car so he had to remove a box from it and I had to look after it until he came back. Annoying as I was planning on being out when he came back. But in the end he got back before I went out, but just as I was hoping for a siesta.

Leilei's hair needs some attention...yuck horrible food for the last time this summer

A Heng's low car, with Luwen's yellow-fronted shop in the background on the right

Well we’d said goodbye to the girls but were due to be back with them in a few days anyway. So, being free, I got Leilei some jiao zi for tea, although I only had eggs yet again. I left Leilei in the guangchang skating alone (even without Xixi) so I was very happy about that. Then it dawned on me I’d need to make tonight my last supper so IM’d all my mates to come to Huang’s Beihai place after 9pm and all replied in the positive. Don’t people have other plans here? Why am I asking that for the umpteenth time here?

Better late than never but now Leilei has his own key that cost about 3 kuai

Well, all except A Wu, who didn’t get back to me but I wasn’t going to lose sleep about him. I got there first of course, and made an order of some seafood stuff as one does. But while I was sitting with racist Huang and opening a first beer a pick-up truck drove past slowly with a tannoy attached to it blaring out something I couldn’t make out. But Huang could and within seconds his workers had brought in all the tables from the pavement outside. Clearly there was some police-like thing saying you couldn’t sell your wares for consumption on the pavement but when I asked Huang he just said “bu li tamen”, meaning take no notice of them. But that’s not what Huang’s servers had just done.  I really wanted to know what had just happened as it wasn’t the police who’d told them, but gave up on the risk of sounding rude, or finding out something that I shouldn’t.

The front of 北海海鲜

Anyway, we seemed to be allowed to put two tables together just outside the opening of Huang’s restaurant, as these weren’t on the pavement. Waterman was the first to turn up at 9.30, then the others turned up in dribs and drabs and it turned into a great night with my friends of from two years to 15, and I didn’t leave till nearly 2am (I did check on Leilei at home). The total bill was 1100 kuai, which considering it was for over four hours and included a lot of beer was ok (the last two years were both 900 though). On the way home I somehow happened upon Boss Zhou's place but didn't stay too long

The initial platters

Luwen, Uncle Yellow, Li Kun

Err...

I heard that the girls had arrived in HK from Nanning ok despite a delay, and were boarding the long flight, so everything was cool and when I got home I allowed myself a wee beer to drink slowly for a change, safe in the knowledge that I’d had another successful last supper and hope for another next time.

Ma Laoban red wine meal and more guitar

We took advantage of the jiao zi woman being back as we’ll not have her tasty pleasures much longer, and then had a bit of a lazy afternoon as sometimes that is what you need. But I’d promised the kids a ride to the shops to get some last-minute tat, before dropping them off at A Hua’s place as Tan was there with her friends to eat. I would love to have stayed in the place we lived in for three months back in 2008 but Ma Laoban had finally got some spare time from his new baby and insisted that we eat together. So I explained to the ladies and they all said that was perfectly fine.

Shopping with the kids..."Your text here"

The ladies about to have a meal at A Hua's place

And when we lived there in 2008...such good memories - note the Wii and balance board below the tv

As I pulled up at Ma Laoban’s Lenovo shop instead of greeting me with a “ni hao” he shouted at me to lock up the dian dong che. Ha! You haven’t seen someone for a year and that is how they greet you…. But I’ve been here long enough not to take any offence...he cared about me and that was his way of showing it. We took his Toyota 4x4 to some new place on the east side of town. He then took a box of “Left Hand” red wine bottles from the boot of his car, together with three other bottles that I couldn’t see the name of.

We went upstairs to a private room (of course) and he ordered what he thought fit to order, and over the next 20 minutes or so some more people turned up, including at least one woman I remembered from the last couple of years. The meal was great and the wine not drunken too quickly unlike previous years, so all in all a really comfortable evening. It took me an hour before I realised Ma Laoban was drinking alcohol-free red wine, which was cool not least because he was driving, but also because he admits to being virtually a non-drinker - though why he is so interested in red wine is still a mystery to me.

"Left Hand" red wine

Lovely Ma Laoban meal with red wine and red non-wine

I got back early enough to take the kids to the guangchang, and afterwards we popped in to advertising friend’s shop to hand back her macintosh and give a little present of some skin cream and facemask, before taking the kids home to shower. Then as I’d promised I met up with waterman for a few bevvies till nearly midnight when I heard from Awl that poor Woody had passed away yesterday. To be fair he’d been looking a little ill before we left. So when I got hope at midnight and saw that Xixi was clearly awake I told her the sad news and she had a cry for 10 minutes, after which we had a chat and I managed to get a laugh out of her.

Then I received a picture message from Li Kun from his tea-house where it appeared people were playing music. The kids were now lights-out, and I was in my last few days in China this summer so thought sod it I’d go, and ended up staying there till 2am singing and playing the guitar as you do.

On the way back home I passed by the bar that Zhang Hongping often drinks at but noticed he wasn’t there for a change. But the owner was and recognised me and hailed me to come. Oh dear, what could I do? We spent the next 45 minutes or so chatting and drinking until some new guests arrived at 3am, and I used this as an excuse to 1) have a drink with them and 2) to leave. Sleep came easily.

Family meal, Zhang hua, late bite

I hadn’t seen Zhang Hua much this year, so pinged him to see if he’d eaten, but as soon as I had Leilei called me to say I’d been invited to eat with family friends. This was pretty much the first time this year with the usual gang of Tan’s friends’ families; A Xia, Xi Li, A Pang and the like, with a couple of husbands and many kids. I said I wasn’t drinking but there was a woman there who was new to me who said she fancied a beer. So it was out of politeness that I said I’d join her as drinking by oneself in such a meal would not look good, so we ordered a very reasonable four bottles of 1998 Li Quan between us.

Then Zhang Hua got in contact to tell me to go to his mate’s new restaurant that I went to a couple of weeks ago. The kids decided to come as they’d had enough at the family meal, but weren’t too interested at this new place, and after a bit of watching football on the tv I took them home. Back at Zhang Hua’s it was pretty civilised until we were invited to move to a private room where there were many empty beer bottles on the floor, and four blokes and a token woman at the table. I had to make my excuses before midnight as I was simply too bloated, but advertising friend had left a couple of messages to go and eat and I thought “what the hell?” so drove over to south of the town. I had a bit of a headache already and I pulled up outside a pulsating disco place and my heart sank. I felt I physically couldn’t enter but then I heard her voice from a place a few doors away. Phew, a normal eating place

A group of us played mo pai, which I’m still not 100% on the rules, but it’s a much slower drinking game than cai ma, and we ate mini red lobsters that took ages to get the meat out of, but were worth it. Finally, I said I needed to leave at 2am, and they all agreed it was time, and one of them footed the bill of 1054 kuai. I didn’t even bother to try to pay any.

On the way back it started to piss down so I borrowed advertising friend’s dian dong che raincoat before I got completely soaked, and for once didn’t get waylaid on the way home, probably as with this weather there was no-one to waylay me.

Fat masseuse and too much going out

Well it was a bit of a wedding hangover, and breakfast was leftovers of the kids’ delivered noodles. At least it wasn’t DFC. I went to have tea at the same place as yesterday until it was time for the kids’ tea. At one stage a man came in for a massage, but a minute later left saying something I didn’t quite catch. Apparently he took one look at the masseuse and decided she was too fat. I could understand if it was that type of massage place but this was above board. Well...maybe he had a point but it was pretty incredulous to my British ears that he would have acted on it….

Actually I was "forced" to have some berry alcohol too, and tried not to focus on the lighter in the background

I can even use WeChat pay in the supermarket, though this time they scan me instead of the other way round

I picked up the kids to go the the guangchang as there is not that much time left, but bumped into Tan on the corner and she took them for the first time. I got home well in time for the Bournemouth game, and found a reasonable stream. But I didn’t have a stream of beer to popped down to the nearest shop to pick up a six pack of 1998 Li Quan. The shopkeeper’s husband was sitting having a meal with a mate and made me sit down with him but I kept it to one bottle, and told them I’d be back in 45 minutes.

The blooming stream broke for most of the second half but it looked like we deserved the 3-1 win but we also should have had a VAR penalty - how can something that purports to be so fair be so wrong? It was the clearest penalty you’ll ever see.

After the match I totally forgot to go to the shopkeeper downstairs for a drink as Li Kun had pinged me to have a glass of rouge so I popped over to him for a while where there was much merriment and I spent more time than I ought to have. I should have gone straight home afterwards but I’d noticed Boss Zhou saying he was eating earlier in a group chat so at 1amish I popped my head around just to see if anyone was there. “Go upstairs” I was told and I was immediately thrust into a room with him and three mates and was suddenly gan bei’ing and cai ma’ing again. But I was relatively good and kept it to just an hour.

Li Kun's daughters were still up post-midnight with the screens

With some random people I apparently know upstairs in Boss Zhou's place

The problem was I’d passed Zhang Hongping on the way to Boss Zhou’s and now he was pinging me for a glass. I wouldn’t be able to go back without going past him so accepted and spent the next 45 mins or so catching up with him. Catching up on what I’m not sure as I saw him just the other day but he seemed in good spirits anyway. The last two hours would simply not have happened if the beer here was more than 2.8%.