Got up reasonably early and my breakfast comprised last night's dish but the lads didn't want that so went out to find something. I asked them to bring back some food for the train journey. When they got back I asked what they had bought for the journey and the answer was "I forgot". Bloody 18 year-olds....
At 11am I went to reception and asked about the shuttle to the train station. I thought I'd understood what she told me and she said the next one was in half an hour so we got our stuff together and went down again. I asked if the room had been paid for but the answer was neither "yes" nor "no". I didn't really have time to ask exactly what that meant so just asked if I needed to pay anything - "no" was the answer I was hoping for and what I got, which is fortunate as we only have about 300 kuai left between the three of us and Pingguo.
The near midday heat was very close, but manageable. That was until the clouds parted and I realised why everyone else was standing in the shade of the fronts of the shops; I could feel myself burning within seconds, not to mention globules of sweat running down my face. I saw two minibuses, or bread cars as they're known here, and I saw that our ticket had 20000D printed on it which was the numberplate of one of them so we looked to be safe. But as the driver opened the side door people appeared from nowhere and pushed to get in with their huge suitcases and I realised that without doubt we really were back in the mainland. But I was worried as we also had huge suitcases and there was almost no space left, and then another lady rudely pushed in plonking her own white box of a suitcase on the step. I nearly said something but bit my lip. A man already in the van calmly redistributed the baggage that was already there and we all managed to fit it all in, though it was a very tight fit. Then the driver announced that this wasn't the van to go to the tube station, and the rude woman with the white suitcase had to disembark in shame (well I hoped it was shame). Still, there were two oldish women standing in the aisle, so I offered one my seat but the driver was telling two other women sitting down with their toddlers to put them on their laps to allow the elder women to sit down. You shouldn't need to be told to do that. The last 5 minutes were incredibly sweat-inducing, not helped by the bit of stress about possibly not getting in and the lack of A/C.
But we got there with two hours before our train, and the cool air emanating from the station was more inviting than anything we could have seen or heard or tasted at that moment. I'd been reading up about train luggage security and there are some very specific rules, such as no aerosols greater than 120ml. Effectively all your luggage is hand luggage on a train, so I'd been careful. But there is generally an air of randomness, and I was hoping we wouldn't get a strict official as we had five litre bottles of duty free (the rules say max size is 500ml) and our suitcases were over-sized and mine was overweight. As we put them in the scanner I noticed a man in front of me was taking various bottles out of his luggage and taking a sip of each one in front of the security woman, presumably to prove it was not dangerous. This was not really a surprise to me as I'd been asked to do that before, but I didn't want to open the duty free and take a lug of neat orange gin. As it was, all three of us went straight through and were not asked to open a single bag. I'll tell Tan that but if they are asked to open their bags it will be my fault!
Despite the air con the midday sun was coming through the transparent roof and causing us to sweat in our seats, so I tracked the source of the air con and found seats as close to it as possible and it was so much more comfortable there. The lads went on a walk around the station, and I realised there was no wifi here, and we would probably be without a connection until we got to Pingguo unless things have changed and the trains now have it. So I just sat back and people-watched for the best part of an hour, enjoying a lot more than I would have done at any train station back in the UK. I went for my own gander when they came back with a bit of food and thought I'd just double-check that we didn't need a paper ticket. There was a small queue for the information desk but people just kept pushing in in front of me before I could get to talk to the bloke. I hate this, and hate to do it myself but eventually I just had to force my voice to be heard and my body to lean on the counter and eventually got the e-ticket information confirmed, and the quay (A28) we were to go for. There was "only" half an hour to go so I thought it best to get over there. Indeed there were already queues and once again it was sweaty time. Luckily they opened a new queue for manual ID checking and of course there was a mad rush for it. But we were patient and eventually very relieved to find there was plenty of space for our suitcases as that is not always the case on crowded trains. A justification for the extra 15 quid each for first class. Pity they couldn't put on any wifi though....
The three and a half hours took a little less than that as we were now pretty relaxed. The next thing that could go wrong was changing trains in Nanning East as annoyingly when we booked the tickets the direct trains to Pingguo were already sold out (two weeks in advance). At Nanning we arrived 10 minutes late but still had 31 minutes to make our connection. It turned out we nearly needed all that time as when we went to change platforms a worker apparently needed to see our passports again. Then when she told us where to go we needed to show our passports again to get there. Again we had first class just to give a better chance of getting luggage space and indeed there wasn't as much as the previous train. But the lads were able to put their suitcases behind the end seats and we went to sit down for the last 59 minutes of our train journey. And it passed by relatively smoothly despite not being able to keep an eye on our luggage. We got off at 18:40 and I breathed a deep Pingguo sigh of relief and remarked to the lads "welcome home!".
It was genuine relief...it felt like there could be no going back now. Literally living the dream (or nightmare had it been full of westerners ). I'd not asked anyone to pick us up as perhaps I should have done but wanted to do something under our own steam. Three years ago Leilei and I had shared a san lun che from the station to home and I fancied doing the same thing, despite half joking they probably didn't exist any more. But that looked less like a joke as we passed the taxi drivers but I was determined and finally we came upon a group of ladies and their three-wheelers and negotiated two of them to take us to Waipo's place. The lads loved this welcome to Pingguo - so much more interesting than a boring taxi.
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| Taking san lun ches back home |
Jiuma was there to greet us and within a few minutes we all had our rooms and started the A/C. Leilei and Nedas decided they wanted to go out for a walk and I didn't argue, preferring to sort out my bags and grab a shower.
But first I asked if they had wifi and breathed a massive sigh of relief when she said she did, and 3 minutes later we were online again after 7h40m without connectivity. The VPNs were still playing up but I could get connected to people on WeiXin, so let the appropriate people know we were safely back in Pingguo, and I agreed to contact Li Kun when the boys were back.
So at 8.30pm Li Kun sent his location, which was on the south side of the football stadium and told us to get a didi che taxi there. I told him I couldn't use WeiXin to order one so would take a san lun che. He then told me there weren't any so I told him how we got back from the train station and anyhow worst case we'd just walk it in 15 mins.
Well it seems he was mostly right about the san lun ches, as we saw none and walked up through the guang chang in full swing. Yes, we were well and truly back. As we got to the foot of the stadium we couldn't see the place named 两室一厅 (Two bedrooms and one living room) so asked one of the outdoor food stall people. But she didn't know and told us to ask someone at the traffic lights. We had no idea of the significance of the traffic lights but headed in that direction before asking a bloke running a clothes stall. He didn't know either but when I showed him on the map he looked at the actual address of the place and part of it was 北们 (north door). Given we were on the south side of the stadium we said our thanks and headed to the north side. Interestingly, the floodlights were on and we could see people walking about as though it was a new feature of Pingguo.
In fact Guangxi Pingguo Haliao are top of the Chinese League 1 (2nd division) at the moment and I was keen to go and see them. Until I heard people have been queueing up from 5am to get their hands on them as the online ones sold out immediately. However, Ling Ming told me that if you buy a top for 120 kuai you can get in for free as a "cheerleader". So a week or so back I asked him to get 3 for us and indeed his wife Xiao Nong obliged and we hope to pick them up soon, but whether we'll actually get in or not is another matter. Wouldn't loads of people just buy a top to get into a match rather than queue up that early?
Anyway at the north side we quickly found 两室一厅 with Li Kun and two friends the only occupants. It was like nothing had changed. His male fried was already half cut and the female friend drank and served tea. The boys, having only had some crisps and sweet snacks since breakfast (due to having forgotten to get lunch) were famished and as soon as the soft chilli peanuts were served set upon them. But with chopsticks this can be frustratingly slow one at a time, so someone brought a spoon for Nedas. Well actually he is now known as Nezha, who is a famous character from around the time of the Monkey stories (he is a naughty boy in them). When the bbq started to be served 15 minutes later the two of them wolfed it down. I've never seen Leilei eat so much in one sitting.
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| The bbq went quickly |
When they were full they went for a walk for 20 minutes or so and said they were tired when they got back, so Li Kun ordered a didi che and used the address Tan had given me. I hadn't used this address with the san lun che drivers, preferring just to give them the name of the street and then pointing until we got to the house. I told Leilei to message me when he was home (we had wifi in the bar) but after 15 minutes was concerned when I'd heard nothing. There wasn't much I could do; they had no means of communication and only a key to the house. Finally, after about half an hour I received a message saying the taxi had gone to the wrong place. I have a suspicion there is more likely to be something wrong with the address as Li Kun had pasted it in the app when ordering.
After another 40 minutes or so I was flagging myself so Li Kun ordered me a didi che, but this time I showed him on the map where to go. As per usual the car turned up in under 2 minutes (I remember the days when Uber used to be quite good), we said our farewells and we'd meet up tomorrow when he'd sorted our SIM cards.
A couple of minutes later I was standing outside our complex 御景华庭 but before going in I thought I'd get three bottles of water for us. Well that turned into a walk to Huang's Beihai seafood place. I suppose it was lucky he was away in Beihai on business for a couple of days as I shouldn't be out too long, but some chaps at a nearby table recognised me and invited me for a beer. Well...I told them I couldn't be long as the boys were at home but still a bowl and a glass were shoved in front of me. I stayed for maybe 15 minutes and of course when I took three bottles of water and a can of lemonade they wouldn't let me pay for it.
Back home I saw a missed call from Li Kun and a message asking if I'd got home ok so I replied giving my reason for being a bit late...I guess he was a bit concerned, as I was about the boys earlier on. They didn't come out for their water so I assumed they were asleep. Something that I unwillingly avoided until nearly 3am according to my watch/app.
