Basketball and birthday seconds

Managed to get up soon after 11am, which was going to be hours before the boys would emerge. So lunch was a simple affair of a boiled egg and some yoghurt, before A Wu called to invite me for an evening meal, which I guessed would be the leftovers from yesterday's affair. Of course he told me to be there at 4.30pm. Then Haiwei pinged me to ask if the boys could play basketball. Oh shit, he'd invited us to go and play this evening at his workplace. I answered that they could, but they were not very good, just before he called me to confirm we would be eating tea then playing basketball. He followed that up with a message saying he would be here at 5.15pm to pick us up.

It was nearly half past four but at least I'd managed to get the boys up. I had no intention of playing basketball so grabbed a shower and of course when I was getting out at 5.09pm I had a call from Haiwei to say he was waiting outside. Well he'd have to wait a few minutes longer...I'm so used to the "kuai dian!" it barely registers any more. We got ready and met him at 5.19pm, then we stopped at a hotel where his sons were with a couple of mates and told them to get into a white car. Why we had to go there to tell them that is beyond me in this age of remote communication. We drove the 8 km to Haiwei's impressive new work complex and parked by the basketball courts, and when we got out knew there was no way anyone would be able to play in this heat.

So we went into a large hall that was so much more comfortable heat-wise, even without A/C. As an evening meal we had what was probably the simplest meal I'll ever have in Guangxi outside of where we're living. It was the workers' eating place, and as such you pick up a metal bowl, plonk some rice on it, then, like a school canteen you hand it to the lady who spoons some tofu, duck, and greens on it and that's it. I think each person cost 6.5 kuai but we didn't pay ourselves. And the food was fine, and possibly the first beer-less evening meal since we got here, which was refreshing in its own right.

Workers' canteen

Simple meal

After the meal Haiwei took me for a tour of the complex while the boys decided to try to play basketball. I asked what they produced and apparently it is just a single product: tea alcohol. I tried to understand in depth what that exactly meant but although he tried to explain, the vocabulary needed was beyond me and I didn't want to be looking up literally every fourth word. I do intend to find out though in time as its these details that make our trips here much more a living experience than just a holiday. The complex wasn't yet officially open, and we toured some fancy meeting rooms before walking around the outside, where it looked like they hadn't spared much expense.

Haiwei was pointing out various trees and telling me how expensive each one was...30k kuai for this one, 80k kuai for that one. They looked fairly fancy but I have no idea how to value trees so just nodded as though I did. There were various large pots around that would eventually be filled with the alcohol liquid and stored for three years before being sold for 100k kuai each. So around £90k per pot. I should have asked how many litres each contained so I could make an estimate of how much a bottle could cost but it doesn't look to be cheap. After feeding some fish (reared as food for the workers) we got back to the basketball area but it was still far too hot to play so we went inside to fetch more water.

Tan's secondary school teacher called to confirm he had invited us for a meal on Wednesday evening, but also invited me to go to Nanning with him tomorrow for a drink and to stay the night. While somewhat tempted, I said I thought we were already invited out tomorrow, which was true but in fact that was when I had basketball in mind instead of today. Then he said he was in Pingguo this evening and could also see me, but he was taking medicine so wouldn't drink. I said I was busy this evening too but would ping him if I had time.

Haiwei in the hall of the new complex

The rather lush gardens and expensive trees

Eventually, as the sun started setting, two teams of five were organised, one including Leilei and Nezha, and a game started. I know very little about basketball but I do know that a normal shot in the basket is worth 2 and from outside that semicircle it's 3, so when the first shot went in I flipped over the scoreboard to reflect it in jest. But in fact that ended up being my task for the next 20 minutes. Leilei and Nezha were clearly outclassed by the other guys who play every week, and are very physical. They were both voluntarily subbed two or three times during the game and I felt bad for them, though at least Leilei made a couple of good blocks that got recognition. I hadn't realised the level of who they were playing with and thought it would just be two against two mates playing like he does in London. Still, I hope it was a decent experience for them.

A Wu called to ask me to come over. To be fair I had IM'd him to say I'd already said I'd go with Haiwei, and that I'd come over when I could. So I told him I should be able to leave after this game. Well the game continued after a few minutes' break and it was decided it would end at 40 fen. Now fen can mean "point" or it can mean "minute" and in this context it could mean either. So I double checked and indeed it was the first to 40 points, and by now it was 26-13 to the team without any foreigners. Well they duly won 40-32, so that was it, at least I hoped. 10 minutes later they were preparing for another game and this time one of them took a whistle and became a referee. I stayed on as the scorekeeper, and had to pay attention as the ref was taking it really seriously and making sure I put a 3 when necessary.

Basketball by sunset

A Wu called again and it was a bit tough to talk and keep score at the same time but I told him I'd come when I can, and then he put me on to some drunken mate I couldn't understand so I just said the same thing. I let some other bloke take over the scoring, and then went over to practise some free throws on the other court. Blimey it's harder than I remember in school. Finally the whistle blew and they came off the court but it was only half time, and something like 60-40. The scorer bloke said they'd play till those in front got 80 or those behind got 60. Fair enough. And halfway through the second half some bloke turned up with a couple of crates of cold beer. Now this could mean simply have a beer or, more usually it signifies the beginning of a session. But I'd told A Wu that we'd go there and the boys were also really keen to go as they were as tired as they were outclassed and probably not feeling great about being there anymore. So I had a single beer with some of the guys then Haiwei took us back in his car, earlier than he wanted no doubt, but A Wu had spoken to him so not unexpected.

The boys had been invited to A Wu's a few times but this was the first time they'd actually gone, and only because they were hungry after exercise and not having had too much to eat at the workplace. There were still quite a few people there (eating yesterday's leftovers), and there were minor shrieks as we walked in, and the usual photos taken over the next few minutes as the boys attempted to eat. They managed to stay half an hour and clearly wanted to go so using the excuse of needing showers they did their final ganbeis and were off, and I stayed the next 90 minutes or so feeding the ganbei machine and doing rather well until eventually there were only five of us left so we called it a relatively early night around 11pm, and Boss Mong decided he was sober enough to give me a lift home. Tan's teacher had left a message and a location earlier and I had pinged him to see if he was still there but indeed he'd gone back after taking his medicine. I contemplated going out again when home but decided I'd been relatively good today, and made an effort to keep it that way, although was still up till well gone 2am.

A Wu's birthday

A Wu called me at 9.43am to go shopping. Fair enough he'd warned me yesterday and I said I'd be up for it, so said I'd be ready in about 20 minutes. He picked me up in the BMW and Boss Huang was already there. What followed was quite a fun trip through the main market and surrounding stalls to pick up a load of food for what would be A Wu's birthday celebration this evening. Indeed three chickens and three ducks, copious ribs, and more vegetables than you could shake a stick at. Not to mention picking up 10 stools and a load of bowls and plates. A Wu paid for everything, though let me carry a lot of it.

I noticed how the bosses mostly speak among themselves in the local "tu hua" (local language), or "Zhuang hua" (Zhuang language as in the local "race" here) as they sometimes call it. Yes I may be able to speak a few basic sentences but I don't understand 1% of what they are actually saying, but Boss Huang was trying to teach me as we went along. I'm going to go with it and try to speak more. Literally every word they spoke in the market and surrounding stores was in tu hua, and it's what Tan speaks to her family. I guess in a generation or so it could easily die out, and my speaking a few phrases won't change that, but I'm hoping if I can get to learn some it might raise my Mandarin. Like when you get off the motorway and have to drive at 40mph it feels so slow, similarly I'm hoping if I've been trying to speak tu hua then coming "down" to Mandarin may make it seem easier. It's got to be worth a try.

Pingguo market in full swing

A Wu pointed at some sort of white vegetable and said he wanted some. Boss Huang pointed at it and shouted something like "shum chut" and I realised he was telling me what it was in tu hua. But I didn't know what it was in English, let alone Mandarin. Maybe learning tu hua is not going to be such a good idea after all. But by way of an explanation A Wu said it was "liang shu", a relative of "hong shu". Ok, so hong shu is sweet potato, so I knew the "shu" bit, but "liang?" this wasn't coming up in my dictionary so I'll have to remain ignorant for a while. Anyway it's a root vegetable that you can eat raw apparently.

Boss Zhou joined us during this time and we then went back to A Wu's around 1pm. The bosses set upon cooking lunch and I tried the Chinese trick of dozing. I asked his daughter for a pillow then, despite the bright light and loud cartoons coming from the tv, laid down on my back and started counting in German. It worked in a weird way...it wasn't like I was asleep but I could barely get past 10 numbers in a row, and I'd start picturing things in a dream-like manner. This went on for an hour or so so I guess I can class it as in the family of power-naps.

Lunch was a relatively simple affair of chicken innards, or "nei zang" as I now know. I couldn't eat the zhou so A Wu heated up a couple of zongzi which were a decent alternative, and filled me up. Now it was 2.30pm and I was told to invite the boys to eat at 5ish. Well I tried but neither would answer my call or IM. I think they've gone nocturnal.

All afternoon was spent preparing and cooking the food for the evening. There were never fewer than four bosses in the kitchen at any one time and more came and went, bringing more and more food. I asked if I could help and finally was allowed to prepare the greens, by tearing them in half then slicing the main stork lengthways to allow for better cooking. I'd received a phone call from China Mobile while in the lift taking the rubbish out, but not answered for fear of it being an automated message I wouldn't understand, or worse - maybe they were going to warn me about VPN usage. But back in the house I got the call from 10086 again and this time I thought I'd better answer. It started with some music for a couple of seconds so I pretty much confirmed that it was automated, but then there was a pause. I said "ni hao" and then the lady spoke to me again and I realised it was a real person, but with the background noise, and the formalness of how she was speaking I couldn't work out what she was saying, so handed the phone to Boss Zhou who was cooking at the time. After a few sentences he turned to ask me if I was using wifi and I nodded, then he asked if I was having any problems and I shook my head. He asked me some more stuff but I had no idea what he was talking about and after another minute or so he hung up. It's times like this I really wish I knew what was going on.

Then Tan sent a couple of screenshots from Douyin or Tiktok or Weixin, showing a couple of trolling comments under the video of me eating mango. They were probably just a joke (generic negative stuff against the English rather than anything against me) but she told me to be careful. But there's not much I can do...I got invited to go out and see a mango farm and had a great educational experience and of course some bits of it were filmed and it was totally innocent. Of course a snippet of 14 seconds found its way online and for a few brief minutes went slightly viral and attracted some comments, 95% of which were probably positive. The only way I could avoid this is literally not to go out at all.

"UK is the enemy"

At 5pm families started turning up with children, and by 5.30 some women and children had started to eat, though there was still a lot of cooking going on in the kitchen. Finally, soon after 6pm the blokes sat down to eat and indeed for a full 10 minutes no drinks were served. But at 6.22pm the beers were cracked open and the predictable ganbeis ensued.

Always at least 4 bosses cooking

I had to table hop to meet some new people and straight away spilt some beer on the shoulder of some bloke who almost took it as a compliment. He was drinking red tea but I ganbei'd him anyway. He went away and came back with some nuo mi jiu after saying he wouldn't drink beer as it made him fat. Well I agreed with him in principle but can't bring myself to drink that rice alcohol still...maybe one day. Well it was a pretty raucous evening with kids running all over the place and adult males becoming less adult-like by the minute, so I was a little surprised when A Wu said we would go to sing song. Boss Zhou was already asleep on the sofa and Boss Wei looked like he wasn't far behind.

Great meal!

But I walked to the KTV 5 minutes away with some other bloke who'd been ganbei'ing me and we got to room 999 where there were already a couple of blokes singing. And A Wu, Boss Zhou, Boss Wei and others turned up and I felt intensely sober, so managed a few ganbeis as I knew I'd be forced up to sing "Pengyou" shortly. Yang Haiwei arrived as the bloke who walked me knew that I knew him, so at least I had someone relatively sober to talk to, but yes, while I was in the loo I could hear the first bars of "Pengyou", and while I fished out the words on my phone I could even hear them restarting it so I wouldn't miss any of it. How considerate.

No under 18s of course

Haiwei motioned for us to go elsewhere due to the drunkenness of the others but then the birthday cake came in, and as is customary I dipped two fingers in and wiped it over A Wu's face. I had to do one more rendition of Pengyou, this time with A Wu, and to be honest it was quite fun. But Haiwei and I stepped out while every other bloke seemed oblivious, and had a refreshing walk to Tan's auntie's bbq place near the guangchang.

A Wu's birthday cake, not that he remembered

Of course one of the reasons I was there was to speak English to his sons, and younger son obediently turned up on his bike about midnight, with the elder one half an hour later with a mate, saying they had just been drinking whisky in a bar. He proceeded to demolish me at cai ma which was a bit annoying, but we had some English conversation, and managed to leave not too long after 1am. And I managed to pay 213 kuai without Haiwei causing a fuss for the first time in a while.