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%.

A very unexpected wedding reception

Finally the jiaozi woman was back and I was so happy to see her. My first portion in about three weeks! Apparently she had been at her lao jia for this time...she could have least have told me before leaving.

The friend of waterman that I’d met while Tan was bbq’ing with friends the other day had told me we would meet up this weekend but not when. Rather than fart around waiting for him I texted Chen to say I should be able to meet him at 6pm after all and he replied that he would contact me later..

As I was “free” for the afternoon I popped out to have tea with a couple of friends of Boss Zhou, one of whom works in a massage parlour. I was tempted to ask for one but I think they wanted my company.

I got back at 5.30 and thought I’d enjoy a cold one and remembered that now I was officially back on holiday - technically no more work till we get back. But as soon as I opened it I got a message from Chen saying he was on his way to 3000 degree bar and would be there in 15 mins. So I had to rather rush my beer and 13 mins later I received a message to say he’d arrived, and while I was in the lift another to ask why I was taking so long. Ah this is the Pingguo I know and love!

Before I got to the bar I heard a shout of “Peng!” from across the road and saw him in a san lun che. Ok, so we weren’t going to 3000 degrees - that was just a landmark he knew I knew. It transpired we were going to the new hotel that was being built last year just north east of the guangchang. I asked why he wasn’t driving and he said “drinking alcohol” but I didn’t pursue whether this was because he had already drunk or was planning to, or both.

Meeting Chen in the san lun che outside our place

The hotel was quite the pomp it had been billed to be, and we said hello to a couple of people while entering. A pretty maid led us into the lift to go up a single floor and when we got out I noticed to my left a line of wedding people all dressed up. Chen went to the first in the line and shook his hand, so I did the same, wondering when we were to go for our meal. But Chen just moved down the line and eventually handed two red envelopes in, and showed me that one had 彭多明 written on it. Oh no! We were only going to a wedding reception and I was wearing my Chinese football top and shorts! Advertising Japanese Suntory beer to boot!

The room was massive, but so far only 70% full, and we found a table with a couple of blokes Chen knew. Some people had started eating but we waited until our table was full, then the beers were cracked open. Over the next couple of hours more beers were cracked open than you could shake a stick at. Even in China I’ve never seen people drink so much so quickly...it was carnage. I did my best to keep at a regular pace but people were coming to me and doing three gan beis at a time. Then the actual newlyweds and their entourage reached our table and we had to drink more. To be fair, Chen and the groom and a couple of mates chugged a whole can while I sipped my little glass - I was just too bloated by then, and made my excuses to go to the toilet more times than I really needed. At least the beer was the very same Japanese beer my Man City-blue top was advertising, so I made a joke that that was my job here, and it got more laughs than it warranted.

I was not expecting this

and the food was amazing...

Wedding madness

Eventually, after visiting other tables and playing cai ma with people I apparently knew, we left the place as one of the last people. But that meant we just moved on to a KTV place where I had to sing No Matter What in a huge room, but by then I’d stopped caring. A bit later we left the room but went straight next door to what to me was a carbon copy of where we’d just been. No more singing for me but more gan bei’s but thankfully only for half an hour or so before we left. I could happily have gone to sleep but for some reason we ended up at bar 3000 degrees for bbq. I seem to remember more cai ma and drinking with the boss, who smokes more than she should. Back before 4am I found myself mechanically reaching for a beer from the fridge. But as I sat down I experienced a touch of sobriety that told me opening that beer would not be a good idea. And I thankfully left it and quickly prepared the sofabed and within a minute I was asleep.

Sweaty basketball and finally finished work for the trip

Not up too late considering, but by the time I’d taking in the washing, hung the next lot out to dry, and put the third lot in to wash, then grabbed a shower, it was gone lunchtime and the kids had already had their dumplings delivered. Plus two drinks delivered by a second deliveroo person who arrived at exactly the same time. How inefficient.

I'm so embarrassed - for the last week I've been using this as fabric conditioner - I was absolutely convinced that's what it was...but Tan corrected me that it was "clearly" washing liquid...oh well...at least our clothes have been clean

All I had was an egg again, propped up with three packs of those almost weightless salty biscuits. Haiwai rang to tell me to come over and eat at his at 6pm, and I mentioned he had told me I was supposed to be going to his son’s school this afternoon (which I’d forgotten about until he rang). But he said “bu yong le” and that was that. At least I could focus on work a bit more, which I did until hunger really set in at 4pm. I thought I could hold out but it wasn’t going away so I opened another can of that expensive meat our ex-neighbour gave us the other day and guiltily had half of it.

Tan texted in Chinese to take the kids to A Xia’s where they would be waiting to take the kids at 5.30. At that time when I got them ready they decided for some reason they would rather go with me to Haiwei’s house so I called Tan and got the angry response that they had been waiting for the kids. Not much you can do.

We arrived pretty early at 6.08pm, and for the first time Haiwei hadn’t called me to ask where I was, and indeed was still cooking. I’d had the shits all afternoon and wasn’t feeling great, so took the opportunity of having a near-nap on his comfortable sofa counting in German up to 60 but not getting much further until accidentally switching to Mandarin. It was almost a dreamlike state and did refresh me a little.

The meal was typically excellent and Leilei ate up everything, unlike Xixi who has the smallest stomach in Pingguo. And instead of drinking more than a couple of cans afterwards we took our kids to Haiwei’s son’s school to play basketball, which Leilei was keen to do. It was dark and very sweaty - I didn’t particularly want to play but the lads wanted a father and son vs father and son so of course I joined in. Leilei is better than me but the two of them combined were a bit too much for us but who was counting? Xixi was a little bored so I suggested we play free throws, which she could join in with and was a little less energetic. We could have stayed longer but I really had to go back and finish work for the week.

Chen then invited me to go and eat at 6pm tomorrow, but I couldn’t confirm as I knew I’d be meeting waterman soon and he may invite me for the same time. No problem...he just said to confirm tomorrow afternoon.

After work I decided to go and see racist Huang but he was pretty pissed and boring, so much so that I didn’t feel bad relieving myself of his company pretty swiftly to sidle over to Boss Zhou’s place. He wasn’t there, but there were others who bade me over for half an hour or so for a couple of drinks. Then Zhang Hongping called me to say he’s seen me at Boss Zhou’s just now and he was just 50 yards away so I went there for the next 90 minutes until I could barely stay awake at 3am.