Back in Pingguo

Ah what bliss to wake up in Pingguo at a reasonable hour. There were no foreign devils so I got Tan and me some breakfast and we had a lovely morning in together. I knew Awl was planning to be on the morning train from Beihai to Nanning but somehow didn't think he'd make it as I got drunken texts from Venky last night saying they were in some Dutch bar drinking G&Ts and somehow trying to make me jealous.

Well I wasn't jealous but I was slightly surprised to get a call from Awl mid-morning to say he was on the train to Nanning. I'd worked out which train he'd get to Pingguo so knew it would be mid-afternoon and that he'd appreciate a pre-mixed DVDC. But it was lunchtime first, and I thought I'd go for a simple meal by myself. However, I noticed A Wu's car outside his office and as I'd been away I thought at least I could see if he wanted to eat with me.

It ended up spending the best part of an hour in his office and then him insisting we'd go to his new house that was in the process of being decorated. Well although I fancied a siesta I put that thought to sleep and went to his new place. I can't believe it's taken so long for them to get a proper place to live. For someone with two mines and a BMW X6, to be living in a two bedroom tiny flat with cracked floors and walls for 500 kuai a month seems ridiculous. But their new place is pretty nice - on the 17th of 18 floors with a nice living room although only two bedrooms. I can't help preferring our place as it's much more central and has the extra rooms.

A Wu trying to pretend he had me by the leash at his new house that will soon be liveable in

But suitably impressed, we went to eat and I was impressed that he took my advice of going to my local dumpling place where I often take the kids, and where And and Awl have also expressed their appreciativeness of. We got there and had a portion of jiao zi each and then he ordered another couple as they were that good. I've been coming here for two or three years now and I like to think of myself as one of their best customers (albeit only during summer), as I've introduced many locals here. I'm sure the boss does appreciate it but she rarely shows it to me.

Although it was around 2pm and later than planned I still managed a minor siesta. Wonderful. Then I got a call from Awl to say his train had been delayed. There was not much I could do but at least it gave me a bit of time to get his booze after a bit more shuteye, and carefully packed it into the Calvin Klein cooler bag along with a slightly naughty gin in an old lemonade bottle. I took a san lun che to the station for about 5 kuai and while waiting for his train bought a small bottle of lemonade and added the contents of the gin so I would have something to share with Awl should it be appropriate.

There were loads of san lun che drivers waiting by the arrivals gate, and I thought they'd be fighting for customers by the time the train arrived, but it appeared not so at all. In fact when Awl arrived I was near the front and the driver that said he'd take us got positively friendly comments from the other drivers. I could not make this out at all. If you're waiting to take people in your taxi surely you'd be a bit more concerned about being in the front of the queue to get people?

Well we got to our san lun che with the driver bloke and waited for Awl to get himself a DVDC while I also helped myself to a G&L in order to be with him. We drove straight back to our place as he had his stuff and was knackered and intended for him to get a wash before going out for a nice boss meal. But a few minutes later he ran to the loo and had a moment of Delhi Belly which rendered him not in the mood for going out. As he had his nexus pad and our internet connection I had no problem leaving him to convalesce a bit, although would have preferred him to come out for a sumptuous meal.

I don't remember the context of this photo but I think I was trying to get the kids ready for bed and this was probably some exorbitant excuse not to. It nearly worked.

Goodbye to Beihai

I somehow managed to get up at 9.30. It may have been something to do with Awl's description of the breakfast here so I got downstairs and in this case I do agree with him. English breakfast is and always will be the best. You don't have to go for the full monty but eggs and bacon are perfect. Luckily Awl had already been and gone so he didn't see me indulge in western indulgences. I also had a load of watermelon and honey melon which I suppose was healthy too.

Andge and I had to get the midday train out of here to Nanning as his flight was at 6.30pm and we were hoping to meet Tan and the kids who had gone to Nanning yesterday in order to go to some kids water theme park in lieu of coming to Beihai. We got the cab to the train station but after a nightmare queue where suddenly the Chinese cease to see you as a foreigner and treat you as any other we found out that there were no seats on the train, nor any tickets. If only they showed this on the displays...and the same was for the next train an hour later so we had no means of getting to Nanning we thought. But not for long - as we walked out of the station forlorn and wondering if we'd need another expensive cab some bloke came up to us telling us it was 60 kuai to take a bus to Nanning. We didn't look a gift horse in the mouth and despite it being twice the price of the non-available train we agreed and found ourselves on a small walk to a "bread van" car that fitted about eight people.

Thankfully that wasn't the bus to take us to Nanning. It merely took us to an ageing coach a few minutes away. So without much of a choice we dumped our stuff underneath and waited around 20 minutes till a few more people arrived and the coach was full. I wished I'd gone for a poo when we finally set off but I buckled up and Andge tried to too but he didn't have a buckle. So he tied his belt and hoped we wouldn't crash and be suspended upside down, and be unable to undo himself.

Andge trying to get out of his seat at the service station

The journey was a bit crap as the back-right wheel seemed to be under-suspended so the whole journey felt like we were lob-siding from back-right to front-left. But we made up for it with erudite conversation and shared our observations of China. We observed how the marvels of the closeness of family and quality of food compared with stuff that seems so crap to us like pavements that just end in a non-walkable area or magnificent buildings that just outside have dreadful plumbing. It's not that it's better or worse than the UK, but so so different. And you wonder if they really want to impress westerners or not, and if so why they don't just employ some consultants. I would be literally perfect for the job and would advise without insult, suggest rather than order.

But there were some other things we'd both noticed and remarked upon too. Awareness. Driving is something I've commented on dozens of times. I really like it from the perspective of someone crossing roads and also from someone driving. But I wonder if it extends further than beyond the steering wheel. Awareness literally seems to extend to the angle one sees. During the three hour plus drive we talked about this too and agreed that it seems that awareness, while driving, is applied to only what you can see in front of you. If anything is beside or behind you then the onus is on them to tell you if you are doing something untoward. Yes it may seem backward to a westerner (and it still does to me), but there is a logic to it and it works if everyone else does the same. But still to be oblivious of most of the traffic around you seems strange to me still after 10 years.

Not too long before we got to Nanning we passed by a mega sports centre...it was Wembley-like huge and we had no idea what team it must have housed but you got the impression it must have been important. But that was not our worry. I called A Wu and told him we were getting into Nanning but it seemed pretty slow. He didn't seem to hark my words and just said that when we arrived we were to find a taxi and go to his office, and apparently Tan and the kids would be there, which we'd both been hoping for. But then I realised I'd just spoken to Tan and she was very agitated as they were on their way back to Pingguo in A Xia's car and it had taken them an hour to get out of Nanning and now the kids were asleep...at least it wasn't my fault I think.

By the time we alighted at Nanning's train station we already were aware that going to A Wu's office would be a bad idea as it was already nearly 4pm. The airport is well south of Nanning and as it was an international flight we wanted to be in time. So I called A Wu and he said he'd be there in 10 minutes to pick us up. We were just off the bus and a few young ladies walked past us and insisted on taking their pictures with us. I actually rather enjoyed it as for the last few years it's been the kids who have been the focal point of literally hundreds of unknown Guangxi folk. Even an older woman, who had been sitting with her motorbike, decided she wanted her picture taken with us too, so introduced herself and got some pics on her phone. We were ruminating on this, and also on how so many cars thought it would be feasible to go down the underground car park against the "No Entry" sign, when we realised we really were in danger of missing the plane.

I called up A Wu again and he said he was 5 minutes away, but it was already 20 minutes and he should have been there 10 mins ago. I joked that he probably had stopped to buy presents, but I feared my joke was not one. We were really fretting by 4pm and all attempts to call A Wu went to a message to say he was taking a call at the time. Blimey, can't they do voicemail or calls on hold? We ended up getting in touch eventually to be told he'd already arrived, as we'd said we were getting a taxi. But he did arrive a couple of minutes later with A Ni in the back seat and loads of stuff in the boot. But we managed to rearrange everything before Andge was offered 400 fags he hasn't smoked for four years and a nice lighter he wanted but said couldn't take due to customs reasons.

Well we did get to the airport at just gone 5pm and there wasn't a great queue. So it was goodbye to Andge till the next time, and then we made the journey back to Pingguo. On the way the skies turned a deep blue and we were treated to yet another amazing lightning masterpiece that worryingly kept si ji's eyes more upwards than on the road.

Instead of going home to see the family we went straight to Bo Hai, the restaurant that specialises in goose, and had a rather nice meal in a private room with Lu Wen. The only strange thing was that they'd run out of just about every type of green vegetable - I suppose that's what happens when you roll up at 7.30pm without having booked.

Still not having seen the kids, A Wu and I went on to a massage place. I would have resisted going but my back has not been getting any better since my table tennis injury and it can be really painful just getting into and out of a car. Well the massage was sort of professional and included extreme pain but significant comfort too as she applied pressure to the point at the bottom left of my spine as well as everywhere else. But when I got up I knew nothing had really changed so I got my shoes on, woke up a snoring A Wu on the bed next to me and got driven to the bbq place to pick up some fried noodles for Tan before getting home and seeing the kids before a relatively early night.

V

Breakfast was included and went from 6-10am but even that didn't coerce me from my slumbers in the comfortable hotel bed. Why does it not seem possible to get such beds for our house? I dare say they're a bit more expensive but all the beds I've seen in Guangxi houses are fairly hard and to my western back rather uncomfortable. I suppose it may be something to do with the heat but if I have the cash in the future I'll certainly look at upgrading our Pingguo bed, or mattress at least.

The plan was to go to the beach, but when I finally got up at midday I checked my work email and found I had some stuff to do including sending an email in Chinese. So as the boys headed out in the midday sun I worked on that for a couple of hours before doing something I haven't done for months and poured myself a bath. As it was a holiday, and undoubtedly they were doing so already, I opened a cold can of Li Quan that I'd put in the minibar fridge, perched the laptop at one end of the bath, rolled up a towel and put it under my head at the other end, then started watching an episode of Big Bang Theory. I got seven and a half minutes into it, and not even a sip into my beer before Andge came in and I had to shout at him not to come into the bathroom as there was no lock.

Unfortunately he was covered in sand and needed a shower so that was my luxurious moment over for the day. I wonder if seven and a half minutes is actually the definition of a moment. I won't look it up but instead pretend it is.

I went to the supermarket that was closed last night by myself to see what I could see. It was quite a normal place at first, with far too many female assistants, who were embarrassed that they had sold out of nail clippers for me. But I got lots of compliments on my Chinese and I knew it wasn't because they were trying to sell me stuff because they weren't, simply "ni de zhong wen hen biao zhun!". I did pick up some peanuts covered with some hard shell that was supposedly a speciality of Beihai, and then walked into another section of the supermarket where I had to leave what I'd already picked up. The way this section of the supermarket was laid out was clearly zig-zagging through literally every single aisle so you could not fail to walk past everything for sale. That may sound like a good idea but it takes you forever and if you were in a hurry you would be well annoyed. Another thing to slow you down was the two to five assistants sitting at every corner. As you got within about 10 feet of them they would rise automatically and start talking to you and be delighted when you replied in Chinese. But it was also very like a computer game where proximity triggered the approach of new baddies you had to kill, except here their weapons were their smiles.

After zig-zagging for 10 minutes or so, having talked to dozens of women en-route, I happened across Andge and Awl coming from the other direction smiling and telling me I'd started from the back and would have to retrace all my steps. Oh well, that wasn't the worst thing in the world and we walked back and I picked up a 23 kuai back massager/vibrator that also plugged in to a USB port, plus a dodgy 80's picture that was either a tiger or a semi-naked woman depending on the angle you looked at it. I have no idea what I will do with it. Back at the "normal" section of the supermarket we bumped into Venky. We ended up getting a couple of cold beers and Coke 0 as well but as we were exiting, open beers in hand, I noticed an oyster stall where there was a sign saying "10 kuai". I had to investigate and apparently you paid 10 kuai and chose an oyster. The young girl would then prise it open with a knife and if there was a pearl there you could keep it. So I pulled out a 10 kuai note immediately and pointed out a rather demure looking oyster sitting near the edge of the aquarium. The girl prised away its life to reveal nothing but flesh inside. I wasn't quite inconsolable but she must have taken pity as she let me have another go for free. This time I closed my eyes before choosing and this time when she killed the poor oyster it revealed a tiny pearl maybe a 1/4 inch in diameter. And I was allowed to keep it? Yes! Andge immediately called foul and suggested (in English) that they had been pre-planted and weren't in fact real pearls. I wanted to argue but didn't have the heart to ask the young girl running the place.

Then Venky had a go and missed with his first and second choices...but the girl let him have a third go and when he finally got his own pearl and I realised either Andge was 100% correct or pearls are as common as muck. To be fair the girl did "prove" the pearl by asking us to scratch the glass of the counter with it. I couldn't tell if it really was a scratch or just bits of the pearl coming off on the glass and I didn't try to wipe it off.

In my excitement I may have dropped my oyster...

...but it was worth it as eventually I got my own pearl

On the way back to the hotel I picked up a set of nail clippers that usefully doubled as a bottle opener at a local shop, while Venky happened upon the good idea of going to the supposed English bar opposite to see if they had vodka for sale. I wasn't too bothered so left them to it and went back to the hotel room. A few minutes later they were back triumphant with a bottle of Smirnoff they'd bought from the "William Shakespeare" bar for about 180 kuai and invited me for an aperitif. We were peckish and had decided to try the hotel's own all-you-can-eat buffet for 200 kuai a person as it was our last night, so we went down at 6pm to find out it didn't start till 6.30 so Venky and I had a quick game of table tennis before going back for another aperitif. We ended up at the buffet rather later than 6.30 but there was plenty of food and there were plenty of people to eat it. Awl went for the westernmost food he could find just to rile me and after some turtle soup and prawns and sumptious other stuff I did actually manage a small steak but it had been marinated in Chinese style sauce so it was ok, plus I cut it up and ate it with chopsticks. They are now having a go at me for the slightest thing I do that could be considered western.

We were a bit stuffed afterwards so set upstairs for a digestif in the form of a small JD. Then I had the good idea of going for a swim but first I went on the search for a ball to play with in the water. I searched every shop within walking distance for a good half an hour and sadly came back with nothing. So I went down and swam a few lengths and talked to some locals until Andge came down. He asked how big a ball would be fun, which I thought was a weird question, and I said even a tennis ball would be great. Then he wondrously pointed in the direction of his towel which was covering a 4" wide yellow nipple ball he'd bought for Thomas. He made me promise I wouldn't hoof it over into the street, but then realised it's at least twice the fun being in a swimming pool with a ball to play with. We threw it around with some of the Chinese kids there and generally had a ball.

Venky came down a little later but it was getting towards 10pm so we had to leave. Awl and Venky faffed about ordering a further night here and then, uninspiringly, we went to the "William Shakespeare" but at least the English owner wasn't around. We ordered another bottle of vodka but they only had some dodgy Russian brand no-one had heard of. Still, with Coke 0 or lemonade it was ok. Our cultural experience in Beihai extended to playing darts and Venky and I having a pint of German lager in place of more V. I explored one of the private rooms and found it had filthy Europop videos on it, although somehow it attracted the others.

I don't understand the charms of Christina Aguilera or whoever when you are in Guangxi..

Although I spoke to some Chinese there and did a bit of cai ma I left around 12.30 for a bit of bbq at the same place as yesterday. Again I met some people and cai ma'd and probably didn't pay. The boys came out of the bar a bit later and found me and admonished me for not being with ladies, and after a few minutes we went back to the hotel at a reasonablish hour. Well 2am was reasonable but somehow we found ourselves in Awl's room helping him finish his V and take some photos as men all seem to descend to at such times. Finally got to bed at 3.30am.

If the picture had been taken from the other angle the tiger would have been a semi-naked woman - about the only sexotypical thing about this picture...

....but we did it again just for good measure

First night in Beihai

Got up somehow at 8am after 3 hours' sleep, which didn't bode well. I called Awl fearing he'd just gone to sleep but he was up ok too. I realised I should pack so sorted out a few clothes and grabbed a shower at 9.30 after which time Andge still hadn't stirred. I poked my head into his room and he told me it was ok he had an alarm, which he found out he forgot to set when I called him again at 9.50.

The taxi arrived at 10.10 outside our block. There was a bit of faffing about but the four of us plus the driver left Pingguo around 10.30, then stopped to get some petrol and bought some nibbles and beer from the petrol station. Venky had thoughtfully brought a couple of cans of Li Quan from his hotel room but they were already room temperature of a room without air conditioning.

The car was a medium-sized saloon but it was air conditioned and I got the front seat for the first stint. We played Tell Me for longer than most middle-aged men would normally, and the highlight was Venky's immediate response to "A type of flower" beginning with "S". "Self-raising" - genius! I noted it was 11am and Venky somehow knew that meant it was time to open a cold one. Luckily I'd been quite good last night so it didn't feel wrong to join him and it was a holiday after all. Andge and Awl were a bit more restrained, but the latter maybe only because we didn't have any DVDC.

Breakfast

We stopped after maybe two hours of the three and a half hour drive for more provisions and as a consequence of a couple of beers. Yes, only two small cans of weak beer each in two hours. For some reason the boys thought it was amusing to watch me exercise on those machines designed for exercising and stretching on. Blooming westerners. I also got a call from an angry Tan. She had planned to come down to Beihai tomorrow with a couple of families but now A Wu couldn't make it or something. I knew how she felt, being somewhat at the beck and call of him, so I told her just to get a bus or even a taxi. But she wasn't in the mood for solutions (as women so rarely are when flustered, even though it's apparently a lack of solution that causes the said flusteredness). So I let it be and just said if she could make it down it would be great.

I don't see what's funny about exercising normally

A sobering reminder about what might happen if you don't drive carefully (or someone else doesn't)

I slipped once due to the rain and my bad leg made it difficult to get up...but it's ok I have friends....

We actually got to Beihai around 3.30pm. It felt much longer sitting in the back of the car squashed between Andge and Awl during the second stint. We were pretty lost and my GPS wasn't tracking well and I had to keep rebooting my phone, which was very frustrating. So we pulled up at some girls selling swim-ring things for the sea and asked them for directions. We weren't actually that far and they pointed us in the right direction but even they wouldn't accept a few kuai for their efforts.

The Golden Shining hotel was pretty nice and luxurious by many standards and as soon as we'd got comfortable the nice storm that had been brewing up came to a boil with a delightful dark rainstorm. When it had subsided we had a minor swig of the bottle of JD I had thoughtfully brought along, and went down to the swimming pool. Awl and Venky were already in and despite my fears the water was a rather welcoming temperature. I only wished for a ball to play with. I decided to ask the female pool attendant if we could still swim if it rained. This caused a longish conversation where I tried to establish whether we could or not. Apparently when it rains the pool can get dirty due to leaves and stuff coming in. But surely that is only if the rain is accompanied by high winds? Anyway I didn't get a straight answer which was just as well as I wasn't expecting one. I just enjoyed the fact that we were properly on holiday and did a few lengths before grabbing a shower and heading back upstairs to change to evening wear.

Half way through my transformation

The boys were more like girls when we met by the back door of the hotel to go to town. No sooner did Andge see me in my long trousers than he turned around and headed to our room again to change into long trousers. Then Awl did the same five minutes later. Then even Venky decided to go back to his room and put on long trousers. Finally around 20 minutes later we all walked outside together and realised it was about 35 degrees so I took advantage of my thoughtfulness and rolled up my trousers to be shorts as they are designed to do, and took off my socks and put them in my handy pocket, while the others looked forward to a night of sweating.

We got a taxi to the centre of town for a rather steep 25 kuai. We walked around for a bit and I was quite happy not to see a single westerner other than my cohorts. We were rather peckish but Andge and Awl decided they would wind me up by looking for a MacDonalds. In truth we'd been dropped off at a not very touristy point so we grabbed a san lun che for four and told the woman to drive us to the nearest Maccy D's (to my shame). 10 kuai later we were dropped off at the town square and Andge and Awl's eyes lit up when they saw their golden arches. And they did. They entered with gusto and ordered a big mac and fries or something so awful. Damn, I was so hungry I almost wanted the same but Venky and I wandered on until we found a reasonable looking street market where we got some buckets of noodles and Li Quan beer. Ok the others may not have been jealous but we had all the waitresses taking pictures of us with them and got offered a free non-alcoholic drink (which we didn't take advantage of).

Four men in a san lun che in Beihai

One of the copious pics we had with the ladies of the night eat place - it rather suits me...

We got a call from Andge as we were finishing off our meal. Awl and he hadn't managed to find a supermarket with DC or V and it was getting late. I made some enquiries and it turned out there was a supermarket 2 mins from us. So we met them there and despite an abundance of Coke 0 there was indeed no vodak. Strange that Pingguo had plenty of V but this place, more accommodating to foreigners you might have thought, didn't. So we didn't buy anything and got a cab back to the hotel as apparently there was a huge supermarket next to it. Well there was but it was closed.

It was gone 10pm and too late to get a cab back into town for Awl's indulgences so we sat for a drink at the hotel bar area. Andge ordered three G&Ts but as I was walking past I noticed how pitiful the measures were, literally half a pre- 25ml measure (half a gil?). Our hearts collectively sank until we discovered that we could buy a bottle of Stolichnaya for about 110 kuai. But then we were told they had no bottles of vodka. We weren't impressed and asked them if we ordered a glass of vodka and Coke could they do it and they said yes. So we asked what would they pour the vodka from and they realised they would have to answer "a bottle". Then it emerged they didn't actually have any vodka. By this stage we were getting a little bit annoyed, though remained professional. We looked through the menu and found Absolut vodka for nearly three times the price of Stolichnaya and said what about that? Then they said they had some flavoured version upstairs. Blimey ok, so we ordered a bottle but said we wanted unflavoured. And so apparently they did have the normal version. Which would have been great only they didn't have Coke 0 for Awl. To make matters worse we then realised that the "tonic" they'd supplied with our near-homoeopathic gin was actually soda water. So we said we'd take more soda water to mix with the Absolut but then realised that that was the last of the soda water too! No Stolichnaya, no tonic, no soda water, no bloody idea.

There were a few small shops outside and I took Awl out in the vaguest hope of finding a mixer that didn't have sugar. I would have had more hope in Pingguo. The first shop we hit was a typical small place that sold many things that might have been useful at another hour of the day. But for some reason, in the same way as Awl's eyes had radared on soda water just a few days ago in Pingguo, the cornea of my left eye sort of recognised a bottle of Pepsi Max, though I've never bought one before. I told Awl what I saw and we inched toward the bottle. It was! It was a bottle of Pepsi Max no sugar! And not only that there were three of them. And moreover Awl found one single cold bottle of the same in the fridge. The shopkeeper looked at us as if we were properly insane, and couldn't help but tell us that no-one bought that. I didn't have the heart to ask her why she kept some bottles on display and in the fridge then. But we walked back to the hotel happy men.

Well I had a couple of vodka and lemonades in order to preserve Awl's Pepsi Max, but on the third I was already feeling the effects. So as the boys were ordering a second bottle (this time lemon flavoured as that was all that was left) I went for a walk outside. I sensed a bbq place across the road and was actually a little hungry. I sat at a table by myself and ordered five portions of beef, but while waiting introduced myself to a neighbouring table and ended up staying there for two hours playing cai ma and drinking some beer. I loved the beer glasses, which were much bigger than Pingguo ones, and contained some sort of gel that was frozen between two layers of plastic in order to keep the beer cold. I felt like a right tourist when asked to have a couple and the owner charged me 80 kuai for two of them. It was a bit of a rip-off but I hadn't paid for my food and really really wanted to bring them back. As I was about to leave at around 2am I got a call from Andge who was hungry so I bought a couple of portions of rice and stuff. As I left the table to go back to the hotel who should stumble into me but Venky in his bloody shades again. That dipstick was probably out on the pull but we went back to the hotel together where I got to my room and ate some rice with Andge while apparently going on a little too much about the amazing beer glasses. Sleep came easily after 19 hours awake with these boys....

Chilli meal and hot walk in the mountain

It may have been a second night sleeping in the study but I still got up at midday. And was up around the same time and we met up with Awl and Venky, the former having had no sleep yet again. We were ready to go to Beihai but Awl decided the plan had changed and went to bed. Venky had slept, but had a hangover so we went to a noodle place where we first ensured everything was properly vege (he couldn't eat the tofu as it was sitting in the same bowl as the meat), before enjoying a nice simple meal. Venky, without first checking how hot it was, dumped four spoonfuls of chilli sauce in his noodles. I had one and immediately realised it was not light stuff. Venky was nearly choking on his but fought his way through claiming it was a perfect hangover cure. I then had my favourite watermelon juice and Andge had a mango version to round of a meal that cost the four of us (with Leilei) at grand total of 21 kuai.

Andge with a refreshing mango juice and Venky with something else to quench his quadruple-chilli noodles!

A lovely meal enjoyed by all

After the meal we looked into a neighbouring shop with various natural goodness things. The shopkeeper gave us cold, slightly sweet tea and explained what the various things were. Venky seemed besotted by the hard, black, shiny mushrooms that are supposed to be a great hangover cure. I couldn't resist getting one jin (a pound) of dried long yan fruits to take back. I got the better quality ones that cost 50 kuai a pound but they were noticeably sweeter than those for 45 kuai, and got Venky a bag too.

It's hard to shop with a beer can glued to your hand but we managed to get some dragon eye fruit

...while Xixi enjoyed a cup of tea

As we wandered rather aimlessly through the streets we came across a woman squatting on the pavement next to three bags. Two of these had hen's heads sticking out of them but the other had a hole without the head. We watched in some amusement as the hen inside tried to put its head through the hole, until some bloke turned up on a motorbike and picked up the three bags and the woman and drove away. It was just a normal scene from Pingguo only made different by the fact it had been witnessed by three foreigners who found it interesting.

The poor hen in the second bag couldn't find the hole to poke her head out - come to think of it they were all a bit poor

Watching how the various things are burned in memory of the dead

As we were feeling good from our relatively healthy walk up the mountain yesterday, we decided to do it again. But this time as we were with the kids we went for the slightly smaller one on Deng Gong mountain by the guang chang. It may have been a shorter path but it was steep and just as sweat-inducing. But we all managed it in different times and the view from the pagoda was nice, if not as impressive as from Horse Head Mountain. It got us thinking as to what actually constituted a mountain. Andge felt that the ones here in Guangxi were not mountains, not because of their size but because they were covered in green and therefore more hill-like. I suspected size was a more significant factor in mountain-nous but neither of us really wanted to look it up. Some things were meant to reside in more of a grey area.

Venky slightly overdid it with the sun cream in preparation for the mountain trek

But it was worth it and the views were nice...

...even if that beer can is still stuck to your hand

Andrew met a millipede that tried to steal his penknife

The pagoda at the top of Deng Gong Mountain

As it was still gui jie we were supposed to be at Waipo's for 5pm so once again our mountainous exploits were mercifully cut a little short. Venky managed a five minute nap on the way down on a stone bench, and politely declined to come to Waipo's meal. Andge and I hadn't intended to stay at Waipo's for long but the heavens decided to open a minute before we were going to leave after the meal and plastered the floor with golf ball sized splashes of rain for a few seconds until water was flowing everywhere. It was a good opportunity for Andge to do a video call with Lis and Thomas, but the kids and I should have stayed out of the way as as soon as Thomas saw us he started to cry and was obviously jealous that they were with daddy and he wasn't.

The rain did subside and we went to meet the boys at their hotel and have a couple of drinks. My left leg has been getting worse and worse since my ping pong injury nearly a month ago, and I suggested going for a massage. It was a good idea but we had to sort out Beihai and all were on their pads looking for an appropriate hotel. It transpired that we did manage to book three rooms for the next two nights that Golden Shining Special Entry Hotel (4 star) and also book the 1200 kuai taxi for tomorrow at 10am. I just wish I'd had time for my massage.

In lieu of a massage we did go for a nice bbq to round off the evening, which ended in going to bed at 5am, in the study again. At least the water had finally returned though!

Reminiscing market stalls and mountain views

I needed more sleep than the kids appreciated as they kept running into my study where I'd chosen to retire from 9am onwards. After two hours of this I gave up trying to fight it and got up and showered at 11am. Chuan Chuan had bought some breakfast for the kids and as always got too much. But this was to my advantage as I had a couple of fried dumplings and some fried sweetish long stuff that you're supposed to dip into hot soya bean milk.

Andge got up a tad later and we both took the kids out to eat some jiao zi and bao zi at the local place. Everyone I take here really likes the simple fare the woman here produces, even the kids. Lunch done, Andge kindly took the kids out for a walk to the market and beyond, allowing me to get back into my proper bed and extend my sleeping time by a couple of hours. Really annoyingly we had no water this morning. Apparently a pipe had burst below and it would take a couple of hours to fix. I was counting on that as I needed a shower but Andge had cleverly taken one at 3am. Instead, Andge and I took down a couple of empty buckets and filled them up at a tap on the ground floor so that at least Tan would be able to wash somewhat.

Feeling refreshed by the sleep and the fact it was bucketing down outside and therefore cooler, we dumped the kids and went off to walk to Horse Head Mountain. I remembered that I'd made a 10"x8" print of a photo I took in 2003 of a couple of market stall holders. I'd made this because they still remember me and keep asking for a photo. I'd promised for a long time but it was time to deliver, and I even managed to frame it. So I brought it out with us wrapped in a plastic bag to save it from the rain. We barely got to the jiao zi place before we realised the single umbrella we had was not going to be enough for our broad western shoulders (not to mention tummies), so I bought a new blue umbrella for 17 kuai at the place next door in the most manly colour I could find of dark blue tartan. The woman asked where we were going and she looked at us as though we were bonkers when I mentioned the mountain. She couldn't help but blurt the obvious fact that it was pouring with rain but I countered by showing her the wispy clouds yonder on the mountain and said we would walk above the clouds to where it wasn't raining. She looked at me and said "how will that stop it raining?". I didn't answer as I didn't know if she was taking me seriously or not.

Andge modelling a particularly fetching dark blue tartan brolly - very Pingguo 2013

The shopkeeper at one of my local stores who likes me but thinks I am a little insane

We did stop at the market on the way and I presented the framed photo from ten years ago to the market stall woman and her colleague. They were as pleased as punch to have this little memento and forced a few pounds of dragon eye fruit and three fire dragon fruits upon us. We were grateful and asked if they wouldn't mind looking after them for us while we went to the mountain. This time I didn't say we were going to walk higher than the clouds.

The original Nov 2003 pic I blew up to 10"x8" and framed for the women directly to my left and right 

The "reunion" nearly 10 years later with stripy being the one on my left before and light green being the one on my right before - the taller woman from 10 years ago now lives in Liuzhou and the woman in the white here is new I think. Andge has just been stabbed by a light saber unfortunately

I haven't done Horse Head Mountain since the last time Andge was here in 2009 and embarrassingly couldn't find where you start the trek. We bought four cold bottles of water and I asked the shopkeeper how to get to the mountain and she told her young son to take us. I expected him to take us to the end of the road but it was a good five minute walk away during which we had a bit of a chat. When he showed us the entrance we were grateful and offered him a few kuai but he would hear nothing of it and waved away our gesture with a smile. It's a majorly relaxing thing about being here that you never have to fear about being ripped off or giving the right tip. There just does not seem to be that culture here. But it seems to extend even further the other way; I've lost count of the times I've bought something in a shop and the shopkeeper has reduced the price for me even though I had no intention of bargaining.

We did actually come across two people descending the mountain steps in the first few minutes but that was the total of our human encounters. The rain continued plopping down and we produced our own moisture as we mounted the mountain and our clothes became sodden from the inside rather than out. But the effort was worth it and we achieved not only calorific reduction but quite nice views of Pingguo, which I look forward to comparing with photos of nearly 10 years ago. I did have an old photo in my phone but it was unrecognisable from what we were looking at now, except for some mountains in the distance.

View from mountain in Jan 2004 - no guangchang then

View from mountain in Aug 2013 - I struggle to recognise much more than the mountains

We had to make a bit of a move as Tan had told us we needed to be at Waipo's house for 5pm for a family meal as it was gui jie, the time of year when you remember the dead by offering up food and alcohol and burning fake money. So we moved on to the pagoda and took a few more snaps before descending in the incessent rain. Andge managed to take a few more snaps of birds and we got home very soon after 5pm to find there was still no water, or at least there was but with very little pressure. At least it meant we could wash and brush teeth. Tan and the kids had showered at Waipo's and I was considering that but realised Awl and Venky had perfectly suitable showers in their rooms so after the family meal we traipsed off there with a perfectly good excuse for not lingering around longer.

Before the family meal for gui jie

We regrouped when clean and discussed arranging a trip for the four of us to the seaside town of Beihai. We could bus and train it but in order to save time we thought it would be more practical, and not that much more pricey, to take a taxi for around 1300 kuai. But before anything could be arranged we got a call from A Wu to go to a KTV place. Except this time it wasn't really KTV but we had a few social drinks before heading back to the hotel for some more arranging over western drinks. We arranged for the receptionist to call Venky at midday (as 11am was too early on the assumption he'd be up late due to waking up mid-afternoon), and the plan was to leave at 1pm.

At least we weren't leaving at the crack of dawn, so Andge and I went back some time after midnight and before I knew it it was gone 3am and City's first match of the season was under way. I found a pretty good stream and also found we were 1-0 up by that time. We watched the first half together but went our separate ways at half time. I never expected to stay up to watch the whole of the game but we were playing so fluently in a manner similar to the best we played under Mancini, that I watched the second half with a weak beer and enjoyed the 4-0 drubbing of Newcastle immensely.

Boats, birds, beer, shirts, and soda

So little sleep. Got a missed call and a text from V to say he'd arrived at Nanning at 5.30am, but although I awoke to it I fell asleep before responding. Then I received another text at 8.30am to say he was at Pingguo, but I missed this. Up around 10am, a bit before Andge. We took the kids out at 11.45 to get dumplings and bao zi which are a perfect brunch. I was still shattered and left Andge with kids to go for a walk and went back to sleep at 12.15. At 1.49 Venky came in smelling of alcohol and tickled me rather annoyingly wearing sunglasses and a grin only he is capable of composing. Awl looked a wreck as he hadn't slept again so he went back and I took Venky around looking for vege food. After refusing a few places I ended up leaving him in his hotel's local supermarket to get his own noodles, hoping he would find his own way back for a much needed kip and shower.

In the afternoon, as had been planned before, we went to the Lotus Flower place I'd been to a month ago, called He Hua. Unsurprisingly, Awl and Venky were not even contactable to see if they would come, not that we had any expectations anyway. I was in A Wu's X6 with Andge and Leilei and we picked up Li Kun too. We stopped at the guangchang for some reason and I said I'd drive. I remembered it as a 25 minute drive but it was more like 45. A Wu kept having a go at me for driving too slowly but Andge appreciated stuff like not overtaking on a blind corner over a solid line, especially when traffic ended up coming from the other direction. We made it safely to He Hua and immediately Xixi set her eyes on the boats on the lake next to where we parked.

So within a couple of minutes Andge and I were in the boat with Xixi, Leilei wanting nothing to do with it since the nightmare capsizing of last year. It was a pedalo boat, and when we'd convinced Xixi that she didn't actually want to pedal we found ourselves in about the most peaceful surroundings you can expect to find yourself as a white man in Pingguo. Andge spotted some birds and professionally trained his Panasonic TZ20 on some lesser-spotted pippets and a rather dapper kingfisher. We were enjoying our birdwatching so much it was a bit of a disappointment to receive a call to say it was time to eat but at least it took us 20 minutes to get back due to the fact that the boat would turn left ok but hardly turn right, meaning we spent half of our time reversing back to the place to get off.

Arriving at He Hua in the X6 with the papperazi waiting

A lesser-spotted pippet

Xixi manning our left-turn only boat on the way to the meal

Really good meal with good friends

The meal was great, with the speciality we first thought was pigs in sheeps' blankets, but later turned out to be some sort of bacon wrapped around lotus flower seeds which were very yummy. Andge and I were offered a 3% beer and looked at each other and thought "why not?" and after a couple more glasses enjoyed the rest of the meal even more. I asked if we could still do a little boating and was replied to in the affirmative. So Xixi and I got into the boat but Andge wasn't to be seen so we set sail for a bit. Then we got in touch with him and he came down and joined us. Apparently he'd been offered a sample of the local rice alcohol. A Wu chucked us a can of beer each and then some dragon eye fruit but Andge wasn't entering into the spirit of things. Then it became apparent he wasn't feeling too well, so we got to one side of the lake and A Wu helped him out over the fence. It took Xixi and I a good 10 minutes to get the boat back to the mooring place due to the lack of turning right but we managed it eventually and went to see how he was.

Apparently that dodgy rice alcohol, which was only around 8%, but unfermented or something, had had a bit of an effect and not an alcoholic one but something much more drug-like. We spent the next hour walking around and drinking water. A Ni offered some special tea to make Andge feel better but he quite rightly refused to imbibe any further new substance. The rest of the men had continued drinking so when 7pm came around and we decided it was time to go I volunteered to drive A Wu's car back in the dark as I'd only had a couple a long time ago. Driving in Chinese country roads is bad enough when you can see where you're going but in the dark and half the motorbikes don't have lights I didn't care that I went slowly. And again we got back safely.

Just as we were arriving I got a call from the badminton shop I'd left some old sport tee-shirts in a few days back to get my Chinese name printed on. They were ready. So I picked them up and paid 30 kuai for four "彭多明" and one "27" on some old Man City shirts that immediately made them look a little fake but made them unique to me. I'm so glad I did this as on my last day last year I tried to get this done but missed out as it was gui jie and all the shops were closed.

It may not look genuine any more but I was genuinely happy to have this unique shirt

Venky and Awl called me around 9pm as Andge and I were taking the kids to the guangchang. We'd all been invited out to some bbq place, but I was also trying to meet Lin Hong's husband to pick up Xixi's rollerblades while Andge was looking after Leilei in the jumping castle. Apparently Awl had gone out first, then bumped into Venky, then gone back to the hotel to make some DVDC although he had been intending not to drink tonight. Apparently. Somehow we did all meet up among copious calls from A Wu and others, and eventually made it on foot to where I thought everyone was. But they weren't and it took more calls before Li Kun came to show us where we should have been. So finally we sat down at a half-finished meal and ordered loads of lovely vegetarian dishes and vegetarian beer and generally had a good time till nearly midnight when I thought it best to take the kids home for a shower. I got a little admonished from Tan for taking them back so late but blimey this was Venky's first night out and it's not like she took them with her.

First night out with the lads in Pingguo! Gan bei!! Venky you don't need the shades mate...

While the kids went to sleep with Chuan Chuan, Andge and I stayed up as he was still feeling the effects from the weird white concoction. We ended up watching "Four Lions" which was pretty good but petered out towards the end. I only had a couple of G&Ts as Andge was clearing his system with some slightly sparkling glucose and soda drink I'd bought in Nanning. I had been saving this for my gin but I was pleased to see that the old-fashioned (and expensive at 250 kuai) soda syphon had arrived together with 12 bullets of CO2 so finally I should be able to make my own soda water (and I have some sodastream tonic concentrate). I didn't make use of the syphon though as it was a rather late 4am and time for bed.

Home-made soda water in Pingguo - my life is complete

Chicken and Venky non-arrival

I got up before midday after a reasonable amount of sleep and found Andge also up. We needed to go to Nanning again for Venky this time, and A Wu once again offered to help out. This time, as is usual, he also had some business in Nanning. A Wu sounded a bit disappointed when he heard Awl wasn't going to come with us and instead sleep/read and generally do the relaxing things you're supposed to do on holiday and not work. But it made so much sense as his X6 is small inside and an English-sized adult cannot sit in the middle back seat without bending over. Not to mention it would have been four in the back seat.

A Wu's X6 is very nice but that's a Pingguo roller in the background

Filling up for the journey to Nanning

The furniture shop was in an industrial estate that catered for furniture shops exclusively. After going in and looking at the expensive tables and desks that weren't even hand carved we made some pleasantries with the boss who was quite pretty and had a nice smile and asked us to help her find an English man before Andge and I set off in search of adventure. By adventure I mean something other than furniture and also we were both rather peckish. It took a few minutes, and a passing of a couple of people on a rather practical-looking mini-Segways called something like "robocop", but eventually we got out of the furniture estate and happened upon a little hut that sold food. We got a couple of mini packs of dried squid that was delicious but rather spicy so we used that as an excuse to buy a couple of cans of beer. The fish and beer was going down very well when the inevitable call from si ji came and they picked us up outside the estate after having ordered a couple of book cases and a desk.

We drove to some building that looked like a modern office block and were greeted by some bloke in a fraying tee-shirt and shorts, and a few grey hairs. He happened to be another of A Wu's reasons for being in Nanning and A Wu seemed to be his inferior judging by their body language. But Andge's and my body language suggested we needed to go to the loo so we were pointed at an exit at the end of the building which also doubled as an entrance to one of those very modern shopping centres. We could have been in The Glades in Bromley except it was cleaner and there were fewer people. Andge wanted to know how much the prices were at Gant but by the time I got back from the loo he'd been accosted by four female shop assistants and had forgotten what he went in there for.

We got the expected phone call to hurry up and go and within minutes we had driven to a place to eat that for once did not appear to be very posh. A Wu seemed to know the manager, who was rather pretty with a mole on the bottom right of her chin that somehow stopped you admiring the rest of her face. We ordered four buckets of the speciality chicken but only three arrived with the fourth 25 minutes away which we cancelled when it became apparent that two would have been enough. The chicken was ok, but pretty much a whole one per bucket and not amazingly tasty though would be good for the Atkins diet. However the greens were very good and the only thing that spoilt the meal was seeing a Westerner upstairs while going for a wee.

We left and I checked Venky's flight on my phone and no delay was reported so as we were in good time we stopped off to take a wee and to get some cold beers as Venky had requested by text message earlier. The cheap eatery we got the beers from charged us 40 kuai for the case of nine beers which is a little more than I am used to, but £4 for over nine pints is not to be sniffed at. I noticed a group of schoolboys drinking and eating at a table outside and said "hello" and immediately was brought a stool and before I knew it was gan bei'ing and cai ma'ing. Andge joined in too but si ji didn't know what to make of it and bade us go back into the car to continue to the airport. Ok we did but after a couple more gan bei's.

Only when we were arriving at the airport did I get a call from Venky saying he'd been taken to a hotel in Shenzhen as his plane had been delayed something like three hours. Various text messages after that both confirmed and then denied that information and it was only at the airport we found that he wouldn't be here before 2am. So we went to an aiport hotel and were just about to book him a cheap room for £24 when we found it was likely he wouldn't arrive till 5am. We checked taxis and they wanted to charge 600 kuai for the journey to Pingguo so in the end we just left if for Venky to do as he saw fit. The only thing we knew was that his plane was currently still in Nanning, and it was gone midnight and we were all tired. So I left him a text and we left Nanning for home and another late night as we met Awl at 1.30am and didn't get to bed till 3am.

Andge arrival

Inexplicably woke up at 2am!! And couldn't get back to sleep till 7am!! Horrible. I slept on and off till midday but it wasn't refreshing. I had received an email from Awl at 6am saying he hadn't slept either and did I fancy breakfast? but had not seen it otherwise I would have.

I heard from Awl around 4pm. Apparently he'd gone for a wander and walked up Horse Head Mountain in his awakeness in the morning and only got to sleep at midday to be woken by the cleaning ladies four hours later. We needed to go to Nanning to pick Andge up and left around 5pm with Si Ji. Leilei called me and said he wanted to go and I was happy to take him as I haven't spent much time with him in the last two weeks, but I left Xixi to avoid arguments and she was happy to stay on the dian dong che with Chuan Chuan. We had plenty of time when we arrived so ate at some department store. Afterwards Awl added insult to fizzy water injury by finding Perrier in case soda water was not enough. Then, at Walmart he found the holy grail - Watson's tonic water, which definitely wasn't there last year - that meant I now owed him five bottles....

Andge had arrived at Guangzhou and sorted out the Pingguo SIM I'd given him in London. Tan had warned of typhoons that would prevent him landing at Guangzhou but nothing had materialised. However as we drove to Nanning airport the heavens opened and delivered a magical electric storm which meant Andge's flight was delayed. Luckily Awl and I had a plan for that: we sat in the restaurant with an expensive round of lemonade, water and coffee, but made it count with our self-brought DVDC and some whisky I'd brought for Andrew until he arrived - in fact the first plane to arrive that evening - only an hour late.

On the way back to Pingguo I got a call from Li Kun. He'd called earlier to ask us out for a bbq but since we were delayed I didn't think he'd still be able. But when we arrived around midnight he came to the bbq place and we ate and drank till 3am. Awl came back to our house with us but immediately went back to his hotel for a reason I wasn't able to ascertain. Andge and I had a couple of tiny JDs and threw two paper aeroplanes out just because we could. I slept in my study and missed Andge's text to charge his phone at 5am, and Venky's a few minutes later to say he was one his way to Hong Kong. I was glad I chose the study.

Soda water and how to lose a bet

Got up 10am feeling very refreshed. Had a bit of the kids' breakfast at home, bought from the dou jiang place. Around lunch time Xixi and I met Awl and we were going to go to the noodle place near ours for a simple lunch when I pointed out the tea shop a couple of doors away. As it was, my friend Li Kun was there so we stayed for a few teas and he invited us to eat noodles with him. It was refreshing and cheap to have a simple meal and Awl enjoyed it too.

Then Li Kun took us to his place by the market on foot and we had more tea and met his wife and daughter Eva (whose English name I gave her three years ago soon after she was born). Awl normally smokes roll ups but he accepted a cigarette from Li Kun that was more half-fag, half-filter, and apparently much nicer than most normal cigarettes due to this.

Li Kun's wife, daughter Eva and Xixi

Half-fag half-filter

Li Kun went with us to the supermarket there as we'd said we would look for fizzy water. Li Kun said they'd have it, but this was more based on some absurd belief people have here that does not require evidence. It seemed incredulous to him that there wasn't any (despite the fact I'd told him I'd looked for years) and he asked one of the assistants too. Then he said no, there wasn't any, and probably wasn't in Nanning either. It looked like my bet with Awl about not finding any was going to pay me my three bottles of gin.

Awl had said he fancied reading by a pool one day so we took a san lun che to the one in the south to look around with Xixi. But it was very hot, not to mention closed, so we went back and dropped off Awl at hotel before going to Waipo's. Now that they had the internet back I was able to reconfigure the old BT hub I'd left here years ago to give them all wifi again and felt I justified my existence a bit more.

Chuan Chuan, Tan, A Heng and Xixi all happy to have wifi back in Waipo's house (I think)

Tan's second sister Er Jie was there as was first sister Da Jie, plus Waipo and Chuan Chuan. Maybe it was the combination of so much oestrogen in the same room but an almighty racket arose, a bit like some of the storms we've been having recently. I took it in my stride as I know they have a tendency to get over the top and talking in Bangxunese always sounds like arguing anyway. But this time it was particularly loud so A Heng called Tan to intervene as Chuan Chuan was crying. Tan came and calmed down the situation by smiling at them all telling them how trivial the situation was (my interpretation). I can't even remember the reason she told me but it was silly.

I left Xixi there as I was "kun le", which is a useful expression that means you've suddenly become tired and could you be excused for a short while for a nap? But I really was kun le and after going to BBC news on Tan's laptop I found my head on my pillow and when I opened my eyes it was just in time to see the screen saver kick in. I felt rather refreshed and checked the display options on the laptop, which revealed that it was set to turn on after 15 minutes of inactivity, so I'd had under 15 minutes kip but it really worked as a power nap.

I got in touch with Awl and we met at A Wu's office for a little wander. I heard a "baba!" emanating from a shop and identified it as Tan. She was in Da Jie's shop which is manned by Ling Ming much of the time. And his fiancée A Nong was there too. It's a women's clothes shop and Awl joked that everything was too small for him, which caused more mirth than I expected. I told everyone about our bet about not finding fizzy water and how the loser would buy three bottles for the winner and they looked somewhat bemused by this.

A couple of minutes later we stopped at the next supermarket, which I hadn't been to for three years or so, to see if there was refrigerated Coke Zero (as the local supermarket one is warm). We walked past the water aisle and I nonchalantly waved my arm and told Awl he could even look for fizzy water here if he wanted. The bastard immediately set his eyes on a dark can with the "Watson's" logo and identified it as soda water. Now I've seen flat soda water here before but this was the real McCoy. After years of searching it could have been under my nose all this time. So I'd lost the bet on day two and to make matters worse it was 4.7 kuai. We bought one (luke warm as not refrigerated) and confirmed it was fizzy and Awl gloated like a gloaty glutton of Gloatsville for the next hour.

We had been en route to the biggest supermarket to look for fizzy water, but that seemed pointless now. Nevertheless we walked down there and confirmed they not only had no fizzy, but no vodka either. So we went to the supermarket by the market to buy some Chinese "Fjord" vodka instead. We weren't allowed to bring our bags in and had to leave them in a locker. I liked the locker system whereby you push a button and a random (empty) locker opens and a ticket with a barcode is produced. When finished shopping you simply scan the ticket and the locker opens magically again!

Being overly excited about the locker system in the supermarket

Hungry, we went to the dumpling place, which annoyingly was finished for the day. So we went to the bbq place at the guangchang for lovely fried noodles instead. Then Chuan Chuan called and came to drop off the kids as they wanted to be with me.

Awl and I took the kids to the guangchang and as Awl stayed with Leilei in the jumping castle Xixi and I took her new skates and went rollerblading. Inevitably I got a call, this time from Lin Hong, to go out. It was a friend's birthday and they had a KTV room at the opera house. As there were kids there we all got in to Lin Hong's car and drove up (Awl had the wisdom to pre-mix some DVDC). But it was pretty dull and the only interesting thing was the ladies on the stage below practising for some gala night (I assume practising as there was no-one in the seats watching them).

Awl finished his DVDC and I used this as an excuse to leave and we left the kids to go back to his hotel for a little bit. But it was 11pm so I walked back to the Opera house to pick up the kids, who by now were having a whale of a time. So another late shower but after the kids were with Chuan Chuan I managed to sleep at 12.30 which is relatively early.

Return to China with Awl

After two and a bit weeks working in Belgium, with a couple of weekends at home, I got to my "airport hotel" which was in fact a few km away at around 10pm after a meal with colleagues. My last day at my clients saw me dressed in light, tight, white cotton trousers with a summer short-sleeved t-shirt and bright red canvas shoes. As I entered the office, before I could apologise for my less-than-formal attire I was greeted with smiles and compliments on my more relaxed appearance. I thought they were joking at first but it was genuine and in the future I will happily dress more casually there.

I tried to sleep as my packing didn't take very long and managed it around 2am. But at 3am I was awake again and feared not waking up at 5.30am as I'd booked the 6am shuttle bus to the airport for my 8.15 flight to Amsterdam. I called the reception to cancel my wake-up call and had a longer shower than I had anticipated. Then as I was about to leave the room I got a wake-up call but thought better than complaining about it.

While waiting at the hotel reception a taxi turned up and the driver walked in. I was wishing Tan a Happy Birthday on Skype and thought nothing of it but it appeared he was my "shuttle". Ok. I got in and he set his fare as "airport" and it appeared to be a set 12 Euro fee. I was a bit annoyed as I expected a shuttle service to be free. But as I got out my 12 Euro 10 minutes later he told me that the hotel paid for it. Phew.

For the first time, I got all my boarding passes on a single piece of paper, which made sense. The silly flight to Amsterdam was ok as I was so tired. I was commenting to myself that the pilot was weaving in between all the clouds to avoid turbulence when the pilot gave a message to say he was doing exactly that. I thanked him profusely in my head and we arrived more-or-less on time at Amsterdam only to have to wait half an hour in some immigration queue that made little sense to me.

But the lounge was nice and Awl, who thought he would be delayed, turned up a couple of hours later as my guest with a smile on his face that said he'd been on the vodka since 6am. As it was gone 11am, and 5pm in China, I joined him for a couple of G&Ts before spending an extortionate amount of money on women's night cream shit. Awl wanted a last DVDC near the gate but I refused and got to the gate to find we were the last people there and called him to hurry up. I had to ask around but we managed to find someone who would move from his seat so we could sit together and play Tell Me for the early portion of the flight when it was a bit turbulent. But after a meal and a couple of wines (nothing stronger on China Southern to our dismay) we managed to drop off which was good as there were no screens in the headrests in front of any seats. That seems criminal for a 10 hour flight these days.

Three to four hours kip on a 10 hour flight is more than average in my book so I wasn't complaining when I saw there were still over four hours to go when I woke up, but the rest of the flight took forever. Then, in Beijing, China Southern made us wait 45 minutes for our luggage, pick it all up and go to check it in again (Air China didn't do this in Beijing a few weeks ago, and they had tvs in the seats). What was worse was that when we re-checked in our luggage mine got stopped and I had to open it. The security guard asked me if I had any guns in there and I said yes, I had five, but they were children's guns that fired foam bullets. But I had to get them out and show them etc. and it took more time when I was already tired and groggy. At least they didn't confiscate them.

To make matters worse, at Terminal 2 I couldn't use my Priority Pass so we couldn't even get a lounge. But after all that hassle we didn't have that much time and boarded our plane to Nanning soon after I'd sorted out Awl with his Pingguo SIM card. I was pleasantly surprised to see the aeroplane was exactly the same model as that which had taken us from Amsterdam to Beijing (an A330-200 I think). I was pleasantly surprised as I think larger planes are less prone to turbulence and this was significantly larger than any other domestic flight plane I have taken before.

There was some turbulence, and we were at the back of the plane so got more of it but we were bloody knackered and I was dozing on and off the whole time. It makes me care a lot less. I was constantly aware of the chattering around me though so I tried a bit of German counting which must have worked a little as I could never get beyond forty. Awl fared a little better although he was feeling sick, and snored most of the journey.

Si ji was there waiting for us at the airport and we got a lift in A Ni's Toyota as A Wu was busy at that time. The drive to Pingguo was as normal as any and we checked Awl in to the International Hotel around 1.30pm as none of us felt like eating. There I met Tan and A Wu and A Ni. I told Tan I stank and she agreed so after Awl was booked in I went home for a shower and a little siesta to bring me back to life. I needed to see the kids first so I called Chuan Chuan and she happened to be taking them to our house so met them outside for first time in 16 days. Of course they wanted presents so I gave them their nerf guns and water balloon slingers.

Seeing the kids for the first time in 16 days - on Chuan Chuan's UK-style modped

It was so nice to sleep horizontally for a change even if it was a brief siesta. Awl had had a minimal amount of kip in his hotel room so we made a bee line to the local supermarket and bought some room-temperature Coke Zero and some snacks, plus some V and G for good measures.

We were peckish by now but had already been invited to the Mao Zedong restaurant, so got picked up and were there by 6pm. Unfortunately they didn't have ice cubes, so I asked them to put Awl's Coke in the freezer. Then, after Boss Liang arrived, when the beer was poured, we got one of the still warmish Cokes and A Wu proceeded to pour about a quarter of the 40%, 750ml bottle of vodka into a large jug. He then poured half of the 500ml bottle of Coke in and asked Awl if it was enough, and said "no!" and told him to pour it all in. Awl did do some gan bei's but I told him to sip a bit as it was significantly stronger than our 3.1%ers.

Me with the lady of the night at the KTV

Although it was Tan's birthday yesterday, tonight was her night out so we went karaoke with friends and the kids around 9pm at the place on the corner just down the road from ours. I was very tired now but had to sing one English song. To my dismay there were hardly any in English and very few I'd even heard of. I picked something like "You don't know you're beautiful" as I'd heard the kids singing it for the last few months, but that meant I only knew the chorus. I had the good excuse of taking the kids back so Awl and them and I walked home and I left him to go to the hotel. Chuan Chuan had ridden back from KTV and was there before us but I did the showering before letting them sleep with her. Tan was back around midnight complaining of being a little tiddly, but I cared as much as I could keep my eyes open and fell asleep shortly after.