Return 2016

Well I managed just over a couple of hours of sleep, timed by how long I was able to watch uninspirational films for. I ended up rewatching Fargo, which was much more entertaining than the latest tosh. Although we’d left a little late we’d caught up during the fairly unturbulent flight to Frankfurt, and landed 90 minutes before our next flight was due. But we still had to queue for security which caused us to arrive only just in time for the short hop to London.

Fatigue from the journey was taking its toll, but the kids were alright about it, and it made the fact that we arrived at London City that much more worthwhile. However the bloody queues were a pain - I had partly sold the journey to City on the fact that the queues were a breeze, but as one of us was not an EU citizen (maybe all four of us next time) we were told to go to the special queue where it seems we joined just about everyone else from about three flights that had recently landed with non-EU passengers. Finally 45 minutes later the woman said we needn’t have taken this queue as three of us were EU’ers. These people need to talk to each other and be consistent.

But an awkward wait for an Uber XL later in the streets of Woolwich after an easy DLR ride, and the 20 minute ride home later that was it. Nothing had really changed. It was like waking up after a particularly long and vivid recurring dream, and I look forward to bedtime.

Definitely last time in Pingguo 2016

Tan had said that A Heng was coming at 8am to pick us up so I judiciously got up at 7am in order to be prepared. As I got out of the shower at 7.20 I was told that the two cars would be there at 7.30 and we had to have everything ready. Blooming heck, at least tell me to expect 7.30, but that would be asking rather too much. Well I was mostly ready, having spent a good hour sorting stuff out after coming home well before midnight last night.

I let everyone go downstairs and helped take the luggage as they went to Waipo’s to say goodbye. I had the genuine excuse of needing to take the dian dong che there a few minutes later. So I was afforded the time to do a last minute tour of the flat. It’s always sad. I reflected on the 3am storms I’d witnessed, the paper aeroplanes Leilei and I had made and flown, the arguments with the kids for playing on their devices too much, the sumptuous siestas, the Wii Fit, and sweating so much when doing exercise. Simple, non-special activities, that take on a special meaning for me at least when I’m here. Having one’s own place really makes this place. But the kids are growing up quickly now. They had fun this year but I don’t know if that fun that I also share in will continue for them.

I remembered to turn the fridge off and leave the door open, then put my shoes on and left for another final time. I called the lift and as soon as it came I had to run back to the house to pick up a few things I’d left in my study like scales for luggage and rechargeable batteries from the Wii remotes. Maybe they weren’t that important but that last look at the house justified my forgetfulness.

The dian dong che just had enough dian to get to Waipo’s, and I warned them they’d need to charge it to get anywhere. Waipo was not showing it but was effectively in tears and hugged Leilei and Xixi in a way she’d never done before. Before it was words, but today it was feelings, and we knew as we drove away she’d be crying.

The journey to the airport couldn’t be over quickly enough, but it took two hours. Due to regulations now we had to say goodbye where A Heng dropped us off so the chances for photos were diminished. The queues looked quite bad for security but I remembered we had the Priority Pass - not only was there a lounge on “landside” (meaning before security), this lounge had its own security so no queues. Although there were lounges “airside” (after security) I suggested to Tan that we stay here as the ladies told me the wifi wasn’t working in the other lounges.

I was maybe a little naughty but I don’t like flying and had brought a little snifter of the last bottle of gin I’d bought in Guanmart the other day, and dreadfully mixed it with cola. I did try to drink it in the loo but ended up flushing it down as it tasted rough and even the thought of drinking it made me feel like an alcoholic and I knew I was better than that. I did have a little bit of neat G left though which I made useful with a rather sugary 7-up, and made me slightly less worrisome about the impending flight.

But it wasn’t that bad, and we arrived in Shanghai eight hours ahead of our next scheduled flight. Of course this was five hours before we could check our luggage as it was one of those you had to retrieve your luggage between flights in but that was that - apparently there were no seats on the later flights to Shanghai so we’d just have to sort ourselves out without any lounge decadence for a while. Well we bought some snacks and then went for a meal and it made me realise how worthwhile lounge access can be, but when you’re stuck with check-in luggage you just have to wait till you can check it in. I went for a walk with Leilei, then with Xixi. We both noticed a particularly large and splendid preying mantis on the outside of one window. We talked about how they catch their prey, and I realised that at any time, unbeknownst to us, you have an opportunity to educate not only your child but yourself too.

Then at 7pm, an hour and 15 minutes before check-in opened, I noticed there was already a queue. I did something sensible. I bought a beer for 8 kuai (actually my second of the afternoon but don’t tell anyone) and took my laptop and myself away and found a quiet corner on the first floor away from most people. In order to get online I used Chuan Chuan’s phone number and asked her on WeChat to send me the code, which she did half a minute later and I just managed to enter it to get online before the minute period ran out.

With that online time I managed to check-in, something that I hadn’t been able to do from Nanning because it was too soon. I was also able to change our seats to similar to what we did coming over here. By the time I got back the queue was enormous and there was still well over half an hour before check-in gates would open. So I told Tan and Xixi that Leilei and I would go and manlyly stand in the queue. We were so far back the queue had doubled back on itself and people coming out of the lift were having trouble getting past it. In fact the queue was becoming a health and safety liability in my opinion. But thankfully, 15 minutes before advertised, they started letting people in. I thought we’d be at least 30 minutes in the queue but it actually moved pretty quickly. Then I found that those who had checked in online were put into a much faster queue, so I called Tan to tell her and Xixi to hurry up and join us. Gosh that 15 minutes with a beer and a laptop had saved us closer to an hour and we dropped off the without a problem and got through security in a breeze a few minutes later.

And the lounge was delightful. Had we known we might have gone hungry for the food was rather good, and Tan had a portion of noodles even though she’d had one an hour previously. The kids were happy as they had a good choice of food and drinks and baba was happy because he had his first genuine tonic (plus gin) in a month and a half. Two plus hours was comfortably spent here, and definitely helped justify the Platinum Amex for a third year.

We even managed to get priority boarding thanks to our “young” kids. Tan managed this on the way over here and I managed it on the way back simply by asking. This has got to be the last time we ever manage to do this. Although it wasn’t an A380, the Boeing 747 took off ok and I can’t make any complaints. After the meal as most were falling asleep I asked for a last glass of rouge and the flight attendant (male) got up and poured me two. The sort of treatment that might make me choose Lufthansa again.

Properly last night in Pingguo

Hmm. I got up earlyish to the sound of my own coughing and pain of abs. It should be good sit up exercise. Oh this was our last day...so although I thought 90% of packing was done it wasn't and Tan was cleaning everything in sight. The washing machine was on non-stop with bedding.

Finally took kids to Waip's and left them after having a yuebing. I wanted some time to myself to do some last minute checks that I can't do with Tan around, but she was still there when I got back around 2pm eating the leftovers from yesterday's bbq. We weren't due to leave till 5pm so there was no massive hurry, so I did my equivalent of packing till she left at 3pm. First I double-checked the hotel I didn't remember booking. Google had been clever it seems, and automatically put an entry in my calendar for the hotel stay. It struck me that it had the name "Capital" in it, and my heart sank as I found the hotel for tonight was the "Beijing Capital Airport Hotel". We were flying to Shanghai. Oh had I mistakenly booked a Beijing hotel because that's where we first hit China nearly six weeks ago?

But then I noticed something worse. It's only because I was on the work VPN that I was able to access the google services, and when I opened up the link to the hotel it brought up the whole itinerary. It was quite cool that Google had put all the flights in the calendar and even made a timeline of the travel arrangements but what was that for tonight's flight? "Cancelled". Shit, really? I had to check but Air China's website was absolutely crap and the only way I had an idea was that I was not able to purchase tickets for tonight's flight. So I tried to ring them but I chose the English option and was kept on hold for over 20 minutes before I gave up...every minute you have to press "1" to continue to hold.

My first thought was to check tomorrow's flights. I had to make some positives out of this and and if there was a cost then at least it could be put against an extra evening in Pingguo. But the cost was looking like well over 3000 kuai for the three of us. I had to get through to Air China, but I checked the tickets and it said you should check flights at least 72 hours before departure and it was only 10 hours - would they rearrange at such short notice? We didn't have much time and I nearly went and bought the tickets for tomorrow as we can't miss tomorrow's late flight to Europe. To be honest I was more concerned about Tan's reaction when I was to tell her. Somehow it would be my fault and in this case it quite probably was.

I had formed a plan for what to say. I called her and asked if she'd like to stay one more night in Pingguo. I knew she would but her response of course was "why?", so I mentioned the cancellation and to my relief it didn't appear to be my fault for not checking three days earlier. To be fair I'd tried to check-in online last night but the website didn't understand the e-ticket. So not being my fault, Tan set about calling Air China as really they should rearrange things for us. It ended up being a round of several phone calls to different departments until one said to call Lufthansa as the second and third flights back were with them. Finally someone gave us an email address team.shaxr@dlh.de where we had to send proof of the cancellation. The Google message wouldn't suffice, but this time on the Air China website I managed to find the status of tonight's non-flight of "cancel" and took a screenshot and circled it in red.

It took some time but a subsequent phone call to them meant they had the confirmation they needed (as if they couldn't find it themselves) and after a nervous few minutes they said they could get us on the midday flight tomorrow. Ok, lucky I didn't purchase unnecessarily. Things were looking pretty good; we had an extra evening in Pingguo and no hotel to arrive at with knackered kids at 2am and being turfed out at midday with 12 hours till the flight. Yes, I'd have preferred the 5.30pm flight, but six hours in Shanghai airport after a decent night's sleep was very very good. Tan mentioned that we could spend the time in the lounge but I saw that there was a two-hour time limit. But I also saw there appeared to be three lounges so if necessary we may be able to lounge-hop. As an extra bonus I told Tan I'd cancelled the Shanghai hotel (she didn't know it was actually Beijing - and never will), but really it just meant not booking one for tonight at great expense. Hurray!

Back at home again after having sorted out the travel arrangements with Tan at Waip's I went to cancel the Beijing hotel as I would have had to do anyway. But try as I might I couldn't find any confirmation email. After a long time it finally dawned on me that Google had made a false positive - it must be that. The link from the Calendar item Google had created went to the travel itinerary, which only had flights. Somehow Google must have inferred a hotel booking. Moreover it wasn't for tonight but tomorrow. Ah and I thought I'd tipsily mis-booked - I should trust myself more.

Even though we had two cars prepared to leave soon, changing to tomorrow morning was no problem, and I even found the flight was 12.55, not midday, giving us an extra hour in bed. I let A Wu know the news and he said we'd meet up later. Waipo had told us they'd cooked a chicken so I went to hers to eat and pick up the kids. With an unplanned evening ahead I called Zhang Yangwen as I'd promised to a couple of nights ago and not been as good as my word. He picked the phone up before I heard it ring and said yes we'd meet up for a beer. He said he'd pick me up from our house after I'd dropped off the kids but when I called him he didn't turn up. 15 minutes later I asked where he was and he was waiting outside A Wu's old office. 13 years and I still make the same mistakes on phone conversations.

I followed him on his motorbike and we went to a place close to Beihai Haixian. He put the menu in front of me and told me to choose what I wanted to eat. Man I'd just called him and managed to misunderstand where to meet up and he thought I could read a menu in blurred Chinese characters? But actually I understood more than I thought; I ordered fried sweetcorn with pork mince, fried (rather than bbq'd) duck tongues, and horse meat.

He called a mate who couldn't make it, which is rather unlike here. I thought about calling a mate but I didn't know anyone who'd really fit in with Yangwen - he's not a local and is rather a professional it seems, as he's worked in engineering in some Arab states and Pakistan. But anyway sometimes you don't need many people and the two of us enjoyed the excellent food washed down with a couple beers at a much slower rate than I'm used to here.

Then he said he needed to make a phone call and spent a whole half hour on the phone. At first it seemed quite heated but then it turned more jovial and laughs emanated. Strangely, I could understand nearly everything he said, though still couldn't get the context. I suppose he speaks a more standard Mandarin than most people here, well he actually speaks Mandarin on the phone which is fairly strange in its own right. While he was speaking I watched a documentary on the tv about onions. The presenter was a Russian woman who spoke brilliant Mandarin, and it made me jealous, though I suppose it's not my job to interview people in China. Not that I wouldn't mind though - at least she was getting clear answers from people.

When he finished his call he apologised and said it was a work matter. I knew what he meant...sometimes we carry our work stuff with us and as inconvenient as it might appear to be it can actually enable us to have freedom we otherwise would only have dreamed of 20 years ago as we were stuck in an office.

By 10pm I thanked Zhang Yangwen for the food and company and made my way to meet A Wu at the boss’s place behind the KTV where I’ve been a couple of times with the kids this year. I’d been warned not to stay up late gallivanting and had no intention of doing so. When I got there I saw a ping pong table set out and boss Zhou in sporting attire. I Jokingly asked him for a match but he said yes. So there was me in long trousers and an admittedly short sleeved shirt, but a cotton shirt nonetheless facing my adversary. Well actually I did the UK proud mostly. I hadn’t had too much beer with Zhang Yangwen and was able to smash the ball around from left to right enough to really impress boss Zhou. People even helped us collect the balls. I was enjoying this more than I should be but realised I was holding up proceedings. Proceedings being eating and drinking.

We finally laid down our racquets (yes apparently table tennis bats are officially racquets, but lord knows how I’d explain that in Chinese) and sat down to eat a meal that I had no appetite to eat and beer I had no interest in drinking. But that’s not an excuse here, and while the air con plastered my soaking shirt to my back giving me goose pimples I endured a few gan beis not sad because I knew I shouldn’t be, but a little sad because I knew this would definitely be the last time this year. I made my excuses and left before 11pm for the first time this year.

I remembered to take a quick pic of the clothes I'm leaving behind in case I get to come back

More clothes that quite frankly could be chucked but who knows?

Last full day in Pingguo

Oh woe this is our last full day in Pingguo this time. Despite the packing I thought I'd done yesterday there still seemed to be a load to do. But I also had to sort out the sending of the swegways. So late morning I went to Waip's with the kids and realised how big and heavy they were. Thankfully Waipo had kept the boxes and polystyrene so I put Xixi's pink one in and realised there wouldn't be room for more than one on the dian dong che. That actually didn't matter that much as there would not be room for more than one kid either. So I got Leilei to accompany me to the post office near Lao Ma's salon.

There wasn't that much dian left in the dian dong che so we took it easy under the midday sun and thankfully when we got there there wasn't much in terms of a queue. I enquired as to whether it would be possible to send this to the UK or not and they answered by saying I was "Bangxu guye", yes I was husband of Bangxu woman but that wasn't the point. I dumped Leilei there with the swegway and said I'd be back in 5 minutes with the next.

15 minutes later I was back with Xixi and Leilei's swegway. Then I was told we couldn't send them as one parcel. My Chinese was good enough to disagree but my experience was good enough to realise that after questioning this I should let it lie. I nearly enforced binding the two boxes together but even though it would cost me just accepted it, mainly because I wanted to have an afternoon lie-down.

But bloody hell. I had to write down our UK address twice, for each package, among other details, and it took me a good ten minutes. Then they weighed the packages and after an almighty time faffing were ready to take 760 kuai. Actually not as much as I was expecting. I just checked with the woman that this was insured and she said "no". What? I had clearly written the value for insurance as 300 US dollars each and she'd ignored it. She then said "it should be ok" but I was having none of it. Oh it bloody meant we had to restart the whole process and write out the addresses four times again but I didn't get angry. I could have but I've been in this situation too many times and I had kids to witness me now. So I moaned a logical moan so they would understand, and apologised to the kids that their drink would now had to wait more. It was only 25 kuai each for insurance too, but a good half an hour in time.

Waiting at the post office

It seemed quite random that as well as the moon cakes the post office was also selling about 11 cans of beer

Finally we got home well after 1pm, after picking up some jiaozi at our local place. I was looking forward to a kip but Tan called me to say she couldn't get cash out using the HSBC bank card. As I still had 1200 kuai on me I told her I had 800 and I could give it to her so told the kids to behave on their own as I went to Waipo's to pass on the money. As luck would have it as I was half-way through the five-minute walk (as the dian dong che was charging), I got a call from A Wu asking me to "sing song". Normally such a call occurs at well after 10pm.

He was actually being true to his yesterday's word, by inviting me to "sing song". But it was just gone 3pm and I was in no mood. But I thought about it for a bit. I didn't have much time left here at all so I might as well go for it. I made an about-turn and went back to our house to get the kids. As it was our last day I slipped a slight portion of vodka into a bottle of apple-flavoured soda water, and had a little Awl-sized lug.

I would normally have walked to Waipo's but with the kids and the knowledge I had to go singing (even slightly tipsy) I decided to get a san lun che. This was actually the first time I'd done this with the kids for a couple of years so we took a couple of pics. It's queerly one of the things I'll miss the most from here.

One of the few san lun ches we've taken together this year

As I dumped them off at Waipo's I saw Tan, and told her I'd take her to A Xia's, but she said A Xia was on her way to pick her up and would take me too. So I had to embarrassingly explain to the san lun che driver that I didn't need him any more, but I still gave him 4 kuai which is more than he should have expected for the short ride to Waip's. A Xia came a couple of minutes later and despite the heat I lowered the window lest the wife smell any hint of the apple juice-laced drink I'd participated in 20 minutes ago. I think I got away with it. I said goodbye to Tan and A Xia promising I'd be back in time for tea at Waipo's.

I found the KTV place relatively easily but went on a little walk first. It seems Pingguo has a proper mall with loads of tea shops where Chuan Chuan takes the kids out while she plays cards with her friends. I don't particularly like it as it seems Westernised but that's just what people want. I do sometimes find it odd that there is so much jingoism here, just like most countries, yet the desire seems to be to have what other countries have.

The Pingguo Mall

Once in the KTV place I gave A Wu a call but there was no response. Not unexpected as he was probably in a loud room. After another unsuccessful try I asked the girls at the counter if they knew where Li Junwu (his proper name) was but they didn't. Normally he's quite well known so I was a little surprised. As it was, the doors to the KTV rooms had windows so I walked along a little way and it was only the third door before I saw him there.

He seemed genuinely amazed that I was able to find him and I was beckoned to sit down with a couple of blokes and a woman I'd seen last year. It wasn't like a big party or anything but they were pouring beers anyway. I noticed the cigarette smoke was particularly annoying so we opened the door to let some escape. As it wasn't particularly comfortable but I knew I'd be here at least 90 minutes I allowed a couple of gan beis to flow to make it easier.

I had enough to sing Ni Shi Wo De Meigui Hua and Pengyou, but it didn't really feel right while it was still light outside. At 6pm I finally got a response from Tan to say that they were eating now and I used that as a very genuine excuse to go back to Waipo's. No argument from anyone there.

Tea at Waip's was pretty quick so the kids and I were at a bit of a loose end. I decided I'd take them on a magical mystery tour, which really means getting on the dian dong che with no particular place to go and going there. We first went to my favourite watermelon juice place and although I got watermelon the kids wanted pearl tea. Next we moved on about 30 seconds to a place that looked like it fixed dian dong ches, and got our seat fixed so it no longer falls off when you lift it up to put something in the tiny storage space underneath it (or take something out of it). I felt a little guilty when they wouldn't accept any money for it, so insisted on getting a numberplate that Leilei chose, plus removed the front one which was really only an advertisement for LiMa, the brand of bike.

Then Huang called and I said I'd come around later. But first on our travels we found a bloke teaching people how to paint characters properly. Obviously I couldn’t resist but go in and within seconds the kids were given brushes and shown how to write 中, with the brush perpendicular to the table. It was an enjoyable 10 minutes and we left with our paper of characters and the promise that next time we were in the town we’d come back for more.

Practising calligraphy

The next half hour was taken up by random driving around until we came upon the new stadium area where we played for a little time and found the ant tree that we’d eaten lunch by two years ago. It’s good that the kids also now have memories of Pingguo dating back a few years. But now they wanted to go to the guangchang, and I couldn’t argue as it was the last night. They both went on the bungee trampolines but within a minute Leilei was complaining that the strap was hurting his balls and despite attempts at adjustment had to get off - I guess he’s growing up and out. Then Xixi complained she was uncomfortable too and she had to get off. A waste of 20 kuai that the stall-holder gave no impression she’d reimburse a penny of.

By the ant tree we'd picnicked by a couple of years ago - strange but fond memories

So it was time to pay a last visit to Huang the seafood boss. He was there with some mates and there was food but the kids weren’t too interested. As it turned out, Tan was at Tianyang Po’s bbq place a couple of minutes’ away so I took them there after a bit and came back where I could engage in a bit more adult-like conversation as Huang served more and more food and turned what I expected would be a couple of beers into a feast. But I had other commitments - the advertising shop people had invited me for a beer and said they wouldn’t be out too long, plus Zhuang Hua was ringing me to ask when I’d be coming around

We popped in to see A Wu before we went to Huang's seafood place

Huang's wife sorted the kids out with tea and served us a beer

Within minutes there were friends at the table

Making my excuses I first went to the guanggao (advertising) place where the boss’s work partner gave me a lovely bottle of sweetcorn alcohol that had little chance of fitting into my suitcase. We had a nice time and this is one of the places I will miss the most for no obvious reason, but more because it feels so normal and almost relaxing. It was now gone midnight so I apologised for keeping them up and they didn’t appear to understand why I was apologising and I realised I was just being English.

I went to back to Huang’s seafood place only to be called by Zhang Hua and I once again made my apologies that I had to leave again. We had a couple of beers, just the two of us, then he bade me take him to where his father-in-law was. Well he got on my dian dong che and we drove down to the river, nearly as far as the train station, and I was glad I’d topped up the battery during the afternoon. We finally arrived at some eating place where there were not many people left as it was getting on for 1am. His father-in-law was suitably oiled, as was his mate with whom he was drinking white alcohol. We sat down with them to their intense enjoyment and ended up gan bei’ing with them and the owners for a while until Tan called to ask where I was at 1.30am when we were leaving tomorrow. I thought about giving the obvious answer but decided I probably should be heading back.

Back home I made a concerted effort to check-in for tomorrow’s late flight, but Air China was having none of it and didn’t like my passport or ticket number. Why is it even these days there are so many numbers that could be used to identify a flight and it always seems so hard to determine the correct one? Or maybe I shouldn’t be doing it at 2am on the same day.

Last Supper 2016

I've still got this bloody cough but I think I slept more than the previous two nights combined. Even so, I still managed a short afternoon nap, so obviously still under the weather. I'd pretty much made up my mind to do my annual mates meal tomorrow as it was already getting on and I had doubts about the meal we'd been invited to tomorrow anyway. And even if it was on we could do our thing later. But at half past five it dawned on me that Yang Haiwei would be leaving for Tian Yang tomorrow so needed to sort something fast.

I called him to see if he could go for a bite at 6pm and he could. That was one down. Then I called Uncle Yellow and he could make it too. Li Kun was also available so there was definitely a meal on. Boss Zhou, who came last time but didn't make it to A Wu's when I realised I'd double-dated was in the middle of cooking for friends, but would be over later, and A Wu said he'd been invited out but would also make it later. We managed to arrange 6.30 as a more suitable time but I got there for six just before Haiwei turned up.

I considered inviting Baksec Zhai but I thought it may be rather below what he was used to. Boss Hu I also considered, but I'd rung him twice this year and the second time he said he'd call me the next day to invite me for a meal but never did. It's likely he forgot, but I didn't feel it appropriate to ring him a third time.

I was happy to eat outside but Haiwei wanted a room, so we got the one we nearly ate at last time and waited there for a bit. I needed some help ordering food but I ensured we got a couple of portions of fried octopus and squid but we told the cook to hold off cooking until more people had turned up. That didn't take too long and soon we were tucking into some nifty grub. I'd saved eight packs of Marlboro fags for this occasion and gave each bloke a pack each. Boss Zhou joined, and A Wu, A Ni, and their young son a tad later, making it a full table. The guys didn't want Li Quan, as it now has a reputation for being fake, so as there was no Snowflake beer we decided on the 2.8% Yanjing bottles. This was a good thing as the meal included several gan beis as it was effectively my last supper with my old friends. A Wu promised we'd sing song tomorrow, but we'll see what that means.

From left to right, Yang Haiwei, Boss Zhou, A Wu, A Wu's second son, A Ni, Lu Wen, Uncle Yellow, and Li Kun

It was good to start early though, as I managed to negotiate a reasonably early finish at 10.30, by which time most of the blokes were pissed enough anyway. The bill was 1100 - very reasonable for four hours drinking and eating, but I didn't have enough and had to go to the bank first. Back home I managed to find a good stream for the City - West Ham match and mostly enjoyed it, except for some worrying wobbles in the second half. I have found that you can get a lot of Premier League matches streamed officially now in China via PPTV and CCTV5 and even QQ. So far I've been lucky with PPTV but I know you pay for some. It's not the 10 kuai that I'd care about, more setting up the account.

By means of a celebration I went for a quick ride down to the river area at Jiang Bing Lu. I heard a shout and it was the bloke I was watching police stop motorcyclists with the other day. He gave me some bbq sweetcorn and opened a couple of beers, but right on cue Tan called to see what I was up to and ask why I wasn't home. So we finished the beers and I went home.

Sweetcorn and beer with the bloke I met the other day

Photos and Haiwei and foot massage

I spent the best or worst part of the day and early afternoon in bed feeling sorry for myself then realised it was wasted time, though grateful for a few snoozes. I hadn't forgotten the photo woman said they'd be ready after midday so still not having eaten I rode down to her shop to pick them up. Well 95 kuai for six (not five) 12" photos doesn't seem so bad when they've been laminated. I was going to buy a frame for at least one of them but I thought I'd have to cut the excess laminate, plus frames are quite personal and sometimes it's best to let others choose them.

I proudly took the prints to Waipo's house and showed them to Tan. "Why is there no frame?" was the response. Duh. I didn't know where Waipo would want to put them so the lack of a frame gave her more girth. The problem is, and I should have known, if you give a woman, or a person, a choice, then suddenly they inherit some responsibility and therefore have a chance of making things wrong. It's like when I ask if Tan wants something from the supermarket and I feel the negative vibes; she didn't want to be asked as it would be somewhat her fault if she forgot something. Men around the world should understand this, or at least accept it: don't give certain people choices. We might like it (like options on a new vehicle) but for others it's a threat - they want decisions made for them and if they're wrong they have someone to blame other than themselves.

Waipo wanted us to stay for tea as normal and as we don't have much time here, but Yang Haiwei had invited me to tea at his mum's as his elder son was back for the weekend. By "the weekend" he meant his son was back for a couple of hours and would be going back for three lessons this Saturday evening and more tomorrow. I don't think Waipo had any food prepared anyway so I drove most of the way to where I went the other week and only needed the WeChat Location info for the last bit to check where I was. It wasn't quite the large family affair of last week, but not far off. I did my requisite talking in English with elder son, then his natural mum came to pick him up at 6.20 to go to school. The mate who lives on the 23rd floor that we visited the other day also came, along with his favourite Yanjing beer. In a way I didn't mind as it was 2.8% rather than 3.1% of the Li Quans, so nearly 10% weaker.

But the problem was this mate wanted to drink 50% faster. I tried stalling tactics but he was well aware this would likely be our last time having a beer together, so fair enough wanted to make the most out of it. Haiwei's elder brother's wife and Haiwei's wife spent a good half an hour cutting up bamboo into tiny slices to put in the freezer, then set upone a huge honeymelon. Then big brother's wife used a great battery-powered mixer to make honeymelon smoothies for the whole family. It only made about a glass and a half at a time but as it only took about 30 seconds it didn't matter. Of course I instantly wanted one and she said she'd got it at a supermarket for 68 kuai. My next shopping list had already started.

One of the blokes' sons really didn't want to go and let him know in no uncertain terms

I managed to get away from the meal at a reasonable hour and made an appointment to meet the advertising people "in about an hour". Great, I had 60 minutes free time so decided to go for a foot massage as one does when one has this time. I went to the place I'd been to before when looking for an excuse of an hour's free boozing. This time though, the bloke rather than the woman took me. It's not that the woman is in any way pretty, I just don't like blokes massaging me. Looking back I clearly could have asked for the woman to do it but being British I just accepted it was him. To be fair instead of starting on the feet he did the top half first while my feet soaked, before moving, err, down.

But even half way through this massage I got a message to say that the advertising people were already at the bbq place waiting for me and it was I who had invited them. So I embarrassedly told the massage bloke I had to go rather quickly and although he nodded in some sort of agreement he continued as normal. I knew A Wu wanted me to go to the bosses' office but I'd clearly not turned up. When he called I made the mistake of telling him where I was. A few minutes later a red-faced boss turned up in the massage place and held his hand up and said "no no no!". I knew he wanted me to go upstairs and drink beer but I said quite firmly I was staying here and would be there "later".

But when it had finished I went to the advertising place. Nothing felt less enticing than 11 bosses drinking except for 12 singers singing. It was only the boss and her "little sister", yes that was what she was introduced as but I had my doubts and enquired further. It transpired she was six years younger than the boss and not blood-related. I asked how they had played with each other for 30 years when the younger was clearly 26 years old, and they mumbled some sort of answer. But this time I wasn't having any of it - I mentioned a few examples of when A meant B etc in Pingguo and they just had to accept that sometimes they said things that weren't officially true. So I got them to confirm this and then made some statements like Pingguo is two hours from England and asked them if that was ok. I'd like to think they got the point but they probably thought I was pissed. Then the annoyingly good-looking boss/partner came and at least gave me an excuse to drink more than half a thimbleful of beer.

It was actually a rather sobre and nice evening and I'm glad I chose it above the bosses' office, though it was nearly 2am by the time I got home.

My new football kit

The other day I went to find somewhere to print a couple of the photos of Waipo and her daughters. I didn't want something really posh, just a decent 12" sized print that she could look back on. I found a suitable looking place, rather than going to the wedding photo place that would have cost 400 kuai and taken a week, but found that the boss wasn't in as s/he was eating. So I came back in the evening and indeed she was there and said she could do some nice photos but it would take 14 days. Well I barely had four, so instead of telling her what I wanted I told her how much time I had and she understood and said we could print some 12" photos. I had chosen three of the nice ones from when Da Jie was here, and ordered five prints, with a couple of copies, that would be ready for tomorrow. She asked me if I'd already beautified them and I sheepishly said I had, well I'd let Picasa do a little work on them as I knew Tan or her sisters would have done the same.

Later, despite still feeling quite ill with this cough, I decided to pay a visit to Zhang Hua. He was on his own watching the shop but still invited me in for a beer. The football kit had arrived! It even had the matching shorts, both with the number 27 adorned on them. I really hope he hadn't paid the 118 kuai that was on the price tag for the top, but didn't question. There was certainly no question of my paying for it anyway, at least not with money. Eventually his wife and other family-in-law came around so we had a couple more beers, but nothing excessive.

Zhang Hua is on the right, and second from the left is "Lao da" - I think he's the father-in-law and he certainly likes a drink - Zhang Hua's son is in my arms

Zhuang Hua and wife

I'm sure more happened today but quite possibly I spent the rest of the time in bed feeling a little ill.

Cough and cold and a Boss Huang meal

Despite the lack of sleep yesterday for some inexplicable, although probably explicable, reason I got up at 9.30am. I suppose it was related to the fact I've come down with a cough and a cold. At about 10am I found myself in the top of a big wheel. For some reason I was part of a small party allowed to have the first chance to look inside one of the capsules. But then a few more people came inside and it started moving, and I realised I was now part of the first time this big wheel would go. It was ok until we got near the bottom and then we were plunged into the sea/lake for the last quarter. Luckily the capsule didn't leak and I worked out it was waterproof for this reason, but on coming out of the water we suddenly went up very quickly, and it made me feel sick. This went on for at least another revolution before I woke up. This was quite close to another Chinese hallucination I'd had a few years ago, and I hope to consolidate the ideas of graffiti and underwater exploration for my first big wheel - maybe I should crowdfund it.

Due to the weirdness of lack of sleep I remained in bed for more time that would be acceptable if I was working or had to look after kids. It's at these times when having a reasonably large phone really pays for itself; it wasn't much - mainly reading some Guardian articles with comments and theregister.co.uk - but it helped wile the time away as I coughed up phlegm.

Then Lu Wen called me to check about the boss meal. Oh yes, I'd forgotten about that - I'd told him that yesterday would be ok but had rearranged Baksec Zhai only to be told he couldn't make it. So really it should have happened yesterday, but what the heck? Could I make it tonight? I wasn't feeling particularly up for it but of course I said yes. Tan was invited too but wasn't that interested, so I took the kids to Li Jia He Xiang where I thought the English teacher's husband had invited us. But despite my WeChat conversation with Lu Wen, who said it was "the bloke who spoke a little English" I had got it totally wrong.

The bloke who had invited us was one of those from the other night where we'd got particularly drunk at A Ni's, and I didn't massively recognise him. But he recognised me for some reason. As we were about to sit down he made a rearrangement and suddenly we were put in a different room as the current one would be too small. I was fine with that and the kids didn't care as they had wifi (with an "88888888" password). We waited quite a long time for others to come, but they did eventually.

Leilei with Lu Wen's cute and podgy daughter - she clings to me

I think the boss's name is Boss Yong, though when I found him on WeChat he was Huang something. Again, I felt the pang of logic go through me and felt the need to ask why Yong and Huang? Which was correct? Which did he prefer? But despite the absence of beer I managed to hold it back - something that only 13 years of coming here will allow you to do.

Of course the meal was great, and much more was ordered than was needed. Then the boss's elder sister's husband (Jiefu) arrived, followed a bit later by Jiejie herself. Well everyone had wine glasses, and this time with my cold I thought this might be slightly better than beer. Boss Huang was transfixed on the kids and I told him I thought it was really important for them to be here mainly for the cultural experience. I told him I thought living in a different country was a great education and he seemed to agree with me more than is necessary. Then Xixi made a remark that she could be considered quite rude if she were to drink her glass and stick her little finger in the air, as is considered quite posh by some English ladies (according to her).

I translated this to Boss Huang and he went into a tirade about how intelligent Leilei and Xixi were! I didn't milk it at all and was merely presenting it as a fact. But he seemed to think I'd revealed the tincture of life or something. His elder sister then brought things back down to earth by proposing a toast and by this time I reached for ice cubes for my wine. I'd mentioned to them that the French would hate the way the Chinese drank wine, but after having tasted the room temperature way I realised they had probably been sent a dodgy box from Australia. I managed wine for a while, but protested about downing it due to my cold/cough, which I was really was milking. I'd done a pretty good job by the time A Wu ordered beer and the two of us continued with that for the remainder of the meal.

A Wu, Boss Huang's elder sister, and Peng

Chuan Chuan came to pick up the kids at 7.22 in her big Mazda, and off they went to see Ice Age 5, while I went back to nurse my beer. I had half a mind to add lemonade to it but at 1.25% that would almost literally have been taking the piss. I was quite impressed at how Huang's big sister was knocking the red wine back, though was is a bit larger than many women here. She overtook her husband in the drinking stakes, which I understand is akin to losing your face here. Then she insisted on inviting us to come to hers to eat. I couldn't do the next evening, or the next, but eventually settled on the 29th - oh great her birthday. But it's also the last night before we leave, which could be tricky if there's a family meal planned. But booking something four days in advance here? Something must go wrong.

I must have been quite ill as I don't recall going out later, though I quite possibly did. The advice here is typical: oh you have a cough - you should drink alcohol...oh you have a cough - you should not drink alcohol. Who to believe?

Headwash and another late City match

Yesterday I invited Baksec Zhai for a meal today, but at 8.20am he sent a message apologising, but he had to be elsewhere this evening. I appreciated his prompt response and texted him back saying no problem we'd sort something when we had time.

As Chuan Chuan is on holiday for a few days the kids have mostly been staying with her. To Tan's annoyance she drove them to Baise, and then Lin Yun yesterday, where they stayed the night. The main annoying thing is that she's only recently passed her test and shouldn't be driving on motorways until she's had more experience or is with someone who has had three years at least. So yes, on hearing that I was a little annoyed too, however she seems one of the more sensible 26 year olds here, it's just that she looks literally half her age.

I didn't eat more than a couple of rice crispy cakes, which I always have in as part of a default backup breakfast here. They're not particularly healthy but can fill a gap. Although I could have found useful stuff to do, I decided to have one last (or second-to-last) head wash. Maybe because I'd had a pre-heady tipple, or because I'm just weak, when she asked if I wanted a facewash too I barely prevaricated before ascenting into the obvious, knowing it would be three times the price. But yes it was worth it.

I hadn't expected the mask

I had plans of staying up to watch the second leg of City - Steaua but didn't manage to get the chance for a late afternoon kip. Then A Wu called to say we were going to the KTV place later. At least that might wake me up. Well what he actually meant was Boss Zhou's place behind the KTV place. I took the kids but as I'd already eaten couldn't face the mountain of duck breast kindly put in my bowl. I also insisted on mostly sipping my beer, rather than gan bei'ing, and refused their 30 degree honey liqueur. I took the kids back when they were bored, but came back to the meal as promised. Luckily I only stayed another 15 minutes or so as A Wu and I were to take his son to have his shower. I had to hold his son in the car so left the dian dong che at Boss Zhou's which meant I'd have to be back.

Sure enough, we gave his son a shower, or rather let the ladies do it, then dumped him off at A Ni's and went back to Boss Zhou's. I managed to take it relatively easy though did have to do a fair few cai mas, before I finally said I needed to leave to sort the kids at 9.30. At home, Lu Wen called to say Boss Yong had invited us to eat tomorrow and could I make it? Yes, I suppose I could.

A had a coffee and then Tan got back from the bbq at some time after 11pm. She had a cup of sweet lime tea spare so I took it and drank as much as I could until I couldn't take any more sugar. The game wasn't to start till 2.45am so I had ages and put a wash on and had time to hang it up before I got in contact with Mat, and spent the best part of an hour playing World of Tanks with a crappy ping but it was better than nothing.

Rather than go home straightaway, A Wu took me to a place just around the corner to drink tea. In this case, the people we happened upon were drinking tea, and thought it really weird that we actually wanted to drink tea and not beer. But we persisted. Apparently one was a friend/cousin of A Wu. The tv was on and I noticed it was "Pingguo TV" - I hadn't realised we had our own tv channel so was more interested than I otherwise would be. I said that they should recognise some of the people and they nodded as if to say "of course", but then they said "Baksec Zhai!", and indeed there he was on tv, participating in some sort of opening of something. So when he texted me this morning he genuinely had something more important to do!

Baksec Zhai (on the right) on Pingguo tv!

I got back and had a coffee and then Tan got back from the bbq at some time after 11pm. She had a cup of sweet lime tea spare so I took it and drank as much as I could until I couldn't take any more sugar. The game wasn't to start till 2.45am so I had ages and put a wash on and had time to hang it up before I got in contact with Mat, and spent the best part of an hour playing World of Tanks with a crappy ping but it was better than nothing.

I'd heard that there were more football games available on Chinese tv/streaming now, and was glad to find http://www.livesoccertv.com/competitions/england/premier-league/ where it showed what you could expect to see on tv and online. I installed the bloated PPTV but couldn't find the match, and in the end just used their website to find it and watch it in Flash. It was not worth staying up for but we won 1-0 in an effective dead rubber. What was weird though was that I still couldn't sleep till 7am, two and a half hours later.

Ordering water and another boss meal

I wasn't in the best of moods for eating so skipped Waipo's for lunch and just ate some dried squid instead. After a couple of evenings of excess I decided I needed some exercise. I did a "Seven Minute" one and it really took it out of me. Then I decided to justify bringing the extra Wii Fit board I picked up cheaply in a charity all this way for the first time since 2008. As I fired up Wii Sports for the first time in a long time on this Wii it scolded me that it had been 2029 days since the last time it had seen me. Later I took the time to search how long that was, and surprisingly I found it was February 11th 2011. As I'd not been here at that time, and it was incredibly unlikely that anyone else had managed to fire up the Wii and play as me, I looked again and saw that if I only counted weekdays the last time I'd played would have been a much more likely November 12 2008. However, I couldn't understand why the Wii would only count weekdays, and also I'm pretty sure that I was in Nanning that day (as it was Xixi's first birthday) or returned to Pingguo but with the flu so unlikely to have exerted myself so much. I'll have to look into this further to see what is going on.

I need to sort out when this was

But I spent well over an hour on Wii Fit. Who cares if it isn't HD? It's a great console with some immensely fun games, and I sweated out buckets especially with a 10 minute rhythm boxing routine. I called A Wu and for some reason he was in Nanning, but coming back later and he said we'd play ping pong at 8pm.

I doubt there are many in Pingguo, but annoyingly we weren't the only ones in 2008

We were out of drinking water but annoyingly the phone number I've used for the last few years (and indeed a few weeks ago) to order it was powered off. How can you run a business if people can't call you? Maybe they have a WeChat account or something but if they have it isn't attached to their phone number. So after a tad to eat at Waipo's I went to the water place by the jiao zi place next to our building to see what was going on. Apparently this wasn't the place I normally used, but the place I did use had now closed. I wasn't sure I understood, or even trusted this, but I needed water so ordered a tong to be delivered soon. I even ordered the expensive 22 kuai bottle, but not because I actually understood the explanation for why it was the most expensive.

The water arrived nearly an hour later in the form of a phone call asking me to come downstairs as the buzzer wasn't working or something. Typically someone let the bloke in as I got to the ground floor so we shared the lift up. He gave a little more explanation about the other company - apparently the woman was getting too old to be doing such deliveries. Fair enough I suppose but I'd recently paid a 40 kuai deposit for a second bottle. I happened to mention the deposit to the bloke and said he could give it to the woman but straight away he ripped it up and insisted on giving me the difference between the water and the receipt (18 kuai) and I thought that was quite reasonable. I suppose he won't lose any money on having the big bottle back and he's now got a new customer too, though it's likely to be the last water we'll order here this year.

I had hardly expected A Wu to call me at 8pm to go to ping pong but thought I'd check with him at quarter past as I might have plans of my own. Oh he was simply at A Ni's place and that was that - no mention of ping pong. Almost as if he knew, I got a message from a different bloke to go and drink beer with him this evening. I sort of lied and replied that I'd have to play ping pong first, and he said ok. But I didn't know who he was. Even looking through his WeChat album there was no photo I recognised, but I saw that we'd registered as friends last night at 11.32pm, so I surmised it must be Zhang Hua's father-in-law who likes beer and speaking English.

At about nineish I popped round there - after all they were sorting out a footy shirt for me. Well I got there and Zhang Hua was alone in the back with his wife at the front and certainly not expecting me. Nevertheless he immediately invited me to eat the nearly finished food and join him in a Suntory beer. As his father-in-law wasn't there I realised my logic must have been wrong; it was not him who invited me over, which explained why they weren't expecting me. But somebody was expecting me somewhere. Strangely enough that same somebody then texted me to say he was on the road to Pingguo. Zhang Hua and I shared a couple of beers over a nice chat where I learnt a few more words exactly rather than roughly, like "jiaoliu" as a formal way of saying "communicate", and "zhengshi" for "formal".

Then A Wu called and asked me to come over to drink alcohol. I wasn't massively in the mood, but I reckoned wherever this would be had a better chance of containing the bloke that invited me than where I was. Zhang Hua invited me to play football Thursday evening and I said I should be able to, and we shared a last glass. I realised the place A Wu said he was was directly upstairs from where I was and he looked surprised that I'd got there within seconds, but the other bosses looked happy as spiders who had just coaxed a rather juicy English fly into their web. Every one without fail was drinking red wine, but I insisted on beer. They pointed out there wasn't any then I pointed to the obvious beer can in the centre of the table. Then one of the blokes calmly picked it up and removed it and said now there wasn't any. But to be fair to A Wu he did ensure beer arrived and I only had a tiny mouthful of the horrid Australian wine that was probably rejected in its mother country.

To be fair it was a bit of a laugh. There was some great food on the table but within minutes we got to the serious business of cai ma. It was dictated that I was to challenge each of the 12 other bosses on the table in turn, with best-of-threes with each. I calculated that the worst that could happen would be that I drink 12 small glasses of 3.8% beer and would probably still be the most sober.

So it was with not a little pride that I beat the first six in a row, to their and my delight. I'd just beaten the bloke who supposedly had studied in the US but wasn't really speaking much English to me when I came upon the tall bloke with glasses. I didn't mind losing the first round and having a drink, and wasn't too annoyed that I lost the second too. But on losing the third round, I found the rule was I had to move back anti-clockwise and play the English-speaker again that I'd beaten before. Well luck comes in clumps and my losing clump contined as I lost to him this time. Thankfully it only took one win to get back to tall bloke, but he bloody beat me thrice again and I was back to English-speaker. It took two goes but I beat him and then finally moved on from tall bloke with a nice "BET!" (eight) that he wasn't expecting.

The tall drinking bloke is where I first got stuck

But now that I knew that you could move backwards in this game I knew my supposed maximum of 12 beers became effectively infinite, and therefore my confidence took a turn for the worse. I tried to logic-up some confidence and argued to myself that the fact I had lost and drunk a few beers now ought to counter the confidence-drop that occurred to my recent understanding of the rules. This helped, and I managed to finally get to the end, smashing A Wu, but taking a few goes to beat the main boss sitting with me who seemed to be the main guy. There was also a rather pretty girl sitting at the table (a wife of one rather than something else) and she was the only one I didn't have to cai ma.

Well, apparently I'd made a good entrance with that stint of cai ma, and it used up a good 20 minutes or more. As the bosses got drunker, one by one they moved on to beer - I presumed I must have been somewhat of a sober figurehead that they appreciated, but it could just be because they ran out of wine. Towards the end the bloke who had studied in the US suddenly remembered a lot of his English - funny how alcohol does that - and insisted on talking to me at some length. It would have been easier in Mandarin but I was not going to language-bully him and I think he appreciated that. However, after five years in the States I would have expected just a little bit more vocabulary.

We left at well gone 1am, and downstairs outside I saw the father-in-law of Zhang Hua, who hadn't been there earlier. I left the drunken bosses talking on the broken pavement and stepped inside the shop for a couple of less-hurried beers and a wee chat. By the time I made my excuse 15 minutes later A Wu was still outside talking to a couple of bosses and it was decided that we'd go for Won Tun. Well I had the dian dong che outside and wasn't going to leave it so one of the bosses, who'd joined after me and was from Bangxu, and was now quite pissed on red wine, decided to go with me. It's not normally a problem with Leilei and Xixi but he was quite heavy and didn't make any effort to stabilize the bike with his feet as he got on and I nearly let it fall over.

We followed A Wu's car down to the river and found the Won Tun place that I recognised I'd been to before. Annoyingly, as it was served, drunken Bangxu boss poured half of his Won Tun into my bowl, even though I had no intention of finishing it. Of course he finished a couple of minutes later, so I repaid the compliment by giving him 3/4 of mine, in an exchange that had proved to be pretty pointless, especially as he finished mine.

Then a bloke and his young daughter came to talk to me. I recognised them as I'd met them the other day when going for a ride around here. He had stopped on his dian dong che and we'd got chatting. I had noticed that a few yards away there was a policeman and he was in one of the few parts of the road that actually had a gate separating the two halves. He suddenly stopped the driver of a motorcycle that was coming in the wrong direction, and I guessed that was one of the few traffic violations they may take seriously here. Well I wasn't going to go the wrong way, and after making sure that nearly all the other dian dong ches were driven by helmetless drivers (and I don't mean women), bade farewell and went that way too. Then I noticed that 20 yards past the single hidden policeman were about five policemen quite well lit up. Then a motorbike in front of me, on seeing them, made a 180° turn, presumably guilty of something, and I realised the hiding policeman was probably stopping all the 180°ers as they must be hiding something. Pretty sneaky, and I was concerned I might be stopped for some reason but my light was one and I was on the correct side of the road and I got through without incident. But yes that was the other day.

After we'd eaten we left, but drunken Bangxu boss insisted on me giving him a lift home, so we drove quite a considerable distance to his place, and when he got off he pointed in the direction I needed to go to get home. Bloody drunks. I drove a fair few minutes to the less and less populated suburbs of Pingguo before I came to a dead-end in the road. I felt a bit like I was in the Truman Show. I wondered if I tried to go beyond the concrete bollard, I'd hear a loudspeaker from the sky telling me to go back. Had it not been gone 2am I probably would have tried. Plus the fact that I didn't have great range on the dian dong che spurred me to think of a better course of action.

I could either go left or return, so decided to return as at least I should get to somewhere I knew. I found the bbq place I'd first seen last year and entered just to see what it was like, but apart from a handful of places open it was dead. I didn't go back the exact way I'd came but took a right trusting in my general sense of direction. Thankfully it ended up being a good decision and a few minutes later I could see traffic lights, meaning I must be getting closer to home. I was ever-so-slightly tempted to get invited to some of the late-night tables still eating and drinking but decided enough was enough for one night.