Hitchless trip back from Baise and meal with Haiwei and friends and 公文包

Neither Leilei nor I got up before 11am, but I needed to as unlike him I haven't adopted the Chinese habit of showering before bed rather than in the morning. In addition to the morning, fair enough, but once a day I've generally turned into a "just before you go out for evening stuff" shower guy. Thinking about it though, if you are going to shower just once in a day, just before bed seems more logical (especially if you're sharing a bed with someone - we weren't). I mean much of the sweat and grime you can pick up during the day will just get moved to pyjamas and bed clothes if you don't. Having said that, if you've had a rather heavy night out, and are not sharing a bed, then a shower in the morning makes a lot of sense. Other than using up a lot of water though, the best policy should be both last thing at night and morning and/or early evening. Or of course just after the gym, which could an issue to your shower rhythm if you don't have a fixed time of going to the gym. And the last Zoe podcast I listened to (while in the gym), said you should really exercise at the same time of day. Something to do with circadian rhythms.

So I was ready and packed by 11.30am, and still had the drinks and crisps I bought from yesterday in a separate bag. I didn't want Tan to see the leftover beer though, so at 11.41am I thoughtfully chugged it (330ml of 3.3% isn't going to get you tiddly, whatever time of the day).

We checked out soon after midday and walked to find a noodle place. I managed maybe half of mine, as did Leilei with his chao fen. The ladies did a little better. Still, a whole lunch for four of us for under £4 can't be sniffed at. We then planned to walk around the corner to Er jie's house. Tan couldn't contact her as she's blocked her on Weixin and has done for months if not years. They seem to get on much better in person than digitally, and were sitting next to each other last night. But it meant as I had Er jie as a contact I needed to call her to find out her address. She answered and I asked her address and of course the words she used were not in my vocabulary so I handed the phone to Tan who got the relevant details and indeed it was only a three minute walk away.

So up to the 24th floor it was. Apparently the kids had stayed here before in the past when in Baise, but I don't think I had. But it looked like any other modern apartment, and the huge tv was showing highlights of last night's opening ceremony of the Olympics, so we drank tea and watched that till 2.30pm when Er jie's bloke took us downstairs to his car and we all piled in to go to the station and got there 15 minutes later.

I was sweating not just because of the weather but I knew any mistake in my online ordering of tickets would have resulted in a commotion like yesterday's, if not worse, but we were all beeped through successfully and I mini-fist-pumped.

It was an uneventful journey with the kids on their phones and me on my laptop, and Pingguo was the first stop 40 minutes later. Interestingly (for me) there were a couple of policemen after the exit (where we had to scan our passports to exit), who needed to check our passports. Not for ID as such but for visas. This is the first time it's ever happened to us outside of an international airport. But I guess as now there are free three-day visas for some of the big cities here they need to check that people are not leaving those cities for other places. Anyway, a casual glance at the visas was more than enough proof we were legit.

As we were in person at the station, Tan decided to go to the ticket office to sort out once and for all what the problem was with her booking tickets for Xixi. I followed the conversation as much as I could, and it transpired Tan needed to download a separate app for the railways, that wasn't in Weixin. I wasn't going to wait in this heat for that so stood by the open doors of the station where the A/C wafted out keeping me cool. It took another 20 minutes before she'd downloaded the 1.7GB app that has 1.6 stars out of five on average, and is apparently really crap to use. Whether she'll be able to use it in the future to book tickets for Xixi we don't know. But I can so it will probably be my job in the future.

I didn't worry about meeting Haiwei for 5pm, that is early even for China, and got there after 5.30pm as his son was arriving, to find him cooking and no table set. It gave me the opportunity to go out and get 24 cans of Li Quan beer though. Around 6pm we finally sat down to eat the lovely roast duck they'd ordered and the rest of the stuff they'd cooked. After 15 minutes the drinks were poured and I was the only one on the beer I'd brought. Haiwei, on the other hand got through a nearly full bottle of rouge before opening another one and getting through that too, with the help of some caima.

I'd had some forced conversations with his sons, so had done my job, and the younger one told me he was bored and I completely understood, so he booked a didi che himself to go and find his friends, and elder son left a bit later on his dian dong che to play games. Haiwei started on the beer but his girlfriend made him drink some water first. 

A mate I hadn't seen for some time, Haiwei's girlfriend Li Baoli, Haiwei and his rouge

Some woman had come to deliver 公文包 as you do, and seemed to have delivered a whole box of the plastic bottles, then sat down with us to eat as you do again. I was looking at the box of bottles and a bloke thrust two of them into my hands. I genuinely didn't want them and it must have looked fake as I couldn't get away with not taking them, so hopefully they'll come in useful as a gift to someone.

I am now the proud owner of two 1.25l bottles of 22% 公文包

By 11pm Haiwei was pissed enough that we decided to call it a night. I don't know why his girlfriend didn't give him a lift back so it was left to me to bring him to the same place he's been staying for the last year or so.

As it was only 11.20pm I pinged Li Kun who said to come round to his office where there were a few people drinking. I managed an hour and played with his kids for a while until his son tried to jump on my back and fell off and collapsed into tears so he had to be taken back home with middle sister. I realise I'd probably had enough too so called it a night soon after midnight and managed to get another reasonably early night falling asleep to the Olympics.