Friday 23rd November, 2012          2000

Gordon flipping Bennett! This afternoon it turned positively freezing! Well ok, it was probably down to ten degrees but these days for me that is flaming cold. Time to buy a new hat for bike riding and drag the earmuffs out of the cupboard methinks.

Quite a good day today, both classes went well although the English corner cum party was a trifle disorganised in that it was held in the walkway on the third floor of our teaching block. As a result the students behaved in the usual rude manner by chatting loudly with each other while my class performed a playlet they had been working on and crowded in when I gave them the games to play, but in fairness they seemed to enjoy it and it only lasted an hour.

Tomorrow Kevin is picking Kiki and me up to return the bread maker, go to the bank, do a quick shop (Kiki needs to buy a thick sweater) and then by way of recompense for his trouble I said I would spring for lunch, especially as Daisy is back in town for the day and he can bring her along to make a foursome.

Saturday 24th       1730

I made the oddest dinner last night. Not fancying anything on campus I decided to use all my available resources at home - to wit, some farfalle pasta and a tin of hot and spicy sardines in tomato sauce. Sounds disgusting but actually it was fine and filled a hole. In fact it was too much for me to eat so the cats got an exotic treat. I was disgusted with the dog and the cats though for earlier I had gone to buy fish for their supper but seen some meat. Instead I bought the meat, basically a lump of pig ribcage, thinking the bones would be good for Pepsi. When I found out the price - 40y - I fervently wished I had stuck to the original plan and bought fish for a third of that. Not one of the animals has touched it, so I reckon I will end up taking it down to the shops tomorrow and leaving it on the grass for grateful wild dogs to devour. My lot are spoilt and would probably be quite content with liver every night, something I am seriously considering because that is the cheapest thing I can buy which pleases them all.

Anyway, the bread maker is now winging its way back for repair free of charge this time. Tomorrow I may use Kevin’s machine but use the exact ingredients mine calls for - it will be interesting to see whether his contraption produces bread as heavy as mine is, in which case I know I need to seriously play around with the volumes.

After a swift pitstop at the bank we all went our separate ways, Kevin and Daisy to China Telecom to try and set up internet access for his phone (they did but he never got the password!) and Kiki and I to the Lottemart centre. All I needed were a few bits as I can go again after teaching tomorrow but Kiki didn’t buy her sweater because the cheapest she could find was 220y (£22) which I also thought was a little expensive. Then I treated everyone to lunch at a Korean barbecue restaurant - on the dear side and not somewhere I go often, but nice. In fact I wished it had been more expensive as I left not quite full! They do the best beef in the city in my opinion, we had scallops, prawns, rice cakes, spuds, sushi etc and it made a nice change. Mind you, for 40y more I could have bought that sweater!

Today was cold but bright, unfortunately the forecast says I will require my cape to go downtown and the mercury is not expected to rise above 5C, a temperature last seen in March so it won’t be pleasant. It will though be a good test for my gauntlets.

Some of my new students stopped to chat with me last night and in the course of conversation they said their class would like to take me for lunch or dinner on Christmas day. That hasn’t happened before and I asked them to speak to me again during the week as usually we foreigners eat together along with our favourite Chinese students. Now if it isn’t another Chinese promise it would mean a free meal for me but as Kiki will be leaving early in the new year I rather want to have her with me on the day regardless of where or what I eat. I have a plan if they are serious, and that is to ask Kevin and Ollivier if they would like to come with a student apiece (Daisy probably won’t be here) and we could all contribute our share and if agreed then I would suggest the class organise a nice meal in a large private room for thirty-odd. That would be very nice indeed, if it comes to anything.

And while I was typing that last paragraph I received a timely reminder of what winter here is all about, keeping an eye on how much amperage I am using at any given time! I was suddenly plunged into darkness as the main breaker outside tripped because I had the aircon, two blow heaters, a hotplate and the washing machine on all at once. I had forgotten that to cook in winter I have to turn off at least one heater. Roll on the warm weather again…….