Friday 26^th February, 2021 Lantern Festival 2015

As the (banned) fireworks exploded outside I asked what the occasion was. Well it's not something I would know, now is it? Every other day seems to be some festival or other, I'd need to constantly Google Chinese dates to keep up.

My lethargy knows no bounds of late, a second BHG trip to stock up on plonk never happened so next week I had better make myself busy. Things to cook and freeze for lunches, laundry, back to school haircut now the weather is warming up, that sort of thing.

I have still yet to be told officially we start on Monday 8^th or what my timetable is. I suppose on Monday I had better enquire about the latter. Jody can't even look on the computer system for me because this school, unlike Chizhou, doesn't enter foreign teachers' classes on it. I wonder if my freshmen will have military training but somehow doubt it with the latest little Covid flare-ups.

I hesitate to tempt fate but I have been thinking about summer. I think after the awful year we have had and the ruined holidays I deserve a month of roaming. May not happen of course but the people involved are up for it. The tentative plan is to fly to Nanjing, spend the night collecting IHG points and then a fast train to Suzhou, Anhui to stay and earn Honors points in the Doubletree for a few nights. Leave there, maybe another IHG night in Nanjing before flying to meet Alice in Kunming, from whence we will commence our aborted tour from earlier this month, following which we (if she has enough holiday) will adjourn to Shanghai for the usual piss-ups, shopping and with luck a passport application. And a fair few wind-up arguments but without the menace this year - I will be 65 then and in no position to stand upright for long, let alone defend myself!

Nothing to do with China but my morning ritual is to pore over seven – sometimes more – news websites. Two of those I admit are tabloids, the Mirror and the Mail. Why do I read them? Because very often they offer stories in far greater detail and although the Mail is a dreadful rag, it is sometimes right.

Anyway, the point of all this is the enormous preponderance of “stories” they tell in the national interest that are anything but. So and so lost ten stone after being shamed on a flight when the seatbelt wouldn't fit, woman reveals game-changing hack for cleaning bathroom tiles, woman shares on TikTok what 30% chance of rain really means and peoples' minds are blown – you get the idea. And then there's the “celebrity” news. Mostly people I have never heard of but as I watch UK telly but not cheapo reality TV I assume they are from love island, Essex or they are a real housewife from Surbiton. But have you ever noticed the taglines?

Heartbreaking reason/heartwarming reason/ adorable photo etc and how is it that almost all the women who are not “Mum of four”, “Grandmother” etc are ALL models or aspiring models?

It's just the same intro time after time, the only light relief is when they fail to pick up a typo (which is often). When did journalists become so thick?

I remember years ago reading the Telegraph (in print then, no website stuff) article about Lawnchair Larry who was up for a Darwin Award. Look as I might I cannot for the life of me find that article online (there are plenty of other inferior ones) but it had me hooting for days as I read it to friends and colleagues. There is nothing with any humour combined with class any more. Are we all being, as they say, “dumbed down” by attrition? Innit? KnowwhatImean?

I won't begin to postulate on world affairs, I try not to make my blog too depressing – hell I could end up with a multi-million dollar lawsuit against me from San Francisco after a suicide!

So hey, it's Lantern Festival, the season of goodwill towards all lanterns – and I never saw a single one on sale for me to buy and send floating into the night sky..........

 

Wednesday 24^th February, 2021

A week and a half left of the holiday that just felt like time off work. And still I have not officially been told my start date or my timetable! Am I surprised? No. The Chinese teachers get their timetables about a decade before but the foreigner always gets his/hers half an hour before start of term.

Now it may well be that I have retained the same timetable as last term (doubtful) and whilst the late night finishes were a pain in the derriére then, with the light evenings I can handle it – along with the long lay-ins in bed!

So we have done huge shops in Metro and today in BHG, I just need to make sure the wine lake is topped up sufficiently to only need one box per week once I am working. And of course get to work making my sausage rolls for any lunchtimes I am stuck at school. What I wouldn't give to have a Greggs nearby or even; as in Shanghai; western delis where you can get proper bread and ham and salami and all things nice! I get bread that tastes of battenburg and ham that never saw a pig in its life unless I make it.......

I know I have sort of tried half-heartedly to avoid the Covid thing and I know I was never barricaded in my home as some news sites showed happening in China (with people who were actually infected and couldn't be trusted to isolate) but a year ago it was pretty dismal here before the rest of the world cottoned on. Sure, I could come and go at will but only for a walk (that's a laugh, me? Walk?) or to the supermarket. It was damned boring and being the only foreigner here with students on a distant campus who in any event had gone home, it was to all intents, isolation, and my only relief was my daily trip to see Mr Jing Jo. Now if we could speak to each other then maybe I would dwell awhile and quaff a can of Snow but it will never happen. So yes, at least I had a “wife” but one whom I have been married to for 80 years and talk to as much. Like two minutes a day.

So of course I was peed off with the lockdown, coming as it did right in the holidays. I bore it and also accepted my summer Yangtse cruise was off (and given it was to be the MV Anna with Zhu Anna as my companion that was a blow). This spring festival my travel plans were blown again. I could have gone but had anything happened I would have been out of favour to say the least. If they try to stop me in summer I will go bonkers. We will take that Yunnan trip, I'd also like to go and see Joan again and then there's my Haj to Shanghai -where I do rather hope to lodge a new passport application. I get jittery when there's only a year to run.

But watching British TV makes me want to call the Samaritans! Every second advert is about what the Halifax is doing to comfort their customers, the “new normal” crap and the one with the guy and dog social distancing (God how I hate that phrase!) and then to top it all, the look them in the face and tell them you are doing everything one!

If the UK had done what China and other countries did at the outset? I carry a mask and wear it on average 5 minutes a day. Jody sees her friends and I see Mr Jing Jo and family and we are bare-faced. We may get it but maybe not, it's been over a year.

But the one that annoys me is the mental health one. As if a few are going through it when the whole world is! God almighty, what would the people who lived through two world wars think of the people today? I know what I think. And the Chinese people are not included, they just carry on and keep calm -even without the coffee mugs.

 

Sunday 21^st February, 2021 2030

Two weeks holiday left. Going to be a wrench.

The plan yesterday was to go to BHG but someone wanted to go to Lanzhou Center for a spicy burger. Well it was on the agenda so we swapped days. I think I am going to stick to double cheeseburgers in future, everything else I try is not good. At least I now know how to stop the 7¥ charge for the “free” chicken nuggets which are actually awful. I just have to say mayo gee kwai. I thought mayo gee was enough (and maybe is) but better to be sure.

Then it was the obligatory trip to Metro. Two large bags later and a bill of 900¥, admittedly almost half of it down to luxury chocolates and ones with liqueurs. It would have been more as I had my heart set on buying a live lobster or two for today's dinner but the buggers never had any.

I've never done a live lobster and I am certainly squeamish about chucking them into boiling water alive. Done my research on humane methods and am now ready, just don't have the damned lobster. So dinner tonight was just chips. The space I made in the freezer was taken up by a certain person so methinks she can come and help me buy a chest freezer and get it delivered. If I do indeed have the same timetable next term then I want to be able to pre-cook meals so I can eat properly.

We have a dispute over where the optical health hospital is (the big one). She thinks it's the 15 bus and I think it's the 131. I may coerce her into coming with me. I really need some specs that work. Nearly £1,000 and still I am not happy. Oh God, give me a UK Vision Express!

I stunned Jody tonight by informing her that Gansu province was twice as big as the UK and more than three times as big as England. The Chinese seem to have no conception of the size of the country – for instance this city alone is a tenth the size of England. I am sure I can use those facts in class next term.

Speaking of next term, no sign of a vaccine – western or otherwise.

 

Friday 19^th February 2021 1920

In two hours or so Jody will be back.

Her parents didn't want her to leave (and between the lines they have come to terms with the fact she will leave for South America in due course and her spirit will not be harnessed -sensible people at last) but she was told by the school all teachers had to be back in the city by tomorrow, 18 days before term starts. I am guessing that's an incubation period but along with being the poorest province in China, Gansu is certainly one of the safest when it comes to COVID.

Hell, when I look back a year everyone shit themselves and the west looked on. Now here it is just precautions and the west never behaved so they paid a huge price – lives, jobs, the economy et al when a quick effective whack was what was needed. Instead the response was dilatory and now if I want to go home it means 10 days in a Holiday Inn at £175 a night. I love Holiday Inns in China, they are on a par with Hilton, Sheraton etc but in the UK? Travelodge is better!

Anyway Jody is bringing back a chicken from her uncle's farm which her mother prepared. Sadly it will still have legs, feet, neck and head attached. But she wants it stuffed. Ain't had a chicken big enough to stuff yet so we will see. She does love her roast spuds though. And I do still have a packet of Paxo from Shanghai so no need to make my own this time. What I would give for one more time in the days I had an appetite to go to the pub or club on a Sunday lunchtime, have a skinful and come home to a mountain of chicken roast, mash and veg, complain it was too much, finish it anyway and then fall asleep watchingTV.

2000

Someone thought 1900 was 9PM so arrived earlier than I was expecting. Sans chicken because it was too heavy.

Pissed off? Work it out. Now I have to try and find a big one, no mean feat here and they can cost up to £10, peanuts in the UK but a good day's expenses for me. Finding one is the hard part.

Such is life

 

Tuesday 16^th February, 2021 1730

Well there's a first. Just popped out to the jing jo shop for my daily needs, which today were to cost 80¥. Loads of boxes outside the shop along with large buckets of eggs. I wish that had happened two days ago before I bought two dozen in the supermarket, not only would I have had fifty eggs but a great reusable bucket to keep.

Anyway, Mr Jing Jo was busy dealing with customers so as usual I went inside to get my beer cans and jing jo ready, problem was there were none of either out on the shelves. Mr JJ poked his head in and pointed to which box of beer to open and indicated the jing jo was behind the counter. So I served myself and bagged up. As I was wondering whether to go into the cash drawer to put my money in and take my change, JJ poked his head in again and indicated that indeed, I should do so! Immensely trusting of him considering there's a fair amount in there, albeit in small denominations. To my relief there were no 100 yuan notes in there – only 50s and below – so my bright red ton will be immediately apparent the next time he opens the drawer.

The bonus? He would have given me a 20¥ note in change, I took a ten and two fives. Why? Because I am hoarding tens and fives for next term. A taxi to or from BHG is ten and to or from school is fifteen. It saves problems having the right money when the driver has no change or indeed no money and expects that Alipay thing I don't use on the phone.

It's as dull as ditchwater here of late. A great deal of blame must attach to my lethargy, I even keep delaying BHG trips, hence tonight's dinner will be a dozen of those dumplings the school gave me for new year. Well – I have to make some space in the freezer! I had some a few days ago, prawn fillings and I never realised what happens to Chinese dumpling vinegar (which bears no relation to our wonderful Sarsons for fish and chips) if you leave it overnight in the bowl after eating. It lays down the foundations for a new block of flats! I shall be sure to rinse after dinner tonight!

This is the fourth day Jody has been gone. After a year of having her here (spats and all) it seems strange to be alone again. I find myself at night going as if to turn down the volume of what I am watching in case she is asleep and then catch myself when I realise she isn't here.

Please don't get the wrong impression, we are like an old married couple who hardly speak but each knows the other is there. And occasionally we can go out shopping together or for dinner. Outside of term time when at least I had students, it would have been hard in solitary so her company has been invaluable. At least when the Yanks were here I could always have some company – even if their stipend meant it cost me a bloody fortune.

Alice asked me if my school wanted an English teacher so I asked. She is keen to leave the international language mill she is at. So I emailed dean Delia who jumped at the chance but never read my email properly saying she was an old student of mine. Delia thought she was a foreigner. Where am I going to conjure up one of those in the Covid years?? Interestingly it seems the new rules for new-entrant Chinese teachers are that they must have a PhD so Alice is out of luck for public unis for now, possessing just a Masters.

Ah well, at least I am saving money. Might even get Alice roped into opening a bar if she becomes really disillusioned......

 

Chinese New Year's Eve 2021 2000

The gout had been banished by bedtime on Monday. I didn't want to be seen to be incapacitated when getting The Visit on Tuesday.

And get The Visit I did indeed. Except it wasn't Brenda and the leader. They came mob-handed, five of them. Brenda, the leader, Jody's boss, Dean Liu (who is really behaving herself lately) and some other guy I didn't know. And they came bearing gifts.

Shedloads of stuff! Two enormous packs of frozen dumplings (which meant I had to clear out and rearrange the freezer), a whole Peking duck, family packs of tissues and toilet rolls, big bottle of laundry detergent, box of yoghurt, two of milk, four pairs of cotton socks and a set of long johns. Oh and a pack of burger cheese squares. While they were here they even assembled my replacement hat stand, which lazy-arse here hadn't even taken out of the box. In my defence I once assembled a B&Q bookcase and had so many bits left over at the end that I was frightened to tackle it. Anyway it is now up and currently in use and only one small washer was left over. Note the masks and social distancing in the photo!

Jody was going home that day for ten days. Late that evening she returned here, much to my surprise. She had changed her train to yesterday. She confided in me that she really didn't want to go and so I told her if she wanted to stay here I would be happy. No, I have to go, maybe I will stay a week. Initially it had been ten days.

Today she went to campus to visit the Uzbekistani students who are stranded (much as I am), lonely (which I am not) and skint (also which I am not). Apparently scholarships weren't approved but today, just in time, shopping cards worth 1,000¥ each were handed out to them so they could go and buy food in BHG and cook in their accommodation. They don't drink as they are Muslims – just as well.

Anyway, suffice to say that we just feasted on chicken and chips for her new year's eve banquet (strawberries being prepared as I type for dessert) and she will go home tomorrow. The ten days became seven days and is now down to maybe two or three! Quite why she wants to subject herself to an annual grilling as to why she isn't married yet is beyond me.

Fireworks (which are banned in Lanzhou) have been going off all afternoon close by and no doubt there will be a flurry at midnight. Thankfully it won't last until breakfast time tomorrow such as it does elsewhere. Maybe that's another bonus in living surrounded by predominantly pensioners and geriatrics!

I was annoyed earlier to find the stalls around the corner had all closed. Jody had opined that would be the case but I scoffed and assured her they would be open. Longer-term readers will remember my new year habit of going to that vegetable stall which also had live birds they would kill and cook on the spot? Also that at this time of year I paid 100¥ a bird so I could free them to fly again (not the chickens obviously but the pigeons and doves)? Ok, that stall disappeared thankfully when the area was developed and modern lockups were constructed for the stallholders. But I know damned well they were open then and I always bade them seasons greetings on my way past to liberate the fowl. Maybe they are earning more now.

 

Monday 8^th February, 2021 1430

On Saturday Jody did agree to come to Burger King and help me shop in Metro. Burger King's motto used to be “Have It Your Way” but nobody told China! Whopper with cheese? No. Can I get a slice of cheese and put it in myself? No.

To be equitable to BK the problem was the stupid girl serving. Previously I have ordered burgers that came with bacon and I asked to substitute that for cheese without problem – who the hell likes Canadian/American bacon except for natives of those countries, who have no idea what bacon actually is?

We then encountered a strange laowei, coincidentally half Canuck-half Septic and he was, shall I say, “interesting”. We never exchanged contact details after chatting.

Then we did the shopping. I am getting peed off with this green health code mullarkey. After the time before in BHG when Jody had to sign us in, last time when I went alone I took the phone and they weren't interested when I pulled the phone out and blow me, Lanzhou Center never wanted it so bugger it, I am not lugging an enormous phone around any more for nothing.

Saturday night I was too tired to even try to watch the opening matches of the 6 nations. There was never any point in watching the France-Italy match but I thought I would watch the Calcutta Cup on catch up yesterday morning. Idiotically I opened Facebook first. Roland in Shanghai had asked if I was watching (but he posted not long into the match) and Ollivier my ex colleague and French teacher asked how I enjoyed the match. I guessed I might not enjoy watching.

But of course I have dual nationality. I may have been born in England from English parents, grandparents and all ancestors but of course having worked for a Scottish shipping company I have decided for now I am part-Scottish! Not going to dwell on it and I am not an expert but I think England escaped lightly. I just wondered why on earth they were playing a kicking game when England are renowned for brute force and ignorance. Last night I watched the Ireland-Wales fixture and the Paddies were using force and winning with a man sent off! Ok so they lost in the end but rugby union in my mind should be a brutal game, not delicate little flicks.

Last night Jody came back from her studying and told me she didn't really want to go home to her parents. I did mention this might be the case a while back but her train ticket is booked for Tuesday. She had told me she would be gone for ten days. I said she could stay here throughout but she feels obliged to pay lip service. I have a feeling she will return possibly after three or four days. We shall see.

Today I had intended to pay another visit to BHG to get yet more wine for next term's stockpile. However, whilst I had been perfectly fine when I rose for my nocturnal “bilge pumping” at maybe four, when I decided to get up at nine I found myself in trouble. A sudden attack of the dreaded gout in my right ankle. Nothing near as serious as a full-blown attack I hasten to add, but sufficient to see BHG cancelled and for now my using a crutch to move about home. Such attacks are, thankfully, rare and usually a diclofenac sees them off after three or four hours. It has now been five hours with only marginal improvement. Jody's gone for her lunch and promised to be back by 1830 for a fish finger and chips dinner and mercifully will get me my liquid supplies when she returns.

Had she not been here I would have needed crutches to get to Mr Jing Jo (although I know he would have carried the stuff to my flat for me), which since the latest Covid scare has seen the shortcut sealed off again and now involves double the distance. Bolt cutters anyone??

I am hoping by tonight I will be as mobile as I was yesterday. I really don't want to have a problem tomorrow when Brenda and the leader come calling. I can just imagine him thinking this old duffer is a liability and we need to get rid of him! I suppose I could lie and say I twisted my ankle but hopefully that won't be necessary. My experience of being fired temporarily in Chizhou over medicines taught me that the Chinese take no account of the fact you have had a condition for many years (in my case almost 36 years) and coped perfectly well 99% of the time.

At least the temperatures are becoming more friendly in daylight.

 

Friday 5^th February, 2021 1700

For the past few days I have been trying to get myself in gear and go and do the shopping I need to do before the mad rush. It is new year's eve next Thursday and there is no way I want to be a prop forward or crowd control officer then, I will steer well clear of the known “troublespots” ie main supermarkets.

But I get by far the best deal in BHG on wine so at the very least I needed to get in enough stock to last until after the frenzy. Annoying really considering yesterday I should have been in Kunming and looking forward to a trip for five days in Lijiang starting tomorrow. Anyway, I am alive. And lazy.

Last night I entertained thoughts of going to BHG today and then on to Burger King and Metro. Silly me. What I did do though was actually move my backside and at least get to BHG. Didn't get much food though, hard to carry much more with a dozen bottles of wine at my age! I did get tinned ham for my ham, egg and chips dinner tonight and yes, it is as awful as I remember. Tastes like Spam in aspic. But hey! Rejoice! The annual potato famine is over and there are half-decent ones available now! And once I move myself I can make my own ham. Oh for some Branston......

Anyway, when I turned into the wine aisle to find one of my “girls” to order my plonk, I was immediately confronted by four bodies wearing army fatigues, shopping. You may be forgiven for thinking the Chinese are diminutive in stature (as I did before I came here) but this was ridiculous. I thought perhaps I could have been looking at the Chinese version of the Harlem Globetrotters! I swear the shortest was no less than 6' 2”. With my paltry 5' 7¾” (definitely less now 45 years down the line) I felt positively tiny.

And the taxi driver who brought me home was yet another who wanted a “selfie” with me. I really should start charging! I know there aren't many foreigners in Lanzhou now compared to a year ago but we are still hardly a rarity.

In fact Brenda forwarded me greetings from the Bureau of Foreign Affairs today which said they had recently taken 28 laowei on a cultural trip (thank God they never asked me after the last time climbing a mountain!) and informed me she and the leader will descend upon me at 1500 on Tuesday. That means I need to do Metro tomorrow or Sunday and another wine run to BHG Monday. I am trying to amass sufficient reserves so that a box of six a week will see me through to summer at a bottle a day. No telling what my timetable is next term even though the Chinese teachers all have theirs. Odd that.

At least though the temperature at lunchtime is now above zero, in fact this afternoon I wore a jacket but no jumper. Roll on summer!

 

Tuesday 2^nd February, 2021 1750

I just watched this film (don't ask me where I got it!) and uploaded it on YouTube. If you have ninety minutes to kill in lockdown you may find it a powerful thing to view. When I think of my so-called American “friends” and others who believe China did it deliberately I have thoughts I shouldn't post here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxZYcKljCVg

So, once again lethargy won the day. On Sunday I wanted to go to Metro with Jody, have a Whopper and get some luxury shopping, but she was too tired and I got -and still have – the hump.

Yesterday I meant to go to BHG but got watching catch up TV. Lately the internet has slowed drastically after noon so it has been a case of watch it when I can and so it ended up too late for me to bother. Ditto today. In fact I haven't set foot outside.

I had ideas of making myself chicken and chips or maybe ham, egg and chips. No, not my own home-grown ham (not started that yet) but remember that weird tasting tinned stuff in a rounded triangular can? Well I was going to buy some at BHG but here I am!

I just went to get a load of luncheon meat from the fridge, that would have done. Except it wasn't there. That annoyed me but not half as much as the fact the mouse that stole my Spam has bought potatoes and said nary a word, I only noticed them when I was cooking the very last of the tortellini I bought in Shanghai in the summer. I am starving and could still have had egg and chips! Argghh!

Now, it's spring festival and last night as I was nodding off in bed I recalled my first – this is my eleventh in China. It was Jan/Feb 2011 and Kevin was cluttering off to the UK for the duration. How he afforded to do it every winter and summer I have no idea, his private teaching must have been monumental.

Anyway, he warned me that his first year (the year previous) he had been left stranded. Readers who have been with me a decade will know the story so my apologies for the repetition.

In those days the buses stopped running for a week. The uni was 15 miles from town, the campus was deserted and all local businesses closed for the holiday, not that there were many in those days. He found himself marooned with six apples and a jar of coffee. Ultimately he begged a guard to get him a taxi at great cost and went downtown for a meal and a shop.

Forewarned, I had the campus supermarket bring me 30 cases of beer and as many bottles of red wine together with the same number of half-litre bottles of jing jo. My flat was stocked as well as any bar! My assistant was aghast but a man has needs. Then I set about cramming my fridge and freezer with food. I never had an oven then, just a regulation supply microwave so I bought loads of frozen pizza slices and ready meals. Can't get them in Lanzhou but in Chizhou I could get pasta dishes that could be ready in 5 minutes. Not great but filled a hole.

I found (once in lockdown – sound familiar?) the pizza slices, regardless of topping, all tasted of chemicals and it was most unpalatable. I ended up donating 99% to a local kid when school reopened.

But it really was isolation, with the advantage I could take my dog Piggy out in the deep snow at will. I think the following year the buses only stopped for three days, the next year one and after that they didn't.

So my point is that whilst some places will close a decade later most will still remain open and my only concern is getting enough wine in early enough so I can avoid the “Christmas Rush” as they panic-buy last minute supplies in the supermarkets. I well recall about eight years ago spending 45 minutes just to buy a carrot and some chicken breasts for the animals when I had the stupidity to go two days before the big day.

This year it was supposed to be different. On Thursday I was flying to Kunming for a two week tour of Yunnan, then flying back well after the spring festival spree.

Let my obituary say “He wanted to see the Harbin ice festival and Yunnan” - maybe one day!

 

Monday 1^st February, 2021 2100

This article was on the BBC news website recently. I shall say nothing further except to ask you to read it. Regular visitors to my blog will need no hints as to what I was thinking as I read it!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-55830497

The day of my last entry I happened to ask in the jing jo shop if there was a parcel for me. Stupid really, Alice was always going to tell me when it was there, the couriers text every recipient and as it is done in Chinese there's no point them having my number because I will assume it is spam. But Alice sends me a message on Skype so while I was out I thought she may have done so.

Well that was a mistake of sorts. It took the best part of ten minutes to get across to them that I was expecting chilli sauce and then further time with Mr Jing Jo asking for my phone number. Utterly pointless unless he has someone who speaks a little Ingrish by his side but I acquiesced. Blow me, yesterday it arrived and he called me. Well, face to face we can usually get an idea of what's going on but on the phone? I kept trying to tell him I knew the parcel was there and that I would be calling to collect it later. He was very persistent and so I enlisted Jody's help. Not only had it arrived but he was bringing it to my home and was on the way! Very decent of him and to be honest it gave me chance to show him my last remaining old bottle to explain what I had ordered.

In the UK people go ape over Amazon using excessive packaging. Not so here. You can order a salt cellar and chances are it will arrive in a box big enough to fit a respectably-sized television. Thus was the case here although the reason was because the (well I suppose it was) bubble wrap they used was enormous. You could have used what was around each bottle as water wings for your kids in the pool!

This afternoon Brenda called me to tell me the leader will visit me soon, probably next week. Whether she meant the leader of the school or the foreign language department I know not but despite my protestations I will indeed be descended upon. As she put it, he has to give you something for new year. What would you like? A million yuan? Cue laugh. Do you need anything from the supermarket? No I shop every week. In the end I gave her the answer I used to give when asked what I wanted for Christmas in the UK – socks. You can never have too many. Anything else? More in hope than expectation I said boxer shorts but not Chinese ones. That flummoxed her. I then explained Chinese ones were unisex with no pee hole and western ones had a slit with a button so the indignity of undoing your trousers and dragging down your knickers is avoided. She now has a photo of “real” boxers but I will be amazed if she can find them. If she does then I want to know where she got them!

Not quite so cold here today although events lately in the Far East seem to be taking a worrying turn on a more personal level. Burma has been taken over again by the military, China is yet again sabre-rattling regarding Taiwan (not for the first time) but more concerning is the Hong Kong BNO passport which threatens a serious rift between here and the UK.

I can see both sides. I do not agree with things that have/are being done although I understand why. Not really my business but should things with the UK escalate it is not beyond the realms it could affect me and other British nationals here. I wouldn't be so melodramatic as to suggest Brits would be detained aka Canadians and I am hardly high profile but one never knows.

It's a volatile world these days, more so now I think than any other time since VJ Day. And I blame the Golfer for a great deal of that.