Ledong, Home Maintenance, Dreaded Lurgy

A worrying week begins. I really feel I should have gone to hospital in Haikou, if only to ease my mind, but circumstances prevent it for a few days. Still have a lot of pain in my left leg. Anyway, chin up, as they say!

April 1^st Same as March 1^st, lazy day, updated blog, learnt some more Chinese characters.

April 2^nd A short walk, bought the lottery tickets, and took a photo for Jake’s World Street Photography Facebook page. Huan was wondering how such slender stalks could hold such heavy fruit. I certainly wouldn’t want to be underneath when they come crashing down. They look beautiful, shame about the smell when you open them!

April 3^rd A very busy day today. Up at 5 o’clock. We set the clock radio for then, it switched on, but with no music. I guess they don’t start that early. Luckily enough, the light woke Huan. Off to Ledong after breakfast to see the old tenants out. Traffic was very easy so we arrived early, far too early. We went up the roof for a look round, bit of a hazy day but some great views.

Plenty of memories for me too, the Air Force were practicing, probably ‘circuits and bumps’ so every few minutes there was a roar of fighter jets as two of them flew over. My sibling would also have loved it, we grew up on RAF bases. I did try and get some pictures, with very little success though. Probably just as well!

Still with plenty of time to waste we went for a stroll around the city. It is much bigger than Wuzhishan and we saw a lot we hadn’t seen before. In fact I think we may have stumbled across the original Ledong village in the middle of the city.

We spotted one of the earlier Chinese modes of transport. I saw many of these in 1986 on my first visit to Pingdingshan. We often see them when we drive around the rural areas of Hainan but very rarely have the chance to take photos. Well, here’s one now.

Another thing we often see is ‘ducks in bags’! These little chappies weren’t too happy about me getting too near but I did snap their pic.

All too soon of course, our leisurely stroll had to come to an end and work had to start. The first thing was tile replacement. The tenants had not taken care and the kitchen door had slammed causing two tiles to fall off. We got them fixed, not quite a match but fine if you don’t look too closely. Message to all potential house owners; make sure you keep spare tiles!

Now these tenants had only been in residence for four months and we left them with a brand new gas hob. What a mess it was to clean! They even had a housemaid but I guess her job was mostly ‘the twins’! The bathroom is a mess too but I told Huan I would clean that next time. In the five or six years that we have rented the apartment out, we have never returned to a toilet bowl yellow on the outside and a toilet seat with the beginnings of black mould!

I guess we should be grateful that almost everything was still there.

Much worse for us was the holes had begun to reappear in the walls that we repaired last time.

Well, I argued with Huan this time and said we would have to have the job done properly. (I hope that’s possible in China.) We needed to have the walls sealed before trying any repairs again. The man who fixed the tiles was in agreement with me, luckily. Of course, he may have just been seeing dollar signs in his eyes! He advised us to clear all the plastering off up to where it was no longer easy to remove. I didn’t think any of it was that easy! It seemed we would have to purchase a hammer, according to him and Huan, so off they went to the shop while I had a coffee and a fag.

Huan returned with their version of a hammer, which in my words, is a metal axe. It still wasn’t so easy but we did what we could. Here’s Huan giving it a ‘bit of welly’!

It became obvious to me after a while that we would not be able to get enough off to satisfy the ‘tile man’ who would be coming back to do the next job so off we went to the tool shop. I thought I would be able to find something to put on the end of my drill. No success there. The lady offered to sell us a tool that would do the job, I was reluctant as I would probably never use it again. Knowing us from before, she graciously allowed us to borrow one from the shop. We bought three brushes and off we went. What we had borrowed was an angle grinder. Thank God I didn’t buy one. Years ago I was blasted by a sandstorm in the desert, this was worse! I sent Huan out to buy a water spray and a couple of masks. Huan couldn’t stay anywhere near me to get a photo while I was actually using it but here I am just after a few minutes break going in for another attack.

Eventually we called back the tile man, and to our great relief he said we had done enough. He then got on with his job. Here; he is, working on the kitchen wall, earning his loot.

And here’s his finished work on the bedroom wall,

The house was in such a mess now, and we knew we had to wait three days for this ‘sealant’ to dry out properly before any plastering could be done, so we decided to go back to Wuzhishan. That would also allow me to try and make an appointment with Dr. Tim as soon as possible after Qing Ming. We got home around half past eight in the evening I suppose, both of us in dire need of a shower. Being the gentleman, as always, I let Huan go first. I also knew that it would take me much longer than her due to having about three tons of plaster, brick and cement dust all over me and in my hair, ears, nose and even some in my eyes! Apart from all the aches and pains we had from the work we had done, which was quite a lot for a couple of OAPs, my hands had also been badly affected by the use of the tools, in particular the grinder. The dreaded lurgy was back in force along with blisters to keep it company!