Ledong, Renovation, Christmas & New Year

I’m very late with this entry; blame it on Christmas, New Year or just general laziness! Anyway, here goes.

December 1^st Time for a trip to Ledong where we have a one bed-roomed apartment that we rent out. Slowly the compound itself is coming together, no swimming pool yet but it is starting to look better.

Then we move to the inside. First Huan tried to get the electricity and water readings to make sure the old tenant hasn’t left us with a bill. No problem with the electricity. Water however was a different matter. Due to a leak in the metre area, it’s impossible to read out metre!

It seems that a replacement metre will be at our cost. We have no choice but too accept this. In the usual manner of Chinese maintenance companies, there are no metres presently available. (Still none as I write this in January).


Time to move inside. It’s not a bad apartment, for having only one bedroom it’s quite spacious and the view, presently, is fine.
Then the perils of being a landlord raise their ugly heads. Writing on the wall, plaster removed in various places, water damage on the outside wall, coming through to the inside.

December 2^nd Day two, and the work began. We had to buy new furniture. Previously, the maintenance company had bought a bed for us for the first tenant’s use. The bed was so big it wouldn’t fit in the bedroom! This time we sold that bed, bought another one that did fit in the bedroom and some cheap and cheerful living room furniture.

We also had to replace the instant water heater in the shower, and on this occasion, the gas hob too. It was too far gone for me to clean it this time!

While that was going on we were also busy hard at work. Huan filling walls, me sanding them down, and then both of us painting them. Knackered by the end of the day.

December 3^rd Prospective new tenant wanted a washing machine, more money outgoing!

And now that everything was looking so much better, we decided that we had no option but to replace the bathroom sink as well.

The final part was to replace the clothes drier on the balcony. The previous tenant had ‘nicked’ all the hangers and destroyed the existing fitting.

December 4^th All the work paid off, the prospective tenant was happy enough. We were happy, the rent increased by a substantial amount. We had probably spent half of the income from the last tenant putting things right. All that remains to be seen is how much work we have to do when this one moves out!

Driving back to Wuzhishan we had our usual coffee stop under the trees in front of the police station where we spotted this month’s Chinglish. I won’t tell you my thoughts!

December 5^th Got up this morning to an email telling me how I had done in November. I have to say I was quite pleased, even though I realised I’d have no chance of getting anywhere near these figures in December.

This was also the day that Huan put the Christmas tree up. We usually do it on the 1^st December but we had been away in Ledong.

No idea what happened on the 6^th, 7^th and 8^th, perhaps we just stayed in and rotted! If we did go out we have no record of it. I really must try and write these little snippets at the time I suppose. Anyway:

December 9^th Time for another walkies, a nice long one with no hills today and lots of nice things to see.

Huan even found time to go to the gym!

We get to see a lot of animals on our walks, chickens, ducks, geese, cows, pigs etc, today we saw then when we got home too. The cows were in the river in front of our house and the ducks were hanging around outside the coffee shop where we wash the car.

December 10^th More walking and not wildlife this time, but a tree that Huan said reminds her of a peacock. I never cease to be amazed at the flora in these parts.

December 11^th Very unusual in Wuzhishan, maybe the first time ever, Father Christmas was seen in the local supermarket. (Don’t ask me about the saxophone!) Decorations were also on sale, behind the photographer, no prices yet though.

December 13^th This was another trip to Ledong for the tenant to sign the contract and give us the money! On our way back we stopped in Maoyang again, this time at the local WC. It’s clean enough apart from being full of enormous tubs of water, maybe insurance against a water stoppage. PS There is no “Convenience Store”.

December 14^th Something we have never showed you before is Wuzhishan’s indoor market. Most of my photos do not do it justice, I was trying too hard to be surreptitious.

December 16^th, 17^th and 18^th saw us going to Haikou to finish off our Christmas shopping and stopping in to see Patrick, Flora, Podraig and Jake.

I’m quite looking forward to our next visit, not to see all those mentioned above of course, but to see this little fellow!

Quiz time from Haikou, who can tell me what this is? Answers on a postcard please.

December 20^th was yet another walkies day but no memorable pictures I’m afraid.

December 23^rd This was another nice long walk, not too hot, no hills, and as usual, lovely scenery. Do you fancy a house with a roof like this?

There was also plenty of ‘wildlife’ today, starting off with the lesser spotted bridge poser:

Shortly after we spotted the ‘pot bellied Russian bridge poser’, (Russian because my son decided so after seeing some of the other pictures from today).

Lots of cows were next

And finally a couple of our canine friends, one with very unusual markings indeed. I don’t think I have ever seen a dog like this before. It reminded me of a Tasmanian devil. I wonder what kind of mongrel he really is.

In the evening, a visitor for Huan. To my mind, she doesn’t really get enough visitors but she always tells me she’s not keen on them.

December 24^th A selfie by the Christmas tree.

December 25^th “So this is Christmas!” Bonus points for naming the singer. With the weather we started with it could well have been in the UK.

At least it looked more like Christmas in the house. Even the poinsettia was wearing what seemed to be an upside down Christmas pudding.

We had to follow “Bob’s rules” of course, no pressie unwrapping before breakfast, which as usual on Christmas day, was boiled eggs and soldiers. Don’t worry, we got into the sherry before too long!

Not too many gifts, after all, there are only two of us. Can you spot the red envelope? It wasn’t for Huan, she gets hers for Chinese New Year.

And here’s me, proudly displaying one of my gifts!

Dinner for us was not turkey. We had checked in Corner’s Deli when we visited Haikou but it was going to cost over ¥1,000.00 which we decided was just a little too much and would have left us eating turkey for days. As we had had pork last year we checked out the local market and found a lovely leg of lamb.

With it was a parmesan mashed potato, baked sweet potato, (for Huan’s palate), carrots and of course, sprouts.

It was different, very, very tasty, and of course, we still ate lamb for three days. I think we could have eaten it for four or five days if we had wanted to stretch it out. Both of us were too full after dinner so as is usual, for us anyway, the pud was left for another day. We stuck to alcohol and chocolates for the rest of the day before going off to wait for the sandman. (Still need more practice at selfies!)

December 26^th The day after!

December 27^th This was a visit to the doctor day. My Achilles tendon problems had returned along with pain in my metatarsals, all on the left foot. I’m not fond of visiting doctors but Huan had convinced me. What a wasted journey. The doctor didn’t ‘touch’ me at all, and my feet were not that smelly, honest! He said the pain in my toes was probably like the knee pain experienced by older people, and that the Achilles problem was also seen in the young soldiers who visit him. Rest, was his only advice. Ah well, back to google!

December 28^th Today's dinner. (Christmas day leftovers finished at last). Individual Christmas puds with rum sauce.

Thought I would use the leftover sauce and make myself a coffee only to find Huan had scoffed the lot "so that it wouldn't go to waste"! Had an iced rum coffee instead, not bad. Had to have Bendick's mint chocolates too of course.

December 30^th For posterity! We decided that we needed to take pictures of our main street, we’ve been meaning to do it for a while. Many of the buildings on both sides have now been closed down and the fear is that all these trees will be knocked down to make way for some ugly large buildings. We hope not! We have seen some other towns being 're-developed' in a way that keeps the buildings low and showcases the ethnic minorities. We hope that's what will happen here. Either way, at least I have some pics now. Here’s a couple of them.

And we are back to normal food. Here is one of my favourites, chicken with ‘garlic legs’ (as I call them) and potatoes. We had a teacher in Harbin who used to say that ‘garlic legs’ have some kind of addictive drug in them. Maybe he was right, they are very moreish!

December 31^st New Year’s Eve. Being the old fogeys that we are, and as nothing special happens in Wuzhishan at this time, we went to our local ‘European’ restaurant for a meal. Mine was fine, I don’t think Huan will order the same again.

Like many Chinese restaurants, there is of course some Chinglish to be found. Here’s one for you, we have tried to clarify the meanings.

So, papaya snow ear forest frog paste stew, using Huan, myself and Google comes out as ‘rock sugar papaya stew with hashima cream’, and hashima cream, from Wikipedia, is Hasma (Harsmar, Hashima) is a Chinese and widely Central Asian dessert ingredient made from the dried fatty tissue found near the fallopian tubes of true frogs, typically the Asiatic Grass Frog (Rana chensinensis). Because of its whitish appearance, Hasma is often mistakenly described as "snow frog fat". The Western pharmaceutical term is Oviductus Ranae.

And ginger chicken excrement cane has no ‘poop’ in it at all, again with Huan and I and Google, it turns out to be ginger chicken with some king of vine, (maybe rattan). The vine it seems, is nearly the same colour as chicken poop. We live and learn.

Before going to bed my Endomondo summary came, as expected, a lot less than November.

Well that’s it for December and for 2017. New Year’s resolutions? Perhaps write more often, less rubbish? Well, at least you know what a year in Wuzhishan is like now. From myself, and from the Prime Minister, Minister of Finance, Minister of (not allowed) Foreign Affairs, etc we wish you all a gloriously wonderful and happy 2018!