Highway, Ducks, Passion & I Hate Banks!

August 18^th Rain didn’t stop play this morning but the boss did. I was given a job; drive her and other members of the committee and interested residents to court, yes, another court date to talk about our gas problems. No not personal gas you bad people! I had to make two trips there but only one back. They would be happy for me to stuff four in the back making a total of six which I refused to do, especially outside the court house!

Anyway, while they were otherwise occupied I did a fuel run and then went up to the reservoir to check on water levels. My plan was to have the windows open, the music on loud and have fun driving up there. No chance! In front of me was someone going at 30kph or less and that road is not really made for overtaking at speed. Never mind, two out of three isn’t bad! I only had Marvin with me today but I was using his ‘Pro’ mode. As you can see, despite the rain we’ve had, there is no more water than before really.

Next up, using Marvin’s supposedly better camera, I took three photos of the view, the first is a zoom, the second a normal one and the third an extra wide angle one. As memories they work just fine but don’t enlarge them, all definition is then completely lost.

Lots of hanging around for me then with a couple of drives around the town. I thought about washing the car, but didn’t actually do it. Eventually I got the call and picked up the passengers for the homeward trip. “What news about the gas?” I asked. “We have to wait until the next court date to find out” said Huan. I guess I should have expected that answer.

Once home and finished with lunch, guess what, rain stopped play yet again. Much more keyboard practice for Huan and guitar practice for me along with a few more song downloads to add to my list. That was a hit and miss affair, connection to the outside world was very intermittent to say the least.

Good news from Dr Tim via WeChat, the article in question was very misleading. People who have circulatory problems, like me, and hence are more at risk of heart attacks and/or strokes, should still keep taking the tablets!

August 19^th Even more admin today, bank and phone office to start with. We passed the new island bridge, as we always do, here’s a progress photo, they’ve nearly finished laying the steel plates on top of the girders.

As we often do we crossed paths with a multi-legged monster.

Arriving at the bank I expected no problem and was confident that the ATM would cough up, after all, we had waited for far more than the one week they advised us to. I was wrong! The only thing it coughed up was a message saying incorrect PIN, report to the cashier. Of course this meant a U-turn and a walk home first, I was not carrying my passport. Once back at the bank, where my passport was photographed yet again and more details were checked, the cashier sent for the boss, he has to authorise the final part before she can sing it off. I had a go at him, telling him that I had now been three weeks without money and that I have never forgotten my PIN number, least of all this morning. His answer was that there was no problem with my PIN number but that when I received a new visa in my passport they needed to be informed, and my last visa was issued on April 30^th. I thought about arguing the toss and telling him that they had seen my new visa when we came last time, but decided enough was enough. Aside, I told Huan that if my card didn’t work today we would close the account and open one elsewhere. At last luck was on our side and my card is now working again.

From there it was off to the phone company, via the lottery shop, where Huan told me we would be out in ten minutes. I believed her, I was wrong again. To get her ¥800.00 back, (international deposit paid in her name), she had to have her Hukou card photographed, sign twice and have her photograph taken four times! It was then my turn to have my phone transferred to my name. That took rather less time and only two signatures and three photographs, one of my passport, one of me, and one of me and Huan together because she is giving me her number.

After lunch came crunch time, let’s get Alipay on my phone. Installation was easy enough but then I got stuck. The name of the account is Huan’s and the phone number is tied to her name in Alipay. Consequently it was impossible to ‘bind’ my bank card to the account. Now we have to try and sort out Huan’s Alipay account and remove my phone number, much easier said than done. I can foresee more visits to both bank and phone company.

Two walks today, after our eight kilometres in the morning we had another four after dinner. The Post Office had called Huan to tell us there was a letter waiting for us. As luck would have it, by the time we got there the sorting office was closed. Never mind, I’ll just follow the family motto, never do today what you can put off until tomorrow!

August 20^th Yahoo, the weather said ‘mostly cloudy’ so I took the risk and went for a long walk, taking Freddie along for the ride. It was mostly sunny but I’m not complaining about that! My plan was to walk the ladies to school and then check some more highway progress and fish farm status. First off we passed the pet clinic where this little girl was over the moon to see me again; she had only seen me last night on the way to the post office. At that time she was wearing a pair of pampers, I wasn’t sure why. I asked Huan later and she said it was because the dog was ‘on heat’. Anyway, here she is.

After the rains we had I was also checking how the fish farms on the way up the hill were doing. All seemed to be full of water now, they only use the spill-off for irrigation not for human use.

Before long the highway came into view, the supports are all completed and the bridge over the road to the tunnel too. Now Huan tells me that it is supposed to completed by the end of the year. They have done a lot of work since we were last out this way but I still think the end of the year is a little on the optimistic side.

After passing a corral of new bovine friends, not so friendly that they would approach me though, I ended up at the final fish farm cum reservoir, also full. Some more work has been done since we were last here, the restaurant is now open but I would guess not very busy. Two fountains have been installed in the lake, very pretty they are, fish seem to be abundant, but other than that there’s not much change. The lady invited me to stop for tea; I told her that I would when I came back with Huan, not enough time today.

I walked back a different way via all the farmer’s fields, not as muddy as the road up the hill. Because of the construction work it’s not too quiet on this walk but I did spot some butterflies, numerous chickens, I lost count, and quite a few ducks. For now we will ignore the chickens and take a look at one of the butterflies.

The ducks are next, I couldn’t get as near as I would have liked but the photos aren’t bad, you can see some of the variety in their colours and how, just like chickens, they sometimes like to sit on the fence.

Finally, for the countryside anyway, this is what it’s like away from the roads. What you can see is one of the many irrigation canals, not so busy on this side at the moment; I think the work on the highway is interfering with the farmers’ routine. The second picture is a small stream feeding into the canal.

Passing by the pet clinic on the way home I remembered to take a photo of this poor girl. When we saw her yesterday she was very sad, taking a photo would have been easy. Perhaps she had only just been sheared. Today it was much more difficult, she wouldn’t stand still at all and I had to be quick because I was in the clinic. “Dig that tail man!”

Arriving home I was accused of bringing friends home with me, not something that Huan is very keen on normally. “Don’t move!” she said, so here I am looking worried followed by a close up of the accompanying friend.

I will give you an extra photo today, the satellite view of the walk. It was seventeen and a half kilometres in three hours and forty eight minutes. I can tell you that when I got home I was feeling it, my shoulders and upper back were killing me, nothing that a hot shower couldn’t sort out though.

Staying awake after lunch was not such an easy task but one that had to be done. Not only did I have nearly 150 photos to trim down to a more manageable number and edit the results, but it was also my turn in the kitchen today. Falling asleep over a hot stove would not have been very good for me, or for the dinner!

August 21^st Huan was up ages before me, I woke up at nearly nine feeling like something the cat had dragged in. It seems that Huan was feeling the same; she hadn’t wanted to get out of bed at all. There must be something in the air! We decided that we should still go out, a walk would probably do us both some good. The weather forecast was “rain showers” and we were late so a long walk was out of the question, we thought we’d make do with a ‘round the river’ one instead. These gents were obviously not worried about the weather.

We weren’t sure what we were looking at next, initially we thought is was a dragonfly that someone had stepped on. Looking closer we saw that it was in fact a fight, between some kind of hornet which I can’t identify, and the poor old dragonfly. I say ‘poor old dragonfly’ because by the time we came upon them it had already lost its head, the movements we were seeing must have been after death reflexes. We didn’t realise until we got home and looked at the photos that the hornet was dismembering the dragonfly presumably to eat the body. The first photo shows the head and one wing to one side, the second shows another wing nearly off. What we needed was one of David Attenborough’s close up video cameras!

Another progress report on our new local bridge, they have now laid concrete slabs on top of the steel plate. Presumably they will now have to fill the gaps and sand for smoothness and level.

We wondered what this man was doing in the trees. It turned out that he was replacing a blown bulb that somehow was supposed to shine down through the tree to light our way.

I convinced Huan to walk up to the top street so we could pass by and see if my friends were available, in the first location, I should say friend! Here he is, always pleased to see me, his only fault is that he loves chewing on my forearm and leaving dribble everywhere.

His ‘brother’ on the other hand, gives me the impression that were he set free from his chain he would gladly tear me limb from limb!

Huan had me taking more photos of snails on the way home but they don’t have much variety so no point in sharing them. Caterpillars on the other hand, never cease to amaze me. Huan thought that this one was carrying an ant on its back or that some other creature was trying to eat it. In reality, it’s just showing off, although I’m not sure why.

By the time we got home we had covered nine kilometres, not too bad for two old fogeys who hadn’t really wanted to anything today. Mind you, we both needed an OAP kip in the afternoon. We couldn’t have gone anywhere anyway; the ‘rain shower’ had turned up and bucketed down until evening time!

August 22^nd Late waking up again this morning, I’d had a terrible sleep, lots of dreams which would be quite difficult to explain even if I could remember more than I can. Because I was up late I couldn’t escort the ladies to school and Huan told me that there was a typhoon on the way, so I stayed in. Pretty soon the sun came out and banished the clouds that had surrounded us earlier so I checked T.S.R. the tropical storm risk website and found that the typhoon, Bavi, was nowhere near us, it was located east of Taiwan and moving north towards Japan! Not to worry, I made good use of the morning anyway by cooking up another two day stew for the weekend. After lunch those pesky clouds returned along with the rain, thunder and lightning so no walks today. “Does that mean no photographs?” I hear you ask. Well, as it happens Huan was very excited this morning about flowers blooming on the balcony prior to producing fruit, according to her the flower in question was ‘big’!! Be nice to her, she wasn’t wearing her glasses. She told me it was 百香果, (Bǎixiāng guǒ), you would know it as ‘passion fruit’. If we ever see a fruit we’ll try and remember to take another photo.

August 23^rd We’ll start with a progress report on the passion fruit flower. Huan was out on the balcony before I woke up this morning and she had the good sense to use the Fuji instead of her phone. As a result, you can see a lot more detail in these photos. It’s amazing to think that this beautiful flower will close up again and the fruit will be created inside, the flower will eventually disappear, the fruit will appear and then grow, hopefully into a nice ripe one.

Huan’s choice of walk for today was the scenic mountain one, I didn’t argue because I thought if we went too far we might get rained on. We took our usual ‘clockwise’ route, the easiest way, but we won’t be doing that again for a while.

As you can see the ‘going’ is not so easy, our shoes were picking up quite a lot of mud. In the next photo, although you can’t see it well, there is an enormous puddle in the middle with only a six inch walkway to pass. I’d have been fine but Huan’s shoes would have been below water level!

We were fine once we reached the bridge. For the next two or three months we will have to take the ‘anticlockwise’ route to here and then go back the way we came. The second photo is Huan washing the dirt off her shoes; it’s much harder for her. My boots are waterproof and as long as I don’t completely submerge them I’m fine.

Snowbirds were noticeable by the lack of them today, perhaps those present in town knew what the road was like! On the way down we saw a few but far less than normal. Our walk back was reasonably uneventful although yours truly did manage to ‘a’ over ‘t’ again! With the heavy rain we’ve been having the paths can become quite slippery. Nothing was hurt, not even my pride, I’m used to it now! The difference is that when I was younger I would swiftly bounce back up with a cheesy grin on my face whereas now I usually have to sit a while before heaving myself back up.

Today’s last picture is a view of a collie that you may not have seen before. Its bark is worse than its bite. It shares a villa with two smaller dogs and when I walk past, if the door is open, I always coax them out. The owner is not always too pleased because they bark like mad as you can see. If I put my hands through the gate they don’t bite at all, I feel perfectly safe. Once we walk away the barking stops. Sometimes the owner will take them back in and close the door, other times he won’t. Perhaps it depends how much the neighbours complain.

The weather was nice to us again and the rain came after lunch until evening time. We have no real complaints when it does that, at least we get our walks and hopefully the reservoir gets its much needed top up.

August 24^th Monday again and I bet you expect me to say shopping again don’t you? Well, you’d be wrong today. Instead it was a trip to Sanya to renew the car insurance and a visit the bank to check pension incoming, change some money and withdraw some for my Wuzhishan bank. Because we weren’t going to the ‘other side’ of Sanya we took the mountain route, it’s a very nice drive, especially when there isn’t too much traffic.

And that’s it, the best part of our day! The rest of the journey was uneventful and, in Sanya, things were going well until Huan realized how much insurance we had to pay. When I had my little bump recently and we had the car repaired locally, we claimed it on the insurance. I was all ready to pay but SWMBO decided the insurance should, after all, what do we pay it for?

Now in the UK you have a no claims bonus and we have something similar here. If we had paid the ¥700.00 for the repair ourselves, our insurance would be 3.5% of the car’s present value. As we didn’t, it cost us 6.3%. The difference between the two is well over the ¥700.00 we paid. A lesson learned for the commander I think.

Next up was the bank, what could possibly go wrong? As it turned out nearly everything. The good thing was that there was no queue so we went straight to a cashier where things started off well. She successfully updated my passbook for me and a quick glance showed my pension payments were still coming in. We then asked to change some money and that’s when the problems started. “You’ll have to go and use one of the ‘Intelligent Terminals” we were told. Off we went. Now these ‘Intelligent Terminals’ are so intelligent that even Chinese customers need help with them so there are two cashiers behind the desk and three helpers at the machines! Our helper couldn’t help at all. Unfortunately, these ‘Intelligent Terminals’, unlike the ATMs outside, do not have the option of English. Four times he tried, four times I put my PIN number in, and eventually we were sent to the front desk. From there I had to fill in a ‘tax form for residence purposes’ because they didn’t have any money change forms. Of course I was arguing about this all the time and getting nowhere. In the end I filled the form in and back to the cashier we went, handed over my passbook, my bank card, my passport and the completed form. All our hopes were dashed as she couldn’t get the computer to accept my details at all. Bear in mind that I have banked with this bank, and at this branch, since 2007! Finally she said I would have to give the full details of my ‘birth address’, not just the country and city. Now I was born 70 years ago, and I don’t carry my birth certificate with me. “Anything will do” she said, “Just tell lies” said the boss. In the end I put what I could remember which seemed to keep the system happy. She then handed me a form to sign with all the details which I refused because despite asking Huan where I was from, she had put me down as American! In the end I had to sign that paper before she would print another corrected one saying I was English. After all that was done, she sent us back to the ‘Intelligent Terminals’. This time we had a different helper initially but she struggled then declined and gave us back our original helper. A couple of false starts but this time we were successful and feeding the passbook into the machine showed that the currency exchange had taken place. What next? Well to actually draw money out, you have to leave the bank and go outside where the ATMs are. At least they speak English and I drew a bundle out to take back home with us. What should have been a ten minute job at maximum took a great deal longer and by the time we left the bank it was most definitely our lunch time.

Lunch for me was half a chicken, I did share it with Huan and had a little of her vegetables. As you can see, we ate at a very up-market establishment! Through the curtain is the family’s room, we sat at one of the two tables outside. You can see the chicken in the tray, the kitchen is round to the right and Huan wouldn’t let me take a photo of it. Whatever, lunch was tasty, filling and as a result we both started to calm down a little.

Our journey home was fine, dinner was a microwaved frozen pizza, not bought, one that Huan had previously made. Huan then settled down to watch a little TV and I started dashcam work and blog updating. Just to really cheese me off, I was yet again unable to upload this today due to problems connecting with the outside world.

So that was me week, how was yours? See you next time!