January 12th Three more fitness apps bit the dust last night, Walkmeter, Fitbit and Strava, none of them would successfully install on the phone. Apps from the Chinese app stores will load but most of them do not have a website to upload to. I like my big desktop computer for most things whereas Chinese users do almost everything on their phones.
Also last night I was thrown out of bed at half past eleven to go and fill the hot water bottle, Huan just wasn’t warming up at all. Mind you, I was glad I did it, it helped us both!
Shopping today, well prepared, Huan had put the health app on her phone and added me as ‘family’. It didn’t work! There was a way round it today though, we had to fill in a contact tracing form. Not only I had problems, many Chinese folk were also struggling. Some didn’t have the health app on their phones, some old people have no idea how to get it on their phones and some old people don’t have phones at all. The result was a traffic jam.
The sun showed its face in the
afternoon but Huan wanted to stay in and do some keyboard practice. I stayed in
too and tried to decide which songs to sing in the upcoming show, I’m allowed
two for my slot.
After dinner we ventured to the second branch of the above supermarket, the one which I could not enter yesterday. They had a contact tracing form available today so I made a beeline for that before asking anyone anything, I was in before Huan! Success all round, they still had some of my coconut milk, tomorrow’s breakfast is saved.
By the time we reached our little square we had both warmed up quite a bit so Huan stopped off for some more dama dancing. The night time photos there never really work out too well, but I did take some more of the island park. It now looks very much that all the work on the island will be completed by Chinese New Year.
Another fitness app failed today,
one of the Chinese ones, it seems it can’t measure distance without using a
Bluetooth connected step counter. I wonder which apps I haven’t tried yet?
January 13th An ordinary morning for me these days, cooking again, noodle soup for tonight. Huan was out to one of her classes, hulusi I think. After lunch we decided a walk was needed, in fact the weather was quite good, hardly a cloud in sight.
We tried our hardest to find some wildlife for you today, two pairs of eyes being better than one, but unfortunately we failed. Quite a few butterflies have appeared, the white and yellow variety, but all too fast and too small for us to capture. All we did manage to capture was a fly!
Garlic sausages were next on the list, no problems there apart from Huan limiting me to two. Had I been alone I would have bought four. Our route back, purposely, was along the riverside to check on the construction progress, the first thing we found was destruction!
Construction was just a teeny bit further down and what they are doing bears no relation to anything that I had thought of at all. We’ll reserve judgement until it’s all finished.
Having been a little overdressed
today, and strolling gently instead of walking, we got home to a cold house
again. The noodle soup warmed us up and as soon as dinner was over I was back
in my jammies and dressing gown trying to stay warm until bedtime. Needless to
say, the water bottle was in use again, night time temperatures down to 7ºC. We
find it strange that we coped with
Now 2021 was supposed to be a marked improvement on 2020, not that we had a very bad year here, but the problems have already started. Our tenants in Ledong called us, the floor is broken! It looks like four tiles are coming up, two already broken. Could it be the temperature change or is it more likely the shoddy workmanship in 2014. I always thought they had made a better job of the floor there than ours here in Wuzhishan.
Now I know all you dear readers are nearly all on lockdown, something that happened only fleetingly here last year, so this news won’t garner any sympathy for us and neither should it. From Monday, there are to be no gatherings of ten or more people and masks should be worn whenever shopping or mingling is anticipated. Remember our upcoming show? The organiser had changed the date to this coming Saturday but has now decided, quite wisely in my opinion, that discretion is the better part of valour, and cancelled it completely. So much for my singing and Huan’s hulusi performance.
January 14th What a lovely day we had today, a very normal day, Huan home with me, and a joint walk in the afternoon to boot. We started with leftover noodle soup for breakfast with an egg each dropped in for good measure. Later on Huan decided it was time to brave the shower so while she was there I boiled some milk and nice, tasty all milky coffee was enjoyed by both of us when Huan surfaced again. My Mam would have called it milky coffee, I suppose it’s called latte these days. Just like yesterday we walked after lunch, unlike yesterday we weren’t overdressed today. We did have tops with us, I ended wearing mine like some sort of 70s French actor, wrapped around my waist! Our route took us downriver where our first job was to check out the progress of dam destruction for you. As you can see, this side has now been completely demolished. The machines stand idly by, we think because the workers have now disappeared for their annual holidays.
Once again we were on the lookout for wildlife, especially as there are far less people, almost none, on this route and the weather was good. Chatting away with Huan I asked if she remembered when I had come down the storm drain from the top to where we were walking, and we stopped to have a look at said drain. Some enterprising farmer has taken advantage of the state it’s in now and parked his pig there.
Next up we found someone acting the goat, I’m sure I recognised her from somewhere…
Shortly thereafter we found real goats, this is one of them, who seemed very interested in me!
Today we managed to capture a butterfly but not in good enough detail to share it with you. Sorry! Once back up from the riverside we passed the farms that aren’t really farms, (they are like allotments for the people in the nearby apartments), a very pleasant place to walk.
Next I thought another panorama would be in order, this is the land behind the apartments, most of what you can see here is actual farmland and not allotments.
Huan then had me taking photos of chickens, turkeys and ducks; she said they would probably sell us a turkey to eat if we asked nicely. Maybe we’ll consider that for next Christmas.
This walk takes us past my friends the cows but today they wouldn’t come to the gate of their little home at all. I think it’s been so long they might have forgotten me but I’ll try again, when Huan is not egging me on to catch her up.
More goats were passed on the way home, followed by three boys, possibly just into their teens, mixing up clay at the side of the road. Huan asked what they were doing but I’d worked out the answer before she told me, they were dyeing their hair! How long the colour would stay I don’t know, I shouldn’t think too long though. We asked if we could take photos but they didn’t like that idea at all, perhaps they were worried about their parents.
We met them along the road that will eventually connect with the bridge to nowhere next to our apartments. Remember that? Anyway, here’s a picture looking towards the end of the bridge to nowhere. Between where we are standing and the end of the bridge in the distance there used to be some houses, not sure how many, probably less than ten. They’ve gone, all that’s left now is to bridge the irrigation canal in some way and then work can proceed. We still have no idea where the road behind us will lead to though.
All in all a most enjoyable day, it was very nice to walk in the countryside with wifey once again instead of just around the town and river. Soon she’ll be free more often and hopefully the weather will improve so that we can wander further afield again.
January 15th The boss called while she was out, I had to rush downstairs to collect a delivery from Taobao, no time to change out of my pyjamas and dressing gown. I wonder what the neighbours thought. After lunch she then had me filling all the holes where the A/C hoses go through the wall, with my trusty glue gun. No sooner had I sat down for a cup of tea when orders came in again telling me I had to go downstairs to collect another delivery. I guess by now the neighbours were used to me! So what were these deliveries? Our winter clothes for sitting around at night time of course. Here we are modelling them for you. Mine has a hood but not by choice, this was one of the only ones we found to fit me, it’s a 6XL!
My next job was to walk the ladies to school again before having a walk of my own. Outside the house the weather was fine, it’s only winter inside. More construction work, another road to somewhere although we’re not sure exactly where.
Another noodle soup in the evening, once again I made too much and we’ll be having it for breakfast tomorrow as well. Luckily for me, noodle soup is a very common Chinese breakfast. After dinner we both got into our winter warmers, by golly they work well. Within a quarter of an hour Huan had her jacket undone, it took me a little longer. Still, we won’t be cold and our jammies, which we are wearing underneath, will not need warming up before we put them on.
January 16th Well our winter warmers certainly did the job last night, not that we wore them to bed of course, that would have been too much. We were both warm enough throughout the evening, my feet were like toast. I guess the circulation was working well. On top of that, we didn’t need the hot water bottle when we went to bed, we were both warm enough to heat the bed and each other.
Message from our tenants in Ledong Just after lunch, more tiles have now lifted some of which have broken too. We had asked him to get the repairs done locally which we would then have paid for. Unfortunately, despite the fact that Chinese New Year is not until 12th February, no one is interested in doing the work until after the New Year. You would have thought that someone would welcome a bit of extra cash before but that’s not the case.
Keyboard lessons for Huan today, morning and afternoon, so I was left to my own devices. In the morning I cooked, what else did you expect, another two or maybe three day stew. This one was with chicken livers and hearts, not Huan’s favourites, but I added some strange black stuff for her, Google translate tells me it’s edible tree fungus. I would disagree with the edible part!
Solo walking was my afternoon, still slightly overdressed, but not too much. Over the bridge to nowhere I went, stopping to admire the view on the way.
Once over the bridge I popped around the corner to check on the pig from the other day and try and get a better photo. It had moved further back under the shade but I had Freddy Fuji with me today so you can see a bit more.
Under the bridge I decided to take some photos that could be joined in a vertical panorama, which is called, wait for it, a vertorama! I must admit I had to use Google to find that out. Here’s the finished picture, again done with Microsoft ICE (Image Composite Editor). It’s good, and it’s free, try it out for yourselves.
No critters were forthcoming this afternoon but I did find some pretty flowers for you.
I was walking on the other side of the river to our apartments this afternoon; I wish we had a lot more places like it. There are no paving stones, only a footpath worn into the ground by passers by. It’s usually quiet too, not today as you’ll see shortly.
So, why not quiet today? The destroyers were back on the dam, obviously we were wrong and they haven’t tootled off on vacation yet.
The last pictures of the day are of one of those elusive flying things again, you know, they call them birds. I just couldn’t quite get near enough, yet again. Some would say that I’ve always had that problem with birds! Of course, they would be wrong. Anyway, here you are, I can’t crop the pictures anymore or there will be less clarity than there is now. Maybe one of you avid birdwatchers out there can tell us what it is.
January 17th Sunday morning and Huan was off to keyboard lessons today. I relaxed and did some more of my new job, Facebook Editor. For some reason they started asking me to check various details on different pages so I obliged, as best as I could. At times I have to answer ‘unsure’ instead of yes or no, at times I have to try and find websites or other pages but it keeps me occupied for an hour or two.
After lunch more keyboard for Huan and another walk for me, this time to check on the progress of a local hotel. First though I walked Huan to class and we checked the road around the villas, recently repaired by the builders of the site next door, they had destroyed it during their construction. Huan decided she wanted to have a look at one of the villas being worked on, I decided to stay downstairs. With all the money they are spending on renovation and adding extensions etc, you would think they could at least do the wiring correctly!
As for the extensions, here are two, one going up from the lower level villas and one coming out from the upper level ones. In theory, all of the land they are building on belongs to us, the tenants of the complex. We pay maintenance money for our apartment and our ‘share’ of the public areas. I wonder if they asked anyone. That’s doubtful though, there seems to be no such thing as planning permission here. The unwritten rule seems to be “if there’s a space next to your place, use it” and hopefully nobody will notice or kick up a stink. No one usually does.
Onwards and upwards I went once Huan had gone into class, this was the view from part of the way up. Apart from the construction in the foreground it’s very nice.
Just after this I came to the hotel only to find out that nothing has changes since we last came this way. It may be a place to try and get in and make an ‘empty places’ video, I haven’t done one of those for a while. The hotel is barely visible on the left in this shot, which shows something new, a road, seeming to lead over the mountain. Deciding that it would make a change I decided to see where it led.
Almost at the top, after circumnavigating an enormous pile of rubble, I was quite looking forward to going down the other side. I estimated that it would come out somewhere near ‘Shangri La’ another residential complex. Well it may well do, but I couldn’t go any further, the road was blocked with some construction going on behind the blockage. I could see roofs the other side of all the scaffolding, perhaps it will be another entrance into Shangri La. On the other hand, it could be another site completely. Wherever it is, and whatever they are doing, they must be spending a fortune, knocking down stone mountains and putting reinforced walls up against the sandstone further on.
Back the way I came I went, downhill all the way, passing some bovine brothers on the way. Did they know me? I haven’t a clue, but they were certainly curious.
With time still to spare I set off towards the highway so that I could come back on the riverside, on our side, walking upriver back towards home. On the way I passed a little shack that I often stop at to say hello to some canine friends. This was the scene up the steps behind the shack today. The sign says 内有恶犬 － 禁止入内 (Nèi yǒu è quǎn jìnzhǐ rùnèi) and it means “Vicious Dogs – No Entry”. What you see in the photograph is not a vicious dog but a jealous one. His brother, at the bottom of the steps, is getting all my attention!
Not far from home, I spotted another bird so rushed to try and get as close as possible in order to get a shot in. If only I had known… As I created so much disturbance and noise, three more of the same lifted off just below the retaining wall! Never mind, one of these days I’ll manage to get closer. Instead you can have another black and white photo, sometimes scenes look better in black and white, of a lady farmer. She was sowing seeds in her free plot by the river.
Some more black and white photos
were taken, but only of the ‘Dambusters’ that you’ve already seen. Today, there
was a book on the wall where I was walking and a couple of men just about to
walk out on to the existing dam surface. I asked the older one if he could tell
me what they were doing and although I didn’t know the word, I got the message,
they are building a new dam. When I asked how high it would be above where he
was standing, he put his hand above his head, so possibly up to two metres.
Once again we will wait and see, because if it is going to be that high, a lot
of the landscaping they have done will be under the water.
And that’s my Sunday over. Now I am listening to Huan playing the keyboard, she has already worn out my ears with her hulusi practice. Hopefully in another twenty minutes or so she will pack it in for the night!
January 18th All Huan’s classes at school
have now stopped, partly as a virus prevention and partly for the New Year.
They will start again, if all is well, after the New Year. Somehow, despite it
being Monday, and Huan not having to go to school, I convinced her to stay at
home and relax. She did practice her hulusi of course but at least she could do
it in her own time and not worry about anything. After lunch though she dragged
me off down to the police station, the immigration police that is. We should
have reported there with my new visa when we came back from
After a quick trip to the lottery shop and the fish market we wended our way home, no long walks today. Remember the new structures by the riverside? Well we noticed some workmen measuring the billboards, (notice boards) last time we passed by and we guessed they were going to take them down and move them. We didn’t know where to of course. Well, today we found out, on the wall opposite our back gate, below the nurses’ college. Huan said I should take a before and after photo for you, so I decided to combine them into one!
The
rest of my evening, almost three hours worth, was spent trying to get first of
all mp4 files for Huan and her dancing ladies. We managed only two, my software
will not work on most Chinese web sites. The lady who wants these, I guess the teacher,
then told us she needed mp3 files and not mp4, so that she could stick them on
a USB and play them in her small amplifier. It was still a pain in the
proverbial and we ended up using the voice recorder on Huan’s phone and then
tweaking the bass and treble with audacity. The whole evening’s work resulted
in the grand total of three mp3 files. Huan wanted to carry on past ten, I asked
her to wait until tomorrow or this post would never get done!
And that’s it; we come to the end of another week, a cold one for us. We hope you are all coping with the various levels of lockdown that you are experiencing. If you get bored, you can always send me ribald comments! Bye bye until next time.
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