Sun, Rain, Cars, Art, Recipes, Famous Belly and a Red Huan.

June 8^th We went our separate ways this morning, previously planned and approved by the boss. She suggested I start early just in case the weather changed so I was out around twenty to eight. Huan didn’t have to leave until half past eight so I was excused escort duty today. I planned to follow the new road on the other side of the river and see how far it went towards the village of Nán shèng. Yesterday and today were important days for Chinese students, this Wiki page will explain more. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaokao In simple terms it’s the university entrance examination, where the students go will be decided by their scores. As you can imagine there is a lot of pressure on the youngsters. Now just imagine how you would feel with all that pressure and then arriving at the examination centre see the stairs you have to climb first!

One advantage for me this morning, with starting earlier, is the sun would attack me later. I still had shade when I left the riverside walk and headed up onto the new road.

Before long though the shade disappeared and the sun began its onslaught. I don’t know how warm it was but the predicted temperature was 32ºC with no respite until after midday when rain and thunder were expected. Thank God I took my hat today!

At one stage I couldn’t walk on the road, the workmen were too busy and probably would have shouted at me. Instead I walked on this, not as confidently as I would have in the past.

I had hoped for a water stop just by the bridge you can see in the above photo, but the road was covered with deep mud so I was foiled and had to go on. The road didn’t get any cooler at all but it will in the future, you can see that on this stretch they have planted trees. They may look skinny and useless but within three years they will be providing some shade.

Presently of course, I still had to grin and bear it, soaking wet as I was. Further on I found that the new road does not in fact go as far as Nán shèng, instead it crosses the river over yet another new bridge. That’s the route I took too.

By the time I saw this next sign I had already walked ten kilometres and it was only just after ten o’clock. Originally, I had planned to go as far as the village and then perhaps take a bus home. Seeing this sign, I decided to turn right towards home instead of left towards the village. Home would definitely be less than ten kilometres, perhaps I wouldn’t need the bus after all. Nán shèng is left, Wǔzhǐshān is right and straight on is the new highway. It now became clear why the road followed the route it did. People coming from Sānyà or Hǎitáng Wān on the highway would have an easier run into Wuzhishan, and through if they were going further.

The only wildlife I saw today, apart from cows that were too far away, was this goat hiding from the sun behind the crash barrier. I had to zoom and crop for this, I didn’t want to disturb the poor little animal, it was probably feeling the heat just like me.

Being on the other side of the river now and walking along well established roads, I did still have the sun at times, but I also had a fair amount of walking in the shade of the trees. With a little breeze now and then it felt like heaven! Even more like heaven was stopping just after eleven kilometres for some much needed cold water. Before too long I was turning back into town again.

One last right turn put me back on the main road through town and by coincidence, also gave me a lot more shade places to walk. I spotted a sign that had a new addition, or at least one I had never seen before. Huan had never heard of it either. With a name like Yá hú niú guó (Yahu Bull Kingdom) I think we may just have to go and have a look.

After a second water stop, I was feeling much better, especially knowing that there would be no more long walks with no shade. Oh how wrong I was, someone stole all the trees since we last walked along this road. Will it be yet more apartment buildings?

Never mind, I still made it back home by lunch time, although I was too tired to eat anything. I beat the weather by half an hour or so and then down came the rain, a lot of it, and for a long time. No complaints from us, the reservoir needs it now too. How far did I manage to walk before lunch then? Take a look and tell me if you think I did well, or not, as the case may be.

No lunch for me, uploaded my photos to the PC, and of course entered my fitness data and then hit the sack as they say. In fact we both had a short kip.

Once awake it was time to get back to work in the kitchen, an easy one today though, no recipe needed. It was curried meatball noodle soup, no need for photos, you’ve seen that one before. It must have been OK because the taster-in-chief had two bowls.

The rain didn’t really go away but it did ease up enough for Huan to go out for a rehearsal. As for me, I tried to find some missing Facebook friends, not so easy, especially as they may think they already have me as a friend!

June 9^th By the time I left Huan at the cultural centre this morning I had already walked 2.4km, not bad as the centre is only 1km from home. Two thirds of the way there Huan realised that she had forgotten something, something important, her hulusi! I went back for it, hence the additional distance. My first water stop was very early today; I was already sweating cobblers when I got back to the centre. It wasn’t a bad day for walking, the sun was having a nice long lie in, but the humidity was a teeny bit on the high side.

Today’s walk was to be a meander around the river and the town with no particular distance in mind but if I reached ten kilometres I’d take that as a bonus. The first photo looks like a piece of art, it is in fact the emblem of Hóngqí, the red flag in the photo is normally at the front centre of their cars. Maybe we’ll see tomorrow, there will be a car show by the river.

After a long walk down the river and back again, with no photos to show you, I ended back in the town square. There, they are preparing the stage for the upcoming show, I think that is the one that Huan and her colleagues will be performing at. The main stage though is completely cut off, it looks like they may be using a temporary circular stage instead.

Despite not planning to meet her I ended up at the cultural centre around eleven so popped in to take a few photos while I waited. The first one shows what facilities are available for the ‘oldies’ here in Wuzhishan, not bad at all, and all free. The next two show the second floor, where Huan’s class is held and what appears to me to be a badminton court. I’ve only seen it used for the ladies modelling the wearing of the Qípáo. It even has the full length mirrors to check that they are correctly doing the catwalk walk. Strangely, the English translation of Qípáo turns out to be cheongsam, which I always understood to be a Cantonese word.

As I was waiting outside for Huan I spotted another one of those electric vehicles we see every where. I don’t think I fancy driving this one, or even being a passenger sat behind the driver. I very much doubt if any of you would fancy it either, each to their own, or course. By the way, the photos are not distorted, it is a tall vehicle.

On our way home, taking a slightly different route, this next photo surprised us both when we got home. We came across this bird in a tree but in the time it took me to change hands with Huan’s music stand, get the camera lined up and snap the shot I thought I’d missed it and that the wee birdie was already in flight. How wrong I was, one of our best bird captures to date I think.

Just like yesterday, and as forecast for every day this week, but getting a little earlier everyday, rain came back after lunch. No problem for me, my target had been met, Huan had to go out in it though, it will be show time soon!

June 10^th This morning we should have been going out together but Huan had a call, she had to go to a short committee meeting at nine o’clock. I lazed around until she came back, she wasn’t away long, and then we had a slow saunter around town. Why slow? There was a car show down by the riverside and I do like to look at what I can’t buy.

Nearly one hundred photos were taken; they have now been edited down to sixty six. Don’t worry, most of the cars were the usual mundane offerings, remember we are a provincial city and the show’s aim was to sell cars not show concepts. One or two might interest you though, the first one here is a Hóngqí SUV, I would consider it.

I was quite taken with this one by Roewe, (Rover), for an electric car it looks quite ‘real’ inside. Mind you, I wouldn't be able to drive it for long periods, my legs are too long. Anyone sitting in the back would not only need very short legs, but telescopic eyes too, they can't see outside.

The range is fine, although the (honest) salesman did say that it would be more like 260km under normal use. He also told us it could be charged from the electric moped chargers we see everywhere, but they must have ‘three wires’. The ones outside our apartment, just like our apartment, only have two wires! The price is around ¥46,000.00, (just over £5,000.00) before any government incentives are deducted.

PS If you want to see any larger photos of the cars, or anything else I happen to post, just let me know where to send them.

No more cars for you today, if I see anything worthwhile in the next day or two I’ll snap them too. We did spot more artists at work today, more muriels coming on the riverside walls.

And here are a few ‘they prepared earlier’!

The weather was kind to us this morning, kinder than the forecast said it would be, so we walked a little further, managing to achieve a whole five kilometres before arriving back at our place. When we did get there Huan disappeared to the maintenance office to pay the electric bill, I went to see how the new dam is coming on. It would appear that the goats like it!

Le chef Bob was on duty today, here is what he was attempting to cook.

You may notice that the ingredients are for six servings, I imagine that’s because this would normally be served a pokey starter in a tiny bowl. I did actually try and use the calculator on the website to reduce it but it started getting silly, so I reverted to six. Mine didn’t look quite the same, our Soya sauce was stronger and I may have over estimated the red pepper slightly. To my surprise though, it tasted fine and the boss must have agreed because she finished off what was left in the wok again!

For a change this evening, I had a plan, to walk Huan to her practice and make up my kilometres. Rain stopped play for both of us! Instead, I found a new series to watch on Youtube, Crusoe, first impressions are good.

June 11^th Everything’s fine with the world, at least that’s what today felt like. I did have to stay in all morning due to inclement weather but I filled the time with Facebook, Chinese practice and Crusoe. Huan was out practicing of course.

After lunch and a quick check of the sky I decided to risk a walk hoping to get around the river before the rain came back. For my first photo I decided to show you a different view of the bridges to the island, this time from the other side to our house.

The island is fast becoming a popular place for families, despite not being very big. The latest addition is two outdoor gymnasiums, one for the little people and one for the big people.

As I was crossing the second bridge to walk up the other side of the river I thought I would give my lungs a quick exercise and shouted out to Huan, who was having an afternoon in without me. My voice was more efficient than the camera!

Down by the riverside I only found one wee beastie and getting a photo was quite difficult. It didn’t stay still for long at all and if you look closely you’ll see why I didn’t want to get too near. There is a large pointed bit sticking out of its rear end!

Finally, for today, I thought you might like to see the three completed murals from yesterday. I’m not sure how they decide on the subject matter but I think you’ll agree that the finished ‘works’ are not bad at all.

That was it for my walk apart from buying some sunflower seeds for Huan on the way home. I’ve never been able to work out why people eat them, so much effort for so little reward. Give me a bag of hazelnuts, brazil nuts, walnuts or even peanuts and I’d be happier.

I had planned to escort Huan out to her evening practice but wouldn’t you know it, the rain forced me to stay in yet again. There is one advantage if it rains though, Huan agrees not to ride her bike and walk instead, which lessens my worrying a little.

June 12^th With Hong Kong preparing for a typhoon, (800 kms away from HK) and warnings of a typhoon locally, a long walk was out of the question today. Mind you, my weather forecast told me that there was a tropical depression moving across the south of the island, not even up to storm strength never mind typhoon. Huan’s class was cancelled because of the weather, wimps! Going out for me couldn’t be avoided though, I needed tomatoes for lunch and for today’s dinner plus the weekend’s lottery tickets had to be bought. Even though the clouds were menacingly low, the weather held for me until I got home.

Mind you, it bucketed down not long after I got in and then it stayed, intermittently, all day long and into the night. I kept myself busy as I usually do on Saturday’s by cooking up a two day nosh, this week ‘Polish Cabbage Roll Soup’.

With the exception of thyme I had all the right ingredients for this one. You may remember that two weeks ago I didn’t eat all the ‘Groaty Dick’ and so you might be surprised to see rice in this soup. I made sure this time that it was a soup and not a thick stodgy mess. As always, the colour of ours ended up different to the colour on the recipe.

Was it to our liking? Without question, we both enjoyed it, Huan even having an almost full second plate. In fact she will be having some for breakfast tomorrow as well; we still have three litres left in the pan!

Back to Chinese and Crusoe for me after dinner, Huan had to go out for an evening practice, the show is now imminent. I say that, but so far all they’ve been told is that it may be on the 16^th or the 17^th of this month. Sometimes I wonder about their planning!

Before heading off to bed I had an email from Google, it contained this snippet of information.

7,822 views? That took me a little by surprise so of course I had to click the analytics button.

Diving in deeper it would seem that one video has a huge amount of views, the ‘Needle in my Belly’ of 9^th August 2019. Why it should suddenly become popular now I have no idea. Even more puzzling is that further digging showed that 35% of those viewers were from India! Now is it me that’s famous, or the nurse?

June 13th Sunday, the day of rest, but not for us, we thought we would see how far we could walk around the town before the rain set in again. Our first photo is probably the best one of a small bird yet, taken just below our entrance where the bird sat still long enough.

Another flying creature takes the second spot, I believe it’s a moth, because of how its wings are held out. I did gently touch it to see if it would move, it feebly tried to flap its wings and a few more bits flaked off. This would seem to mean it’s getting on in lepidopterous years. There’s also a little bit of pareidolia going on, can you see it?

One or two detours were taken, carefully, to try and increase our distance a little without risking being caught a long way from home in a torrential downpour. Our first one took us through what we call ‘the no house book apartments’, the gate was open so we just strolled in. The residents, be they owners or tenants, may not have legal documentation but they certainly have a place that’s looked after better than ours and with more facilities.

Next up is one that Huan insisted I took a photo of, a pretty little baby. To show you how small it is, the first photo includes a pop-rivet.

Huan didn’t want me to take this next one but she may well have wanted to pick the mushrooms and take them home to eat. I have no idea if they are edible or not, a Google search when we got home was of no help to me whatsoever. My default on our rambles is not to eat anything unless we have previously tried it and lived!

Next up, is it a bird? Is it a plane? Is it Superman? No, it’s a submarine. Well, it’s a sort of submarine that they dangle into the water to check the rate of flow and maybe even take samples although I’m not sure about that. We’ve never been as close to it before so this photo shows a lot more detail than any we’ve taken before. It rather looks like a huge dart doesn’t it; maybe even I could score a bulls eye!

Lost in my thoughts as we walked back over the bridge into town I was disturbed by Huan shouting ‘cars’ behind me. As I was on the pavement and so was she I was quite puzzled by this outburst. It turned out that she was telling me about some ‘secret cars’ on their way through but by the time my brain woke up and my hands took the photos they really weren’t worth sharing. Mind you, I did share them on Drive Tribe.

Our walk did take us back through the car show though so I thought I’d show you a Chinese pick-up. Westerners in general always think that Chinese pick-ups are too small, well this one isn’t. Granted it won’t have a huge American engine in it but is that really necessary anyway. My measured height is around 1.78m so you can see it’s not so small and if you check the price, it’s a huge amount cheaper than one of those US behemoths.

Caterpillars came next along with a centipede, (or millipede), these four were all within a few centimetres of each other and as the photos are not perfect, they are close together again.

On arriving at the back gate of our apartments the rain decided to show its face again, but we were not too far short of ten kilometres so we took a little walk down to where our back road has fallen off the mountain.

I’m sure that you can tell what’s happened here and it’s not all to do with the rain. Remember the new dam? At a rough guess I would say they somewhat weakened the retaining forces that were holding the road up. Let’s hope they repair if before the villa at the top starts a downward journey too. Mind you, that is quite a bit further back than the road. Here’s the hole in the wall showing where the dam work has been going on, you saw the goats here earlier this week.

Rain kept us in for the rest of the day although Huan did pop down to the gatehouse to practice her hulusi with the girls. The duty security man, poor Yu’s husband had no escape, not unless he sat outside in the rain!

June 14^th Another Monday, another shopping day and would you believe it, another committee lunch day. This one was to celebrate ‘The Dragon Boat Festival’ which falls on the fifth day of the fifth month on the Chinese lunar calendar, June 14 this year. To start with, the men were all given an individual bottle of hooch!

It was a small bottle, 125mL, but at 53%vol alcohol was too much for me. I had a small glug from my bottle to show willing and then stuck to beer. Huan was offered red wine by Yú, which she accepted and then Yú adulterated it by adding Sprite! Now Huan is not much of an alcohol drinker, in fact she’s a little allergic to it, and will often say no when I offer. However, she seems incapable of saying no at these lunches. Consequently, she had more than usual, not a lot, just two or three glasses, but enough to make her look slightly redder than normal!

Needless to say both of us needed to close our eyes for a short while in the afternoon, a short while that turned into three hours! I never could drink much at lunchtime, unless that was the beginning of a long session when the early hours of the next day would mark the end. Sometimes I wonder how my liver didn’t give up the ghost years ago!

No dinner for either of us when we woke up, lots of water and a few peanuts for me, lots of peanuts and a little water for Huan. There was no hulusi practice for Huan either, her head felt a little funny, I didn’t gloat.

Another week comes to an end and with it an answer to a question someone asked me. “Why don’t you travel around Hainan more?” The answer is very complicated but boils down to a small piece of advice for all you readers. Make sure that your retirement needs will be fully met by your pension and/or investments and make sure you have some kind of health insurance if you are not in a country that provides it free. Presently we are waiting to see what my August test results will be which will tell us if I have to continue forking out loadsa money every month for treatment. Fingers crossed, that won’t be the case.

On that note, we will leave you with a big smile and a hug, (courtesy of Garfield and Jim Davis), see you next week.