Amazon vs Taobao, Medicine Top-up, Nokia Day, Procrastinating.

July 12^th Our week started with yet another rainy morning. I decided to check for Amazon progress, still none, so tried to cancel the order. A few minutes later I received an email saying the order could not be cancelled. I replied asking where my package was then. Back came another email, telling me that the email account I had replied to was for outgoing mail only! There was a suggestion to contact Amazon on the help link so we tried that. It took some doing but eventually someone phoned us, told us the order had not been shipped yet, and accepted our cancellation on the phone. We should get the money back in three or four days, fingers crossed. Taobao is so much easier to deal with, shame they didn’t have what I wanted.

Rain kept us indoors again, after lunch and after dinner. Still, it gave me lots of time to surf the internet looking for another camera. More binge watching is also on the cards, this time another good UK series, “Line of Duty”.

July 13th John Steed and Emma Peel set off with their umbrellas in hand knowing that the heavens would surely open today. Of course they weren’t carrying their usual “Shaftesbury Slims” and their casual clothes concealed the fact that they were special agents of the British government. In other words we went out in the rain.

Popping behind the women’s clinic we came across a swimming pool, like many in apartment complexes, it was empty.

Around the front of this building there is a lovely small garden.

Returning to the main road we were ambushed by the security personnel from the clinic, they wanted to know where we had been for their Covid tracking efforts. Yes, the inconveniences, minor thought they are, have returned. Having assured them that we lived in Wuzhishan and that we hadn’t been anywhere in the building behind, they took our contact information and sent us on our way. We were off to the bap market, not to buy, just to see how things are, and we entered that complex through a little door for kindergarten children. This was my choice just to give us a few more hundred metres going in a zigzag fashion towards our destination. The market was still empty as expected; Huan decided a photo of her handsome escort was required. Who am I to argue? Spot the camera high up under the umbrella.

Our plan was to head down towards the river. That plan was thwarted, the gates are closed again. In fact it would appear that we were very lucky to get in the way we did, it looks like they are closing down for Covid preventative measures again.

Something scurried across our path in front of the Fodelai hotel. We both thought it was a lizard, the photo is not quite so sure!

The weather kept most people indoors so it looked a lot more like summer than it had been doing. “What a strange thing to say” I hear you say. Well, normally in the summer we have far fewer snowbirds but this year many have not left. I suppose that today you couldn’t blame them for staying indoors though, we were only out because we felt we had to be.

Madame was happy enough, the rain was not torrential. In fact in this photo it has completely stopped so she is drying her umbrella before we reach home.

Reaching our gate we found that the government had visited and we now had instructions and a QRL code too. The instructions are mostly common sense and we don’t have to scan the code because we live there. We do have to scan in other places though.

July 14^th Today was a hospital day; collect the medicines for the next month. To be extra cautious we took our brollies again. Dr. Mă had told Huan that he would be in attendance today, unfortunately for us, he wasn’t. The receptionist told Huan that we could get the medicines by going to another pharmacy, in what used to be the main hospital up the hill. After waiting in yet another queue we reached the front only to be told that what we wanted was not possible here, we had to go to the new main hospital, back down the hill, and to the second floor. Off we went again where the nurse told us to wait outside consulting room #5. After another long wait Huan disappeared and waylaid another nurse who diverted us to room #8. Initially I thought we were going to have trouble here as well, my Chinese listening comprehension is not good at all. In fact the nurse was just checking with Huan why there had been one medicine less last month. Huan explained that the hospital had no stock and we had to buy it outside, all was clarified. Here we are then in another queue, having handed in my prescription and now waiting for it to be filled.

Once out we headed into town, The weather was just as dark and foreboding as yesterday but it was important that we visited Huan’s Taobao bank. Huan had received a message saying that the Amazon money had been returned so she wanted to confirm. It had!

Once back home I piled all the new boxes on top of the old ones, there do seem to be rather a lot. I think before we see Dr. Mă next time I will have to do a count!

So, money back in the account, it was back to surfing Taobao for cameras and checking Youtube and other sources for info and comparisons for the rest of the day. In the end, having gone back through our photos since we arrived in Hainan, I decided spending oodles of money on a large sensor camera could wait. The Fuji is an APS-C sensor, nice and big and produces really excellent photographs. Before we bought it, most of our photos had been taken with the Nokia Lumia 1020 phone, that sensor is far smaller but still took acceptable photos. In the end I decided on a Nikon Coolpix A1000, still a small sensor but with a 35x optical zoom so it should produce better photos than our Xiaomi phones. It will also fit in my pocket should the weather change. If I am ever rich enough to buy a ‘good’ camera again then Huan can take this one. All we have to do now is order it and wait.

July 15^th I thought I would refresh my memory with the Nokia today and the weather was willing so off we went. It was a little late so we stuck to the riverside.

Over the little island we went, Huan forbade me from sharing the photo of her!

The skies quickly changed colour but we decided we could read the weather and pressed on.

Getting close to small objects is not so easy but that has more to do with my eyes and the old screen than anything else.

Do mantids have memories and did this one remember me? Was my memory failing and one green face looks much like any other?

As usual it ended up on my hand but the light was not good for Huan’s phone.

Despite the abundance of shadow this one took my fancy.

And finally here he, (or she) is having one last look at me before I went away.

Now we share with you a couple of cropped (5x7) photos of the river.

The Nokia has a panorama mode but I thought I would try a couple of stitched ones instead, looking upriver and downriver from the Fodelai bridge. Here’s the upriver view.

Seeing the clouds in the previous photo we decided not to go any further upriver but to proceed home, it was approaching lunchtime anyway. Here’s the downriver view, not so good but I think you can safely blame me for that and not the Nokia.

Looking up at the wires, just because…

Huan had us walk back along the main street, so that we could pass the chocolate cake bakery again. I managed to grab this shot of a fairly empty town.

The Nokia is not so good with its front camera and Huan was not too pleased with this shot at all. The ones where I made her take her hat off were even worse!

As we were nearing our apartment the cleaning lady gave Huan some seeds, don’t ask me what they are. They are supposed to be like something already in our living room. I’ll just wait and see, Huan is the one with the green fingers.

Today’s verdict? The Nokia is certainly showing its age, it is slow, it is very difficult to see the screen in the sunlight but overall not a bad set of photos. Hopefully we will be fine with our new compact superzoom and it will not produce much worse results.

July 16^th “Just another day in paradise”, I bet most of you instantly thought of Phil Collins. I did too until I looked for the lyrics and found the same title, with different lyrics and melody by a country singer called Phil Vassar. The chorus goes – “Well, it's ok, it's so nice, It's just another day in paradise, Well, there's no place that I'd rather be, Well, it's two hearts, one dream I wouldn't trade it for anything, And I ask the Lord every night, ooh For just another day in paradise.” Why today? Well Huan and I have been married fourteen years today and I guess we do live in an ‘almost’ paradise.

No celebrating for us though, just a walk around the market starting off with the Chinese medicine stalls again, I wish I could understand this one.

Huan wondered what they used this beetle thing for.

And I managed to take this one even though the stall holder wasn’t too happy about it.

This wasn’t medicine, just a butterfly that looked very much as if it needed some medicine of its own. It was having a lot of trouble moving at all and was still in the same place when we left.

We visited a buddy on the way home; he was a little too warm to chase me today.

We saw another car today; this one looked a little different. It was a Geely but unlike any that we have seen before, a bit like a truncated pick-up. Huan tells me that the writing on the side was advertising cooked salty chicken, quail, chicken feet etc.

While trying to find a vantage point for the front of the car I bumped into this fellow. He is sort of handsome, don’t you agree?

Our no cooking weekend this week consisted of a lovely salad, prepared by yours truly, and some pizza out of the freezer, cooked by the Minister of Food. We are both getting quite used to no cooking at weekends!

July 17^th Sunday is the day of rest, or not, as the case may be. It isn’t usually a day of rest for us, it is instead a day for long walks. Checking the mountains early on I wasn’t sure whether a long walk would be on the cards or not.

I needn’t have worried, the weather cleared up nicely so out we went. Huan took a hat, I didn’t, I thought the sun looked like it was going to be in and out all day. (PS I was wrong and got a burnt head!) Before long Huan had found her first lizard.

Going through the village we were dragged into this small courtyard by one of Huan’s OAP school friends. There is a little Li culture going on here, the people present had done a show in the market yesterday. Huan will also be doing a Li show, in October I think. When they asked her if she would participate she said they told her it would be three or four times a month, perhaps a couple of times a week. Just as I suspected and told her at the time, she is now out for two to three hours every night! If I ever get a new camera I will try and get a video for Youtube.

We learnt a little bit about agriculture today when we came across this family in the rice paddy. It seems that after they had done what they were doing they would just scatter rice seeds, willy nilly I suppose. Once they have taken root they are removed and then replanted, I’m not at all sure why. Huan wanted to go in and help, I asked her to wait until another time, partly because of her long skirt and footwear and partly so I can take a video next time.

About half way round our walk Huan found another lizard, prettier than the last one.

Having the Fuji with me today I could crop the photos when we got home.

What is this I asked myself, the ants seem to like it.

When it grows bigger it looks like this.

And, courtesy of the farm lady, when it is harvested it looks like this.

Views we like to see –

And views we don’t like to see –

We regularly used to walk through those fields. I guess China is becoming more urban just like the rest of the world. Some see it as a good thing, I don’t, I would much rather see a lot of smaller towns and villages instead of cities.

The village of Zali Cun was our next stop, a large bottle of water was purchased here.

Just as we were leaving the village something flew right in front of us. We thought it was a very small bird but we were wrong. Unusually, I was able to sneak in reasonably close for this photo, quite a handsome creature isn’t it.

Our last two photos show the newer (bypass under construction showing the bridge to somewhere) and the older (village lane and irrigation canal) versions of where we live. I often wish that I could see what it looked like here in recent history, say twenty, thirty, forty or more years ago. It was much quieter in 2007 when we bought our place!

July 18^th Monday comes round every seven days, strange that, and it nearly always means that we have to go shopping. Today there was an additional detour, Huan’s Taobao bank again. Let me bring you up to date! You already know that the Fuji is really struggling these days, hence my desire for a new camera. Some of you may also remember that Huan’s computer is also out of order. To add to our woes, my chair, or should I say Huan’s old chair, in the office broke this week. If that wasn’t enough the water cooler has also stopped cooling water! August is car insurance renewal and service time. Because of all that I decided to lower my sights and searched again for a point and shoot camera. I had three different models all lined up and in each case my first question to the suppler was “Is this new?” All of them turned out to be second hand so it was back to the drawing board. This evening, just before Huan went out, I found a Nikon D5300, old but not used, and within my now reduced budget. Somewhere or other the order went wrong so now I am stuck waiting for Huan to come home and sort it out!

Huan came home, we didn’t sort it out, it looks like there is a limit on her Taobao card. Both of us being the worrying sort and not trusting all online stores despite the built in safeguards, Huan has now gone to her ATM to make sure no money has left her account today!

Good news, Huan’s bank has not been emptied. Tomorrow we will sort everything out and I should be able to order a new Nikon D5500, changed my mind yet again. Aren’t I the fickle one?

Even more dithering means that this is now being uploaded almost a day late! Please accept my most humble and grovelling apologies, I promise to try and do better next time!