March 21st Last night as I was cleaning my teeth and wandering around the bathroom, as you do, I spotted something across the other side of the river. I thought it was important enough to disturb the commander-in-chief. What was so important? Fire!
We could not see exactly what was burning. When Huan had dozed off again I could see two fire engines, parked miles away at the other side of ‘Little Island’. However, I could also see jets of water rapidly bringing the fire under control. Perhaps they were using portable pumps and taking the water from the irrigation canal.
Whatever they were doing last night, there is hardly any evidence of it this morning. We couldn’t actually see any fire damage anywhere.
‘Eagle eyes’ was at it again today and in short order found this pretty bug.
Today’s walk was to be a stroll, Huan has an OAP hulusi class on Tuesday afternoons. We stayed near the river and lo and behold, within seconds she had another find.
Chatting to the children in kindergarten came next. As to be expected, there was hardly any English, but the children were all polite and chatty.
Wouldn’t you know it, Huan managed to find another lizard!
Shortly thereafter she found yet another one. However, this one was much smaller and didn’t ‘stand out’ much from his background tree bark. Walking back towards home the owner of ‘Bigfoot’, who you may or may not remember, called out his cat to come and see us. (Bigfoot never comes to town anymore.) The cat wanted a good sniff to start with, first my hands and then my feet. There’s no accounting for taste!
To Huan’s amazement and to my surprise it then decided my feet would make a nice bed. I could have put up with that for much longer but there was nowhere for me to sit down and we had to get home so that the catering officer could make lunch. That’s me today.
Lunch finished it was time to walk Huan to school and then ‘do my own thing’. My first job was to go to my new favourite sausage shop. This first photograph shows the food choices. The meat is mostly pork but there is some chicken and duck there too. The vegetables are pickled or salty or both. The eggs are salted duck eggs and on the same table there pork bones and blood sausages. I would never starve in here.
As well as cooked meats they also do ‘cooked’ alcohol! If I had to I would partake, but I would rather have beer, tequila or even water!
Marching along on my own I always pop in to wherever I know I have four footed friends. Two of them are here, one old and one new. The first is never really sure whether to let me stroke it or bite me. The second shares a shop with a dog who loves me, I didn’t get a good photo of him today. In fact I could have done with the director with me; she would have got a shot of me with the dog on one side and the cat on the other.
On the way home I found another ‘test car’, this was another Hong Qi, (Red Flag). I rather liked it, I thought the headlights standing proud set it off well. I only got the one photo because the driver spotted me and he didn’t look too happy. They were changing a tyre at the back so maybe he didn’t want me to broadcast that. I beat a hasty retreat anyway.
I wouldn’t say no if any of you volunteered to buy me a Hong Qi, but I think I would probably be happier if I could have this one too. I could use the Hong Qi to ferry Her Majesty wherever she wants to go and the use the Porsche for fun!
At home I had just enough time to prepare Huan’s dinner before she was out again for her evening practice with her hulusi friends. “Shellfish soup noodles” was the order of the day, but we both forgot to take any photos!
March 22ndWe were a little late getting out this morning, blame it on each of us. We were both waiting for the other one to say ‘time to go’. We decided we should go over the bridge to somewhere, checking out the riverside farm from above. I don’t know if ‘in the river’ counts as riverside or not, and when they open the sluice gates a lot will be lost. At the moment though they are doing very well.
As we passed the half way mark we heard the squealing of little pigs so we decided to walk along the river and check out the old pig sty. There we found a farmer fishing, for piggies!
Soon enough she caught one and came out carrying it.
It seems that she was moving some of the piglets away from the mother who didn’t have enough milk to feed all her brood. Mother was not too happy about it at all, but surprisingly, despite making a lot of noise, she didn’t try to bite the farmer. Here she is watching.
And here are the six removed piglets, in another sty, mother in the original sty quite contentedly feeding the remaining four.
From pigs we move to goats, plenty of them around today too. For my family’s information, I was behaving today and not acting the goat in any way at all. The first two families ran away, one down the hill to the river and one up the hill and away. The last one, a little kid, sat on the fence, undecided about which way to go. Actually, it was probably far enough away so as not to be disturbed by one and a half big hulking hoomans.
At the end of the river I decided I should be brave today and not use the steps.
Huan, in her infinite wisdom, decided that you should see a thousand photos of my bum again!
And here is the good lady herself.
We turned into LuóBóTè village where I let out the occasional, oh alright, the frequent, moo. Before too long the eyeballs peeped over the wall and so I went for a visit.
My buddies were only too willing to come and say hello; they even let me feed them today.
There was quite a crush to get themselves in the frame.
It may not be obvious from the photos above, but the white faced one, bull or cow I’m not sure, was absolutely adamant that the little calf should not get to the front at all. The little calf though managed to find a way.
Soon we found another family, the lost baby, the mother, and some of the other babies.
And then, just up the road, Huan’s day was made, she spotted a ‘beautiful’ turkey, her words not mine. We still haven’t worked out what happens to the turkeys, we never see any for sale in the markets at all. Maybe the farmers keep them for themselves.
We thought you should see today’s weather, very warm and muggy. P.S. I love it!
Huan was beside herself today, not only had she found her beautiful turkey, but she also found another of her favourites just a few minutes away from home. This time I wouldn’t argue, he is a handsome fellow, or possibly, she is a beautiful girl!
We didn’t really walk enough for me today, less than seven kilometres. However, instead of an after dinner walk I began cooking tomorrow’s dinner, beef curry.
March 23rdLast night I had a message on my Douyin account (Chinese version of Tik-Tok), from a lady who suggested we should visit Chubao village. That is too far too walk so a drive was called for and we started off very well by going the long way round! Eventually we found the place and the first thing we had to do was check in with the forestry fire service.
The village itself was a bit of a let down. We had actually been there before, I can’t remember who took us but it was one of the media companies. It looks pretty enough but you can’t see in any of the buildings, they’re all locked.
A question for you is next, dear readers. Can you tell us what this museum piece is?
One of the buildings had enough holes in t for me to poke my camera through. Apart from a little old furniture all we could see was that it was now used as a hen house.
Let’s finish the village visit with one of each of us.
We had driven the long way, via Maoyang and the highway, to get to the village. We came back over the top, through Shuimanxiang. On the way we stopped to take in the view. I realise the first photo would have been better as a panorama but I didn’t think of it at the time.
From the peak of the bend these were the views, beautiful as I’m sure you’ll agree.
The next sight we saw was the mountain itself, telling us that the village, where we had planned a lunch stop, would not be long behind.
In Shuimanxiang, for a change, Huan had the same lunch as me. Perhaps she thought that the restaurant would not be happy cooking only one egg fried rice. It was nice.
I had been going to take the lunch photo with my phone until I spotted this. What was going on? And why had I only just noticed?
After an uneventful journey home, and a lovely beef curry a la Bob, Huan took me shopping. I had already warned her that if it was going to cost too much to replace my battery I would be buying a new, albeit cheap, phone.
The technician told us that we had come just about the right time, and that my battery was very close to going boom in my pocket!
With the phone repaired I gave the house keys to Huan and set off for a small, but necessary, walk. Just a few kilometres would make up for doing nothing all day. Along the riverside market I spotted a new, not yet in business tea place, taking up half the space of the old, never did open in the first place, beer garden. Let’s hope the tea place does better.
Arriving back I thought I would sneak up and surprise the ladies.
As you can probably tell I am not much good at night photography. I have to admit that the phone is still on iA (intelligent Auto) all the time. I thought it did quite well with this one though. Who knows what we are looking at here? P.S. Look up and down.
March 24th Yesterday I was reading an article about menopausal women suffering from ‘brain fog’. This morning I woke up feeling like one of those women. I had slept badly, worrying about waking up early enough so that we could do a Huan ‘bus and walk’ day. When I did wake up, Huan reminded me that it was Friday and that she had her usual hulusi class at Yefeng today. To try and clear the fog I stayed at home and had extra coffee and, as it was Friday, watched the latest uploaded episode of Taskmaster on YouTube.
Feeling much better after lunch we had a town and riverside walk, nothing too strenuous, Huan had already had a busy morning. Today, for a change, I was the lizard spotter.
Through the town I wasn’t the spotter, instead this little fellow was.
I did spot these two though, too relaxed to be worried about anything. In fact the younger one, after a quick look at Huan and I, went straight back to cuddling the older one.
And that was that, a stroll rather than a walk, although it was over eight kilometres, and only three photos to show for it. Ah well, it’s market day tomorrow.
March 25th Today seemed to be mostly construction and destruction. We woke up this morning to the steady drone of trucks and a very slow moving convoy in front of our house. They were resurfacing the recently dug up road.
The second part of construction was found before we left our apartment complex. It seems that all restaurants have to now have exhaust vents, (chimneys), up to the rooftops. Not only that, they have to pay approximately ¥10,000.00 each to do so.
We did go to the Saturday market today, we even bought stuff for today’s duck and salad dinner. However, we found nothing to photograph for you. Instead, when we crossed the river to walk home we found ‘destruction’. The already existing walkway is being demolished!
As we had crossed the river, and because my hands were full of shopping, I had given the camera to the artistic director. Luckily nature conspired to give us some pictures other than destruction too. I found a little friend; they seem to have very good eyes these wee beasties.
I then found a bird which I insisted that Huan photograph to help her understand why I do not always want to take pictures of things I know are really too far away.
Nearing Little Island I lost Huan who then took ages to catch me up. She had found a lizard and was trying out her new found skills. She didn’t do too badly at all, although if she had zoomed another 50% it would have been a better photo. I think I may have to palm her off with the camera much more often; the only disadvantage will be the sheer number of snaps I will have to go through at home to edit or delete.
Her Majesty then went and found another creature, very close to home, on the final stretch. We don’t know what it is; only that is an insect and not a spider.
As we got closer to home we decided to check on the slow convoy progress, they were doing well. To make sure you could see everything we created collages again.
And then finally, from home, the balcony view again, with no slow convoy.
Did I say finally? When I woke up from my afternoon nap to coffee and cake provided by the love of my life, she stole the camera and ran off to the balcony again! It seems that the convoy was now coming back on this side of the road. I say coming back, but they had already passed our window. The speed at which things are done here is quite impressive!
March 26th Somebody woke me up before half past seven to tell me that we wouldn’t
be walking together this morning! I could have had an unexpected lie in. It
seems that a friend of Huan’s has come from hospital where she had been since
she had a stroke. Huan referred to her as the one who had her head opened. I
don’t know whether it is an age thing or not (our age), but we seem to know of
far more people in
Anyway, when Huan went I decided I should go for the reservoir walk; it had been a long time. However, checking the clock, nearly nine, I changed my mind as I would not have got home in time to prepare lunch for Madam. Instead I walked first across the island, two friends were there.
From there my plan was to walk to
the five kilometre mark, from home, along the
Today, without my walking partner, I was going at a fair rate of knots, my average speed was just over thirteen minutes per kilometre, so there are not many photos at all. Of course the ‘Director of Photography’ was also not there to guide me. On my way home though I did take two water views, the first a tributary from Feicui Park to the river, and the second a stream, within the confines of the river.
As you know I am partial to photographing cars, and also signs. Here’s a combination, a sign on a filler cap. Guess the meaning before scrolling down.
How did you do? I got it completely wrong. The Chinese is 加油嘴呢？Jiāyóu zuǐ ne? I’m not convinced of either translation, Google comes back with “Come on?” The first two characters mean ‘add oil’ and that phrase is used as an encouragement so ‘come on’ works for that. I’m not so sure about the whole phrase though. Because I was not happy, I asked Bing, usually not as good as Google. The answer came back as “What about the gas spout?” That does fit the cartoon a little better. The +93# refers to the octane rating of the fuel to be added.
Eleven kilometres was walked today, putting me over two hundred for this month, the first time for quite a long while. Let’s hope my heart test is still fine this week.
March 27th Now about that heart test, as you may remember Dr. Ma is no longer in Wuzhishan, he has moved to Lingshui. I got Huan to send me his WeChat contact card and then sent him a request which he very quickly answered. He may have thought I had problems so asked me more than once how I felt. All I needed from him was his advice, could I see any doctor in the hospital or was there one that he would recommend. There was, and so we set off to visit said doctor this morning. Guess what? He won’t be in until tomorrow. I suppose he could be doing ward work on a Monday. Ah well, we’ll try again in the morning.
The weather had deteriorated a little today so after the hospital visit we just walked around town and the riverside, trying to keep sheltered most of the time, just in case. More work is going on down by, or should I say in, the river. Our inflatable dam looks as though it is going to be removed, and by the looks of the wall, for good. PS Although the photo looks suspiciously like a badly composed stitch-up, it is in fact one whole photo.
Another car and another bit of culture. Now is she beating the child because 4x4 does not equal 15, or is the red X to show that beating the child is wrong. I take the whole thing as it is probably meant, as a joke. No doubt it would not be allowed in certain other countries.
Our last photos of the day, and the week, are two of our four footed friends showing me how they can also walk on two legs when they want to!
So another week bites the dust, we’re still here and we’re still doing well. How about you? Tune in next week to see if my heart passed its latest tests. See you then!
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