Ledong, Home Maintenance, Dreaded Lurgy

A worrying week begins. I really feel I should have gone to hospital in Haikou, if only to ease my mind, but circumstances prevent it for a few days. Still have a lot of pain in my left leg. Anyway, chin up, as they say!

April 1^st Same as March 1^st, lazy day, updated blog, learnt some more Chinese characters.

April 2^nd A short walk, bought the lottery tickets, and took a photo for Jake’s World Street Photography Facebook page. Huan was wondering how such slender stalks could hold such heavy fruit. I certainly wouldn’t want to be underneath when they come crashing down. They look beautiful, shame about the smell when you open them!

April 3^rd A very busy day today. Up at 5 o’clock. We set the clock radio for then, it switched on, but with no music. I guess they don’t start that early. Luckily enough, the light woke Huan. Off to Ledong after breakfast to see the old tenants out. Traffic was very easy so we arrived early, far too early. We went up the roof for a look round, bit of a hazy day but some great views.

Plenty of memories for me too, the Air Force were practicing, probably ‘circuits and bumps’ so every few minutes there was a roar of fighter jets as two of them flew over. My sibling would also have loved it, we grew up on RAF bases. I did try and get some pictures, with very little success though. Probably just as well!

Still with plenty of time to waste we went for a stroll around the city. It is much bigger than Wuzhishan and we saw a lot we hadn’t seen before. In fact I think we may have stumbled across the original Ledong village in the middle of the city.

We spotted one of the earlier Chinese modes of transport. I saw many of these in 1986 on my first visit to Pingdingshan. We often see them when we drive around the rural areas of Hainan but very rarely have the chance to take photos. Well, here’s one now.

Another thing we often see is ‘ducks in bags’! These little chappies weren’t too happy about me getting too near but I did snap their pic.

All too soon of course, our leisurely stroll had to come to an end and work had to start. The first thing was tile replacement. The tenants had not taken care and the kitchen door had slammed causing two tiles to fall off. We got them fixed, not quite a match but fine if you don’t look too closely. Message to all potential house owners; make sure you keep spare tiles!

Now these tenants had only been in residence for four months and we left them with a brand new gas hob. What a mess it was to clean! They even had a housemaid but I guess her job was mostly ‘the twins’! The bathroom is a mess too but I told Huan I would clean that next time. In the five or six years that we have rented the apartment out, we have never returned to a toilet bowl yellow on the outside and a toilet seat with the beginnings of black mould!

I guess we should be grateful that almost everything was still there.

Much worse for us was the holes had begun to reappear in the walls that we repaired last time.

Well, I argued with Huan this time and said we would have to have the job done properly. (I hope that’s possible in China.) We needed to have the walls sealed before trying any repairs again. The man who fixed the tiles was in agreement with me, luckily. Of course, he may have just been seeing dollar signs in his eyes! He advised us to clear all the plastering off up to where it was no longer easy to remove. I didn’t think any of it was that easy! It seemed we would have to purchase a hammer, according to him and Huan, so off they went to the shop while I had a coffee and a fag.

Huan returned with their version of a hammer, which in my words, is a metal axe. It still wasn’t so easy but we did what we could. Here’s Huan giving it a ‘bit of welly’!

It became obvious to me after a while that we would not be able to get enough off to satisfy the ‘tile man’ who would be coming back to do the next job so off we went to the tool shop. I thought I would be able to find something to put on the end of my drill. No success there. The lady offered to sell us a tool that would do the job, I was reluctant as I would probably never use it again. Knowing us from before, she graciously allowed us to borrow one from the shop. We bought three brushes and off we went. What we had borrowed was an angle grinder. Thank God I didn’t buy one. Years ago I was blasted by a sandstorm in the desert, this was worse! I sent Huan out to buy a water spray and a couple of masks. Huan couldn’t stay anywhere near me to get a photo while I was actually using it but here I am just after a few minutes break going in for another attack.

Eventually we called back the tile man, and to our great relief he said we had done enough. He then got on with his job. Here; he is, working on the kitchen wall, earning his loot.

And here’s his finished work on the bedroom wall,

The house was in such a mess now, and we knew we had to wait three days for this ‘sealant’ to dry out properly before any plastering could be done, so we decided to go back to Wuzhishan. That would also allow me to try and make an appointment with Dr. Tim as soon as possible after Qing Ming. We got home around half past eight in the evening I suppose, both of us in dire need of a shower. Being the gentleman, as always, I let Huan go first. I also knew that it would take me much longer than her due to having about three tons of plaster, brick and cement dust all over me and in my hair, ears, nose and even some in my eyes! Apart from all the aches and pains we had from the work we had done, which was quite a lot for a couple of OAPs, my hands had also been badly affected by the use of the tools, in particular the grinder. The dreaded lurgy was back in force along with blisters to keep it company!

Achilles, Ribs, Lurgy, Failed Tourists

Well, here we are, New Year and all that. I hope it finds you all in the best of health and raring to go!

January 2^nd Another walk, not so fast, my Achilles tendon still playing me up. Still, we live in quite a scenic town really, so always worth a wander.

I also decided to take some photos of all our trees, just for posterity. Who knows how long they will stay?

January 4^th & 5^th Still in pain, conflicting advice from various internet sites. Even the doctor in the local hospital seems unsure and his advice contradicted nearly all the web advice! More trees. I never cease to be amazed at the trees here. How on earth did this one, for example, decide to grow sideways, and how did it not fall over?

Most of my photos are chosen, for better or worse, by me. Just occasionally Huan will pipe up and say “Why don’t you take a picture of that?” Her choices are not so bad though.

January 6^th And we’re off yet again. What do we find, a family in their garden. And a ‘bird’ in a tree. What do they say “A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush?” Well, I suppose, as this one is ‘my bird’, one is enough!

January 8^th No pictures, they would have been unbecoming anyway. There I was, crawling, or should I say lying, on the floor, looking for a chocolate that had disappeared under the sofa. Suddenly, there was a strange ‘popping’ noise, and a lot of pain in my chest. Once again we were off to the internet! It seems like I may have cracked a rib, or bruised one, or strained the cartilage, who knows? Again lots of conflicting advice, but the end result appeared to be that nothing can be done, you just have to wait for it to heal normally. This usually takes about 12 weeks!!

Nothing for a few days, the weather was miserable!

January 12^th Weekly drive. Let’s go to Diaoluoshan Park, just after Baoting, we thought. Let’s get something in the blog besides just walking. Here’s me at our first coffee stop.

This is ‘Daben Tourist Information Centre’ where there is information and no coffee shop, but they do have a little shop selling cold drinks, so cold coffee it was.

It’s a pleasant enough place to stop; it’s at the Baoting junction on the Wuzhishan to Sanya road. Some lovely views from the top, we think this might is ‘The Seven Fairy-Lady Mountain’, but we’re not 100% sure

Here’s the old man having just hobbled back down the stairs!

Inside the building, there were a few local crafts on view, but no information about them.

And then we were back on our way, here’s a screen shot from the dashcam.

When we arrived at our destination, we discovered that the road is under maintenance, and has been for nearly a year. Now we would have like to have walked up and showed you some more views, really we would. However, quite a part from my dodgy ankle, the map showed us it was 18 kilometres to the top, and then of course another 18 down. Not enough time left in the day for us old fogeys. Here’s a screen shot of the road.

January 13^th Back to walkies again. Look what we found? Is Wuzhishan going green? A whole row of electric buses, waiting for something. They were still there at the beginning of February!

Living in Hainan we see a lot of the Chinese equivalent of American “snowbirds”. They call them候鸟 – (Hòuniǎo), which means ‘migratory birds’ so near enough. Come October every year the town starts filling up with ‘oldies’. They like to hang around on street corners!

To be fair, some of them sound quite good, although there are a few who ‘screech’ just like migratory birds. For some reason I can never get Huan to join in.

January 14^th and 15^th Boring again, no walking, partly my ankle and partly my chest getting worse.

January 16^th Early morning rush hour. I wonder if they were taking themselves to market? I also wonder how they know where they are going because often, there is no farmer with them; especially going the other way, towards what I would imagine is home.

‘We’ also decided that ‘I’ should go to the hospital. Having had a few nights of very bad sleep with pain in my ribs I agreed. For the first time in my life, I think, I had a CT Scan.

As you can see I struggled to get on the bed. Huan and I surmised that as the Chinese people seem to have learned from the Americans and now sue hospitals for the least little thing, the staff are reluctant to assist, especially if someone is in pain!

I guess in the UK I would have had to wait for a scan. Here all I had to do was cough up £25 and join the queue. We had to wait until after lunch for the results so here’s a  picture of the hospital, at lunch time.

And a couple outside, spot the Chinglish in the second one. This is surprising because the word ‘supply’ is spelt correctly more than once.

Once we were back inside and we had collected the results it was back to the doctor. No fluid in my lungs, no sign of anything broken, all he could do was suggest I take pain killers.

This was also the day that Huan came down with a bug, sneezing, coughing etc.

Not to worry, it was my turn to cook. French for a change, my version of ‘Duck Confit On A Bed Of Vegetables’. Tasted good!

There followed a couple of lazy days, Huan was still not so good and my chest was still playing me up. We didn’t go out again until

January 18^th Nice day for a walk.

Too warm for this little fellow to move at all. He does look sorry for himself doesn’t he?

Today’s lunch was green vegetable filled Chinese bread. The stall owner told us that the other bread, on the right, was ‘Chinese pizza’.

We still keep up with the lottery here in Hainan. We can’t win as much as you can in Europe, but we live in hope of winning enough to move out of our apartment and into a villa!

We eat all kinds of food here in China, but I have to say we haven’t tried these yet! Huan says she doesn’t know how to cook them.

Of course, a walk wouldn’t be a walk without saying hello to my friends!

Something else I haven’t tried yet, sugar cane. Huan tells me you chew it and then spit it out. Well, what’s the point then? I’ll just live with my memories of uprooting and eating sugar beets when we were children at R.A.F. Waddington!

Still my turn to cook when we got home, today’s ‘dish of the day’ was “Five Spice Roast Chicken Drumsticks With Fried Potatoes”, and a mixed tossed salad, but you don’t need to see that!

January 19^th Weekly drive time, let’s try again for a touristy thing, we thought. Let’s try the ‘Stone Forest’. We did pass some wonderful scenery on the way there; I’ve decided to show you the panorama.

Sad to say, we failed again, the road to this spot is also under maintenance! We even ran into trucks behind us when we tried to go home!

January 21^st Bob’s cooking again – ‘Sticky Pork With Gingered Noodles and Chinese Green Cabbage’ (The recipe called for Kale)

January 23^rd I thought I had managed to get away with it but Huan’s ‘bug’ managed to get me too. Not so good for my chest pains when I started sneezing and coughing too! Still, on the basis that fresh air is good for you, out we went.

Have you ever seen Chinese people practicing to go to the UK? Here they are practicing how to ‘pull the chain’!!

We’re not sure who this is; he resides in front of the Fodelai Hotel. I had to crop the picture because of something we don’t see too much of here, sexual graffiti!

January 24^th Aaaaarrrgghh!! It’s back, the dreaded lurgy has returned. Every now and then I develop fierce itchy red lumps on my palms and fierce itchy blisters on my knuckles or tops of my hands. Doctors have tried to fix it in the past, so now, for the most part, I just live with it. I stays a while, sometimes days or weeks, then disappears for days, weeks, months, sometimes even years.

Bad hands, sore ribs, Achilles problems! Perhaps I need a service! Ah well, I can still hobble. It’s worth it so see views like this.

And who wouldn’t want to see the local tradesmen at work. Here is one preparing ‘Betel Nuts’ for selling. You can always try it, if of course you like mild narcotics and the red teeth that go with them!

I wonder what this gentleman would make of it?

Would you believe it, my turn for cooking again! ‘Zucchini Rings With Mince Filling and a 'dip' of Greek Yoghurt with Parsley’. (It’s supposed to be sour cream)

January 26^th Walking again, a beautiful day down by the riverside.

Now if you saw this sign, you would probably think it has something to do with keeping people off the grass. I’m afraid that, just like me, you’d be wrong. It is telling people to use less salt in their food!

We sometimes see some wildlife, today we found this little chap, who seems to have lost his tail at sometime.

And in this hole we saw an enormous rat! Unfortunately he was much faster than my camera, probably just as well!

Climbing up from the river was not so easy. I gave Huan a ‘bunk-up’ so she was fine. I’m a little too heavy for her to pull me so my climbing out didn’t help all my various injuries at all!

Some of the various modes of transport that we see. Here we have four on a bike; I think the most we have ever seen here is six. The other vehicle is like an OAP’s electric car, takes you shopping and keeps you dry in the tropical rain. And no, I don’t need one yet!

Some of you may wonder what shopping is like here. Well this is the meat, beef first and pork second.

This is the vegetables

This is the poultry

And this is the fruit, although we stay away from this one!

A few days off again, Huan’s bug giving me too many problems.

January 30^th A cloudy day, here’s the view from our bedroom balcony, still nice though, don’t you agree?

We managed a walk today. This little chap often speaks, he will respond to your 你好 - Nǐ hǎo, with one of his own. I think he was grumpy today, must have been the weather.

And what do you think this is? Well, it protection against friends of our little chap above. Where we park there is no problem, but if you park just a little bit lower, then your wing mirrors end up covered with bird poo!

Arrived home, no electricity! Watching the maintenance people and trying to keep my mouth shut! Eventually, they decided that there must be a problem with the earthing between the building main breaker and the compound breaker that feeds it. How surprising! They also decided it could not be fixed until sometime tomorrow. At times like these I wish we lived in a villa where at least I could use a standby generator. Not so easy in an apartment.

Stay tuned to this frequency for the rest of this month.