Court Date, Dentist (Again), Wall Tigers, Rigsby’s Back!

April 13th As often happens; today’s plans were torn up and thrown in the bin. When I got up Huan told me that we were going to court this afternoon which meant I had to do my cooking in the morning! Today’s cooking required some time, all because we have no gas and I have to use only one electric induction hob.

Why were we going to court? Don’t you remember anything that you read? We were going because of the gas saga of course. Being one of the ‘designated drivers’ I had to go twice, taking three people and Huan each time. On this occasion, I was also going to be in the court so I took a few surreptitious photos before proceedings began and stitched three of them to give you the view from my seat at the back.

Here’s the lovely Huan sat next to me, and Yu next to her, resting her eyes, although Huan thought she may actually been having a quick forty winks.

I stuck it out for an hour or so before I decided I had had enough. My Chinese listening skills are nowhere near good enough for a courtroom! As it happens, they all followed me out only about ten minutes later. Was there any progress this time? My opinion is that we are almost back at square one. The judge ruled that we have to find out who constructed the gas pipe way back when, and who was responsible for its maintenance thereafter. Every year China improves things but when our building was built I very much doubt if there were any contracts at all, and I’m 100% sure there were no such things as “as built drawings”. Yet again we have to wait and see. Anyway, here we are just after arriving home; note I’m wearing a tie!

So why did I have to slave in the kitchen this morning? I was making a sort of ‘fake’ Lancashire hot pot. Lamb is not so easy to find here, unless you want a leg, and I didn’t fancy chopping chunks off a leg. Instead I bought the ‘mutton slices’ that the Chinese use in their hot pot style of food. To this I added the usual whole chopped garlic, whole diced onion, whole diced carrot, two small diced tomatoes and a handful of sliced mushrooms. Once that was cooked, I boiled two large potatoes for the topping, sliced them when done and assembled the dish. Green beans were my vegetables of choice, but I managed to burn them while I was engrossed in a movie! Once we arrived home the hot pot was put in the oven, the extra sauce in the microwave and after the oven was turned off Huan cooked some cabbage as our veg. I did take photos of all the parts of the meal individually but they weren’t much cop, instead, here’s my plate.

One of the disadvantages of using hot pot slices in the amount of fat. Now when Chinese people eat hot pot, it is all cooked at the table by you, the customer, and then you remove whatever you want to eat from the broth. That means a little less fat than we had today. Mind you, we both thought it was really tasty and no doubt I will be cooking it again in the future!

April 14^th Gentleman Bob was on duty again this morning walking the ladies to their hulusi class before continuing on his walk. Hills and countryside are out until further notice, that is until I replace my boots. Instead I walked down the main street heading for the three legged dog point to come back by the river. Huan wasn’t so happy with the pictures today, I managed to capture some more lizards! The first one was in front of the army base, I guess that’s why he was wearing brown camouflage.

Today I thought I would treat you to some views of the river, panoramic of course and as usual created with Microsoft’s ICE software.

Next up is a watercolour courtesy of the magic of Picasa.

Now, remember ‘Pointy Mountain’? Not only does it follow us around the countryside, but we can also see it from our riverside walk in Wuzhishan.

Walking back towards town I was alone nearly all the way, the snowbirds that haven’t left were still within the confines of the last bridge. That meant I spotted more lizards. The prettiest one of all was peeping from behind a tree but by the time I got my camera up and my body in the right position he had scarpered down into the hedges. It’s a shame because his colours were amazing. Not to worry, in short order I spotted another three and before you accuse me of using the same one in three different photos, look closely!

Insects were also on the radar today, we’ve seen the empty shells of this one before but we’ve never seen it in this stage of its evolution. Just look at those long arms and the wispy grey hair, who does it remind you of?

For today’s final photo, another panorama of the river, this time looking towards the town centre. What a beautiful day it was for walking.

I forgot to tell you yesterday that due to our court appearance I had a respite from the dentist. We don’t have the usual worries about keeping appointments here in Wuzhishan, we’re not exactly a big bustling city. Anyway, we went this afternoon only to find the dentist wasn’t there, he’d gone to Sanya, the clinic staff said he should be back tomorrow. Another respite for me!

April 15^th Today was ‘The Great 壁虎 (Bìhǔ) hunt. Actually we followed the same route as yesterday because Huan wanted to see some lizards. Later on I heard her talking to a neighbour and it seems lizards, or geckos, are known as ‘wall tigers’ hence the Chinese above. So, did we find any? Well first we found our three legged dog, in residence today, enjoying some fresh oranges for breakfast.

On we went, around the river to continue the hunt. Were we successful? Initially I was getting a little worried that Huan would be disappointed but before long her eagle eyes went into hunting mode and she spotted more than I could catch with the camera. I did manage to catch nine, many of which zipped away quickly, one or two that stayed still long enough for a couple of shots and the last one that posed for ages.

I think we can safely say that Huan was happy with results today and I have to say that she spotted most of them before I did. Apart from the same bug as yesterday there wasn’t much else to see. We did try and take some bird photos nearer the house but they were so well camouflaged against their stony background and so far away, we failed.

Those OAP naps keep sneaking up on us, Huan fell asleep on the sofa and my nodding head took me to the bedroom. Luckily, or now, as the case may be, we both woke up to take me to the dentist! “Is there any pain?” he asked, to which I replied “Just a little, inside the hollow tooth.” Within a minute or two I was desperately trying to shrink through the chair and into the floor as he poked into the hole to see how bad the pain was! I could never have been a spy! Anyway, more poison was put in to kill any remaining nerves and I was sent away for yet another five days. Usually, this procedure takes two or three visits, my next visit will be my fifth, I think.

Back home it was my turn to cook, and today it was simple German food. The bratwurst does not meet the standards I am used to, both from Germany and shopping in other countries, but it’s all we can get here. You can see from the photos that they are shorter and thinner than the ones we are used to. The chips were not cooked as well as they could have been, we don’t have a deep fat fryer so I was using the wok. The currywurst sauce is fake; it is tomato sauce with quite a strong paprika sprinkled over it. Still, they tasted fine.

And that was my day done with. Huan was out again for hulusi practice. She is worrying that she won’t be able to remember the four tunes they have to play in their forthcoming show. What makes it worse is that she doesn’t know when the show is! I think I may have to stick to solo walks until she is happy to relax again.

April 16^th Huan was still worrying about learning her performance pieces so I had a short solo walk this morning. I went down river to fist check on the ‘dam’ progress. One of our committee members told us we would be able to go boating and swimming when all the work was complete. I have my doubts about that.

Past the sewage works, the “end of the road” (a.k.a. the slaughterhouse) and the gas works I came upon a family enjoying their morning bath.

They were not in the river but in a small feeder stream alongside of which is a path. We’ve never explored that way before so I thought I would give it a go today, especially as I saw the car pointing my way.

As you can see, it soon became obvious that the car had reversed there from the path I was walking on. At then end I came to a small farm, very pretty, with the usual farm birds and a very friendly puppy. After a minute or two the farm lady came back and I asked her if there was a way through. There wasn’t where I pointed, across the fish pond, there may well have been through the forest and over the hills. Given that I was wearing my sandals, I made a U-turn!

Back on the path by the river it wasn’t long before I had to make a U-turn there too. This is definitely not a route for sandals.

As I passed the sewage works I took another small detour, thinking it was the old cement works for the highway and that I would be able to come out back on the main road.

Needless to say, I was wrong and had to make my third U-turn of the day. Mind you, at least back at the entrance there was someone to see me on my way.

I was home in time for coffee break, making sure our lunch was made and preparing the meat for tomorrow’s stew. This time I am not pre-cooking the meat to remove skin and fat, just to remove the bones from the chicken legs. It smelled so good it was all I could do to avoid starting it today! This morning’s walk was planned such that I would need another one this afternoon when Huan was off to class again. As usual I walked the ladies there and then just went through town and back, nothing of interest popped into the camera frame.

Huan was cooking dinner tonight and while she always makes sure you see my creations, she is not keen at all on me photographing hers. I felt I had to today, especially as it was fish and chips but not English style. I can assure you that it is in fact, delicious!

I dragged Huan out after dinner, before her hulusi practice, to see the “Sphere of Death”. I have no idea if that’s the correct name or not, but I don’t think it’s classed as the wall of death. Here it is empty, before the start of proceedings.

It was an electric moped supplier's (XiaoDao) way of advertising. The bike was standard, apart from the LED strip lights, and the driver was a young lady, not a 'macho man' as I had expected. Perhaps they wanted to show that the mopeds are easy to control.

It was quite an impressive show considering she was driving a bog standard electric moped. Huan even gave me permission to buy one, but I said no, for now anyway! We took two videos, one with the Fuji which I missed the beginning and the end and the fireworks with, and one with the Nikon Keymission which we haven’t used for a year. We decided it was time to take it out of mothballs. You can see that video here - https://youtu.be/fw_cF-0Al94

April 17^th Saturday again, so a trip to the market again, but this time with the little Nikon camera too, the action cam Keymission 170 again. After yesterday I decided we really needed to make videos more regularly, especially as one of my many brothers and his lovely wife paid me the compliment of saying they liked seeing and hearing me! Consequently, we have no photographs of today’s walk but you can see most of it here - https://youtu.be/w06JWJl9s0A

After lunch, and our now what seems to be almost customary nap, it was my turn to cook again. The meat was prepared yesterday; here are all the ingredients. As you can see there are a lot of vegetables, more than I had planned for. Whether it would all fit in the biggest pan we had was a bit worrying but once the vegetables had cooked down a bit I was able to fit the chicken in too. Needless to say, this will be a three day one!

Having only had a short walk today we had planned an after dinner one to at least make up my daily ten kilometres but unfortunately, the heavens opened up so we were stuck indoors. Still, it gave me time to sort through the music I bought from the market and to sort out Huan’s problems with the second bedroom USB player. All’s well that ends well, I am now typing this in the office with the door closed to try and deaden the dulcet tones coming from the living room, not very successfully I hasten to add.

April 18^th Today I dcided to leave the C-in-C at home so that she could practice her hulusi songs in peace. Not having any boots, only my casual shoes, I decided that the landfill walk would be fine, after all, it’s road all the way. As I approached the highway which I would have to go under, I spotted the only wildlife of the day.

Going under the highway I found that yesterday’s rain had caused some problems. Initially I was doing fine, picking my way along a fairly ‘clean’ tyre track but then a car came towards me and I had to quickly step out of the way. So much for using my casual shoes!

Now and then I took some photos, most of which you can see above. I certainly had to stop the video to take this next one. I got three shots of this little family, however, the ones where the chickens were all upright and looking towards me were not so clear. My intention was not to get too close or they would have flown off their perch in all directions.

My aim was to do ten kilometres this morning and I succeeded, exactly! I did make a video on the way round but I made it with the Fuji camera. Unfortunately, stabilisation, especially when walking, is not so good at all so that video will not be uploaded to Youtube, it will be kept on my PC. It will also go on my FB feed for a few days so if you are on FB you may see it there.

After lunch I had the job of knitting together all the clips, as well as trying to work out why some were missing. For some reason I had battery problems today, even with a new one! Being a Sunday, and a rainy one at that, no further walks were planned, just a long soak in the bath.

April 19^th Monday, a beautiful morning, a beautiful day for a drive, so that’s what we did, from Wuzhishan to Ledong. The internet payment was due today and despite the ISP being a national company, you can’t actually renew from an office in another city. Our tenants have also decided they want to stay another year so although the contract isn’t up yet we had the new one prepared for early signature. We also had to pay them for the repair of the living room floor, the tiles that had to be replaced. We now have two different colours of tiles but at least it doesn’t look like a draughts board.

They still have problems with water coming through a couple of the outside walls, unfortunately there’s nothing we can do about that. Like many buildings, ours in Wuzhishan included, the outsides are never treated to stop water ingress. Just when I thought we were ready to go the lady of the house. (tenant, not Huan), asked us if we could do anything about the toilet seat. The short answer was not a lot, except to go out and buy another one. Here’s what the old one looked like,

How it got to this state in just over three years I guess we’ll never know. Ledong is not in the mountains and is more humid, perhaps that’s the reason.

Off we went, shopping for a new one, we didn’t want to resort to Taobao for this one. We were getting worried after a few shops came up negative but eventually one came up trumps. Here I am with the tenant, desperately struggling to get the second mounting out, (eventually I had to use a claw hammer), and posing on the finished job. Please note, I said ‘job’ and not ‘jobby’!

All I had to do then was clean the filter on the bathroom tap which our tenant had asked the maintenance company to do, but they couldn’t. Job sorted, off for lunch in Ledong and then home we headed. I’ll bet you can’t guess what we did when we arrived home. Yep, you’re right, it was another one of those afternoon naps, both of us were exhausted.

No peace for the wicked though, when we woke up Huan had a message from Sanya, the tenant there says that the washing machine hose is leaking; we assume she means the drainage hose. Rather than have to go there we asked her to see if the ‘man across the road’ who did many odd jobs for us in October could sort it out for her. We should find out later this evening if he was able to and how much it will cost us. If you ever want to be a landlord I suggest very strongly that you make sure your properties are in the same town as you are, much less hassle that way.

Once we were both alive and kicking again, Huan to go to her OAP hulusi class and I had to sort out photos, scan paperwork, get Huan’s dinner ready for her return and finish this post. Oh, life is so hard sometimes! Of course I don’t mean that, life, especially when you don’t have to go to work anymore, is just great! On that note, I will sign off with love from Hainan, hoping you will join us again next week. Bieeeee!

Long Walks, Sanyuesan Festival, 70 Kilometres, Dead Boots

April 6^th Another nice long walk today, Huan’s choice was ‘countryside’ and we were out of the house before eight o’clock. Sometimes we can see the ‘old’ and the ‘new’, you’ve seen a few test cars in my Blog posts, they would be the ‘new’ and here’s a photo of the ‘old’. They still work and do the jobs they were meant for in rural areas.

Next up, something new, and different. We have watched this place being built and today as we passed we were invited in for a look around. There are three bedroom villas and a handful of one bedroom apartments, for long or short term rental. Short term prices are ¥600.00 per day for the apartments and ¥1,000.00 per day for the villas, all meals included.

It’s a beautiful place, but I’m not sure they will find it easy to get customers. If they offer packages including visits to local tourist spots they may succeed, I hope so, they deserve it for all the work they’ve done. There’s even a little pussycat in the garden.

Down the road ‘eagle eyes’ spotted a lizard, she was so happy, it’s the first one she’s seen this year. Her attempts at photographing it failed so she chose this one of mine to share with you. He is a handsome fellow isn’t he?

Onwards and upwards as they say so that’s what we did. Sometimes our memories fail us when it’s been a while, as they did today, and we ended up going along a route with no exit at the other end and had to turn back. The scenery was nice on the way though.

And this was our “zoom” view of Wuzhishan from 5.6kms when we realised we had to make our way back again to find the correct turn off.

Once back on the right track we found a village that we knew and where I could buy a much needed bottle of nice cold water. They had an election going on in the village meeting place, yes, China does have elections. They were electing a new village leader, I did ask the shopkeeper if I could stand but unfortunately I was disqualified!

What would a walk in the country be without Bob being ‘stupid’, well that’s what Huan thinks anyway. Perhaps Robin Hood would have been jealous of my natural hat.

Just to keep the chief veterinary officer happy, we also found a caterpillar today, one of those we are not supposed to touch. It did ‘rear up’ once but we missed that opportunity and Huan couldn’t get it to do it again.

No naps today, once we were fed, cleaned and watered it was off to the dentist’s again. The surgery was full, there isn’t exactly a waiting room, so we agreed that unfortunately, (hehehe), we would have to postpone until tomorrow!

My turn for cooking today, I decided on a variation of Philippine chicken adobo with added mushrooms, on a bed of Huan’s dark rice with some broccoli to provide the greens. I had it all nicely presented on the plates ready to take a photo for you and then forgot! Sorry! It wasn’t too good anyway; it was edible but my reducing the ingredients list downwards for the two of us went a little awry. If you fancy this recipe, or any others that I use, just let me know, they are all stored on my PC.

April 7^th Huan was off to OAP school so I walked her there. I was under orders not to wear my boots and ‘advised’ not to walk too far because of my ‘red feet’. Why this happens I have no idea, my boots feel comfortable enough, it could be the socks I suppose.

More progress on the riverside market, they have now started dividing the sections and adding roller shutter doors. I wonder if our Saturday market will ever return, the farmers may baulk at paying increased rents for their spots.

Today’s walk was longer than Huan would have liked and I meandered a lot, stopping here and there to take some photos. Here’s a couple of snowbirds playing together. I did think about telling them that I had some songs on my phone but I doubt very much if the violinist would have known the tunes.

One of my meanders took me past a roadside temple so today I went up the steps for a closer look. There are quite a few Gods in this little altar alcove, I couldn’t even begin to try telling you who they all are and what they represent.

After a visit to the bapman my timing was perfect to meet Huan from school, mind you, that was only because she was early today. As usual, the bapman gave me an extra one, his wife wasn’t there! Twenty one baps for ¥20.00, what a bargain, well I think so anyway.

After lunch it was back to the dentist, who wasn’t there and neither were any other patients. I did try running away but Huan made me stay until he turned up. More medicine was applied in my empty tooth and I was told to come back in five days, again. Huan was gong to take another photo but the dentist had left his coat upstairs so she thought he would take it the wrong way if she did. I took a photo of the empty chair while we waited. I wonder if you can spot something that is very prevalent here in Asia but that I haven’t seen anywhere else. No? Parts of the chair are still covered with the protective plastic that was on when it was delivered. Here you even see windows with signs of the protective film still on years after installation.

After dinner, I realised that the cotton wool plug had fallen out of my tooth, maybe I will have to return well before the five days are up!

April 8^th Plans are made, and plans are changed, today’s plan was a long walk, it ended up being a morning indoors. Huan slept very badly last night, visiting the bathroom more than once, didn’t feel like walking this morning so I stayed home to provide moral support. (PS I didn’t cook at all yesterday so not my fault!)

We did have a small walk after lunch, back to the dentist, where, just for a change, I had no fear at all! I knew all he had to do was make sure the ‘poison’ was back in the hole in my tooth. We were in and out in minutes. Tomorrow being Friday and thus four days after our Covid jabs we are allowed to eat fish again so I took Huan to the market. One live (for a short time) fish later we were soon on our way back home. The rain arrived within seconds of us being indoors, it looks very much like the rainy season has begun again.

Cooking dinner was down to me today but that was another plan thrown out of the window. To keep things nice and plain I used Huan’s left over sweet potatoes from lunchtime, steamed some cauliflower and fried some chicken breast, nothing added at all. Thankfully, the commander was more than pleased!

April 9^th Our plans worked today, we were up early enough and the weather was good enough to head up the reservoir road. The first three and a half kilometres were warm, no breeze and not many clouds. The scenery was good though.

By the time we reached 4.8kms we began to feel some of that ‘oh so welcome’ mountain breeze. There were also a few more clouds making for good walking weather.

Before long we met a couple coming down, I commented on how fast they were walking. They were tourists and of course had to have their photo taken with me. I did try and get one with them and Huan but I failed.

Now I said we were heading up the reservoir road which was true, but today we didn’t plan on going all the way, instead we were going to head down towards the hotel on the other side of the valley. This was where we turned, you can see the reservoir, about another 800 metres of walking if I remember rightly; you can also see the steps. The best part of seeing those steps is knowing that from here onwards it’s downhill all the way!

There are a couple of resting places on the way down, or up as the case may be, but they seem to be in need of a little renovation. Here’s the first one.

This is the second one, for some reason it is known as “Victoria Look Out Point Scenic Spot”.

They are right in that it is a scenic spot but what the ‘look out’ part is for I don’t know.

And here’s the view looking back up from below.

We were heading to the hotel to check on the swimming pool, whether or not the prices had changed, whether or not an entrance fee was required just to get into the grounds in the first place and whether or not it was open. The first answer from the reception area was ‘no idea’, the second from the restaurant staff where we bought some much needed water was ‘tomorrow’ and the third answer from security at the gate was that no one is allowed into the grounds any more unless they are hotel residents. Of course, you can always come in the back way as we did today! Anyway, here’s the pool that I was hoping so much would be open again.

That’s enough snaps for one day I think. By the time we arrived home, tired and hungry, we had walked eleven and a half kilometres, up and down the hill. We don’t do too badly for a couple of pensioners do we? One of those pensioners, the male version, had to have a nap after lunch; the other couldn’t because she had a hulusi lesson this afternoon. Just like yesterday the heavens opened up late afternoon time, luckily Huan and Yu got a lift home so were spared a soaking.

April 10^th Saturday came round again, much too fast, we both think that someone somewhere is messing around with time! Off to the riverside we went, no long walk needed today, and we thought we would check out the Saturday market again. To our surprise it was there and will be there every Saturday until the 5^th July. What will happen after then we don’t know, the notice didn’t say. Were the traders using the roofed sections of the road today? For the most part, no, although some were using them for parking.

Although we didn’t buy anything today, prices here are pretty good. One vegetable on sale was ¥10.00 for eight, the Chinese name was 丝瓜 (Sīguā) but Huan was unsure how to cook it. When I got home I did a quick Google and found that it was a ‘loofah’. Now before you all start laughing and thinking of the bathroom, this is also from the internet “Loofah is an edible plant, so you can harvest young and eat them in the same manner you would a young zucchini or summer squash”. I even found a nice recipe for them, http://simplymommie.com/2010/01/luffa-with-egg-recipe.html Maybe we’ll buy one or two next week. Another thing we like, not only about this market but about living here in general, is the availability of fresh fruit; it’s nice to know that these pineapples and oranges were grown just outside the city.

As you may have noticed from the picture above, the market is not only food. In fact the gentleman in the ‘woody’ photo is there nearly every day and always likes us to stop and have a quick chat. He does have some interesting stuff, who knows; maybe one day we’ll even buy something from him. This next stall caught my eye; I don’t think I need to tell you why! However, it is not what you think; he is selling USB drives preloaded with stacks of Chinese music, traditional, martial, disco etc. I threatened Huan with me buying some martial and traditional next week.

What I won’t be buying next week is these. Neither of us had any idea what they were for, or even whether they could be cooked and eaten. The stallholder showed us by holding two in his hand and beating himself over his shoulders, they are used for massage!

We headed home fairly quickly as did a lot of the stallholders and other people, the rain was coming in. It fooled us didn’t it, after a few drops here and there it went away again. Still, we had walked five kilometres and we have another long one planned for tomorrow so I guess that was enough. Huan, still being a little exhausted after yesterday had an OAP nap, I was on cooking duty so had to stay awake and make today’s duck stew. This time, there was no precooking of the duck, no removal of the skin or the fat from the cooking, we both enjoyed it much more!

April 11^th We were on the road by just after eight o’clock this morning, early enough to get a real long one in. Our first photo is on the main road heading towards Sanya, and no, we weren’t going to be walking that far. We were trying to work out just what this tree is, any ideas?

Just before we left Wuzhishan, we turned left and headed towards Nansheng village, not the one on this stone that Huan is standing by.

Before long we took a right turn and started our trek through the countryside. Almost immediately we found that our route had been tampered with. Someone had built a new access road to the highway. Coming from the right we knew we had to turn left somewhere but didn’t know where. Before long I realised that this was not our usual road.

Although not our usual route, the road was a very pleasant walk, quiet, hardly any traffic at all, just the occasional motorbike or car, and lots of bird and insect noise. We weren’t sure if the road would take us to Nansheng so Huan asked a young schoolgirl at the side of the road, her parents were in the fields, and she put our minds at ease. She also told Huan that the fruits growing all around us were lychees so Huan had to have a photo of ‘lychee mountain’.

Some of the fauna at the side of the road looked quite dangerous. There were flowers with lots of buzzing things in attendance and then there were these two, neither of which I fancied getting to know any better.

For the most part though the scenery was wonderful and as you can probably see from the photos the weather was just right for walking, a little overcast and a slight breeze now and then. The rain did try for a few seconds but then it gave up.

Lizards were aplenty but they all successfully avoided both my camera and Huan’s phone, I did capture these first two little beasties though and Huan got the third one.

Next a couple of panoramas for you, the first includes ‘pointy mountain’ which like many points of interest seems to keep crossing the road when you’re not looking, the second is rather a large fish pond with associated farm and village buildings.

Eventually we came upon our usual road which led us to the old army barracks which in turn led us to Nansheng village. It only took us four and half hours to get there but in our defence, it was a long walk and here’s the proof!

It’s a good job we didn’t have to go much further; my boots gave up the ghost at around the thirteen kilometre mark. I suppose they’ve done well, two years and hundreds of kilometres.

Being lunchtime we popped into one of the small restaurants for some noodles. I have to say, that despite them being ‘instant style’ they were some of the best we have tasted in a long time. Not only that, my free soup was excellent too and that can be a hit and miss affair in many small restaurants. Needless to say, we were ravenous and scoffed the lot in no time at all!

I was so pleased to see the electric bus arrive to take us home. Mind you, I doubt that Huan would have argued today, she was as tired as I was.

Once home, it was rest time for me, but unfortunately not for Huan. She had decided she needed to visit the dentist today, not the one she sent me to, but one that she knows is cheaper! Luckily for me, Huan doesn’t need any moral support for visiting the dentist so I was able to snatch a much needed OAP nap.

What a day, exhausting but in a very pleasant way, we need more walks like that. I only have one minor worry and it’s this, “Why do the crooks of my elbows make me look like I’m a drug addict?” It could be sweat related but I’m not so sure. Any advice from all you doctors out there?

April 12^th Monday started off differently today, before going shopping we popped across to the island to watch a show being put on for the Sanyuesan Festival. (Sanyuesan refers to the 3rd day of the 3rd month in the Chinese Lunar Calendar, it is a traditional festival for many ethnic groups across China) It turned out to be more of a competition between various groups of mostly school children but with an occasional adult performance, probably to give the judges time to tally up the scores. Some people were leaving as we were arriving, I think because of the similarity of all the groups’ performances, but we stayed an hour or so. The performers were all playing ethnic Li instruments, mostly flutes and a lot of them were ‘nose’ flutes. Unlike many local shows the sound on this one was superb, the guys on the mixing desk did a fantastic job.

Shopping turned out to be different today as well, the car park was nearly empty and there was plenty of space to move around inside. Maybe more snowbirds have returned north than we thought. It certainly makes my shopping experience more amenable.

After lunch Huan was off to school again, alone again, so I walked her there and then continued meandering. I met one of my pooch friends and sat on a stool to say hello and immediately he put his paws on my knee and just sat there waiting for a bit of love. He’s never done that before. Huan told me it’s because his owners keep trying to give him to me!

I felt guilty about leaving him but I had to make sure I was in time to meet Huan to walk her home, even though she didn’t know I was going to do that. My walk had reached nine kilometres by the time I met her, almost ten when we arrived home. That makes seventy kilometres for me this week, I think I’d better slow down a bit!

And that was the end of my day, not Huan’s, she was out playing the hulusi again this evening while I was trying not to nod off. As always, if you want to know anymore about Hainan, or even China in general, just comment below, or send me an email or FB message. If I can’t help with the answers, I know a man who can! Bye for now, see you next time!