Wednesday 31st October, 2007 - A Walk in the Park

Another bright morning, but this will be my last full day of freedom, as I my marking should arrive this evening. And here's where it will have to be done:


Dr Wilding's "Office" - there ain't much space between the bed and the desk.

None of my contacts has been in touch since Monday, and phoning from my hotel room has not been successful up to now. I always get the same signal after dialling: several short beeps followed by complete silence. I've had no replies to any of the emails I sent them either. I did wonder at first whether they might have a problem receiving Gmails, but when I saw the hotel staff at breakfast just now, it was clear they had received - and had enjoyed - the pictures I sent them.

I decided I might as well go out for a long walk. I'd spotted an area of green on the map which I hadn't visited before, and which seemed to be within striking distance. These are some scenes en route.






Above: I'm almost certain this is the place to which I was taken and banquetted on arriving in Zhengzhou. Of course then I had no idea of the lie of the land, and I just chanced upon it today.

The name of the park is "Bishagang", and it is yet one more memorial to the great people's revolution. Here is how the sign inside the entrance puts it, in its quaint-sounding English translation. You'll need to click on the image to make it big enough to read:



Notice they have no compunctions about breaking word
s at any point, without so much as a hyphen. I'd seen this in most of the exhibit-descriptions at the museum, too.

Bishagang Park is a haven of tranquility in a busy working city. "Tranquil" but by no means "silent". It was certainly bustling; full of ordinary people, some of them doing what to us might appear to be exrtraordinary things, but to them just part of everyday life: such as Chinese Opera (one assumes - I may be wrong on that point). The park had several medium-sized band-stands, most of which were occupied by good people like those in the following clip. (By the way - do watch out for the look of utmost contempt on the face of the gentleman seated right, when he sees and appraises the cameraman!).




A variety of instruments was in evidence, but the one I've mainly seen is the two-stringed fiddle. The performances are quite theatrical - choreographed even. Take, for example, the man on the left, singing, in the clip above - observe his very deliberate stance. Interestingly, until I arrived on the scene they had no audience. These displays are, principally, for their own pleasure. Of course they are very happy when they are appreciated, and at some of the bandstands, like this one, a little knot of attentive spectators gathers:



And people will just join in wherever they happen to be:



Now this is a curious one. These ladies line themselves up in ranks, with each rank setting off a few seconds ahead of the next one. They walk slowly, in time with the music, to the end of the area. Then they all march back again. It's hardly strenuous exercise nor - I would have thought - particularly interesting for them. I'm guessing it's some kind of re-enactment of "The Long March", although I've no way of knowing.



Then there are those who just like to sit on the benches and play their instruments ...



... or form a little choral ensemble, perhaps with sax-accompaniment:



Today is Wednesday and, as far as I know, nothing special. It's clear that scenes like these are commonplace - to be found every day in every suitable piece of green space across China. I've often heard it said that China is a land of contradictions. How incongruous these performances seem, when considered alongside the economic revolution taking place. But it is obvious to even me that the performers are retirees - of my, or even my parents', generation. Will such simple pleasures be as popular with the next generation? I doubt it, but to lose this - possibly one of the last vestiges of the old traditional China - would surely be a tradgedy. Not that I would say I found the singing "enjoyable" exactly, but that is hardly the point.

I will have to pause here: a short while ago I had two phone-calls. The first was from Shuai apologising for not having been in touch, but she's had a bad cold. I seem to remember she was suffering a bit when we were at the Shaolin Temple. Anyway, she'd just been invigilating my test and informed me that Jennifer was on her way to my hotel with the scripts. That was the second call. So now they are sitting by my elbow waiting for my attention.

Shuai also said she's located an electronic Mandarin-English dictionary and we can go and collect it from the shop on Friday (I intend to keep up the lessons!). We'll also be meeting up with Jennifer, Judith, Yang Le and the others for a trip to see the Yellow River. I'm looking forward to that as a treat after I (hopefully) finish my marking.

8.20 pm: I've finished marking all the answers to Question 1! There were 17 of them. That just leaves Questions 2-6. I think I'll start on those in the morning when I will hopefully be feeling more like it.

Meanwhile, to continue the earlier discussion: another thing that is most striking (to my eyes) is the total absence of antisocial behaviour - the sort of thing that we in the UK have become accustomed to, and that requires special laws to curb - which don't work. I'm sure I haven't seen a single example of really bad behaviour since I first set foot in this country. True, many folk do have some rather unsavoury habits (such as spitting in what we would consider inappropriate situations), but that is not the same thing at all. Everyone seems to be endowed with an unshakable honesty and respect for others. And when, as very occasionally happens, you pass someone in the street and they look at you and shout "hello" or even "waiguoren" ("foreigner") it is not in any sense of mocking; it is purely what it sounds - a desire to communicate, mixed with curiosity. You can argue the "educational programme" has made them the way they are. That may be so; and I do realise I am making sweeping generalisations to which I am not entitled: I've been here less than two weeks, after all, and I certainly haven't visited the very poorest areas, even of this city. But to compare (no - "contrast") the main thoroughfares of Zhengzhou at 11.00 pm any night of the week with their equivalent in, say, Manchester or Liverpool, Nottingham or London, Paris or New York ..... is to give you the picture. (In fact, by 11.00 pm lights are all-but out here)

And what British mother these days would allow a complete stranger to photograph her child?



I'd probably be hauled before a child-protection tribunal.

We've lost so much in our culture that they still have - for now. In their headlong dash towards capitalism (though strangely not away from communism - another contradiction) there is a definite danger of throwing this "baby" out with the bath-water, so to speak. I sincerely hope not. The world would be a happier and nobler place - global warming and all the other problems accepted - if the rest of us were to adopt their social principles rather than the other way about.

Still, is it for us to deny them their new-found freedom - especially freedom of thought, which we take for granted (or at least we did, until New Labour happened along)?

You can tell I'm being profoundly affected by this place, warts and all. I've heard others from the west say similar things. Until you experience it yourself, though, you are naturally sceptical; you don't quite believe it. But it's true. Ask anyone else who's been here.

Enough pontificating - let's just enjoy a few more photos.













Above: that orange mass in the water is one of several teeming shoals of carp.





Back on the road again ...






This seems to be a government building of some sort. There are lots of them in the city, usually with real guards (unarmed, as far as I can tell) standing to attention on podia either side of the gates. They are also quite massive (the buildings, not the guards!).

Life in and around the central bus depot:







And, closer to home, some of the many stree-vendors. These ones are selling roasted yams.





That's something else that sets China apart from many other countries I've visited: these street-merchants are definitely there for the benefit, primarily, of the customer. They don't hassle you as they might elsewhere in the world; but they're there if you need them. How they make a living defeats me. I only hope it doesn't defeat them.

Finally, for those who are interested in such things, here's the route I walked (clockwise, if it makes any odds).



Unfortunately there is no scale marked on my map, so I had a go at guessing, based on the little street plan in my guide book. Also notice that - apart from my own annotations - there's no Roman script: it's entirely in Chinese characters. You need to be prepared for this if you intend visiting!

Bye for now
Mike

Tuesday 30th October, 2007 - Zhengzhou

7.10 am: That bright thing is the Sun. Looks like it's going to be a nice day. Of course I don't know what the temperature's like yet.

It's another "free" day. I could be kicking my heels around town. I can't contact folk easily except from my hotel (my mobile being blocked), but they may well need to contact me. A bit awkward, that. Oh well.

Breakfast first, I think. Now before I came here all the old lags warned me against the breakfasts. If you throw away your ideas of what makes a good breakfast it's not so bad. In addition to the more obscure items there are little sausages and bacon-like slices, for example; and I like the pancakes and the sweet things such as the sesame-seed-covered date-filled balls, and the various cakes. Not that I have a sweet tooth really, but those are more familiar tastes. And I always try to have something Chinese as well - congee, for instance. That's what they think of as porridge, but it's basically a sort of very runny rice pudding with no taste whatsoever. I can't understand why they all eat it really. Maybe they lace it with soy. It's staple though, so I guess that's why. And, naturally, it's washed down with lashings of great tea.

Well, as I said - breakfast. This morning I tried the "Eight Treasures Porridge". It is very runny, pinkish-grey in colour and contains lots of different (presumably eight) bits. One of them is almost certainly black rice. I couldn't tell what the other things were. The taste? Well, now. How can I put it? Exactly like congee. That is, tasteless. Again. Why do they love these things so much?

I also had some of the scambled eggs. They're mixed in with some greens which I think the Chinese describe as "leeks". To me they seem more like a kind of cross between chives and the green parts of spring onions. That was OK though. Plus a pancake. Plus one of the disc-shaped orange-coloured sweets (again with a date in it) and a piece of what looks like modified Swiss roll. Nice enough.

While it's still in my mind, a few words about the language and the "English" names that the Chinese often give themselves. According to Jennifer and others I've spoken to, they usually look for a name that has a sound approximately like their actual name. This isn't too surprising. For example, Jennifer's real name is Yáng Yàn Fēi. Now to our eyes that may not look much like "Jennifer", but when she says it you can hear a similarity. Notice I've managed to put the accents on the words, as they would be in Pinyin. These correspond to the famous "tones" of Mandarin. They are more or less self-explanatory. The upward rising accent, for example, implies the pitch should start low and rise as you say the syllable. The flat horizontal line means a flat high tone. The sort of "v" shape (not present in Jennifer's name) means falling then rising. Anyway, it takes a bit of mucking about on the computer to add them, so generally I haven't bothered. But in actual communication they are quite important because there are very many words that are spelt the same (in Pinyin) but mean totally different things. You can wind up in a lot of trouble if you aren't careful! Fortunately, the Chinese are very forgiving of any mistakes you make. They are much more likely to praise you for your "excellent" Chinese than they are to criticise it!

Although many words are spelt exactly the same, as I said, they would generally have completely different characters. Even some words that are spelt and pronounced the same will have different symbols. A good example is the words used for "he", "she" and "it". In Pinyin they are all the same: "Tā ". So we get the mistaken impression that the Chinese make no distinction between the three; a man could equally well be a "he" or a "she" or an it "it". (Or, come to think of it, a "him", or a "her".) However, the symbols for these concepts are not the same.

Thus: "he" is 他, "she" is 她 and "it" is 它 (Ain't Google wonderful!).

You might notice that there is one bit of each character that is present in all three, however. That is likely to be the key to how the word should be pronounced. The remainder of the character (known as the "radical") tells you the actual meaning.

Some interesting things occurred to me about all this. For example, the written form of the language is clearly much richer in its ability to convey subtlety and context than is the spoken form. It may partly explain why calligraphy has always been so highly valued in Chinese cultural history; quite apart from its obvious attraction as an art-form.

Another thing is that one could, in principle, learn written Mandarin without ever having heard or spoken a single word. The "symbols" are just that. They originated from pictograms - simple little diagrams of the objects they represented.

As the language progressed more abstract ideas were formed by combining them in different ways: the modern character representing the Sun in "Simplified Chinese" is 日. The Moon is 月. But putting them together as 日月 (sun-moon) conveys the notion "light-dark" which is basically a 24-hour period. So the modern meaning is "day" when it is used as part of a date, for example.

[Perhaps it isn't surprising that these two symbols are closely associated with "Yin" and "Yang": opposing concepts, such as light and dark, good and bad, happy and sad, or masculine and feminine. Every individual thing or concept in Chinese has to be one or the other. What is constantly sought - not only in art and culture, but also in daily life - is a harmonious balance between the two.]

The characters are invariably logical. Once you've learnt to recognise a few of them you can begin to translate small phrases straight into English. And you can put them together in a simple sequence to convey an idea or a message. I'm not even sure the "word" order is always that important, though I might be wrong. The characters are in a sense universal signs, just like traffic symbols. Everyone recognises the little green man at the pedestrian crossing (apart, ironically, from Chinese motorists! But that's another story). It's just that the Chinese characters are much more numerous and, in many cases, intricate. There are over 10,000 of them, although most people I talk to reckon that hardly anyone knows, or uses, more than about 2000. That's still a substantial number of course.

The power of the written language is exemplified by the fact that few Cantonese speakers can understand spoken Mandarin and vice versa; but they can converse with ease using the characters - so they can happily email one another!

OK. Lesson over. Hope you found that interesting. Of course it's only my understanding, so it's probably nonsense.

It's now 9.30 am and the 日 is shining brightly in an almost clear blue 天空 (sky). The nicest-looking day so far, without a doubt. But I bet it's gonna be parky!

Hey, I've just had a flash of brilliance: I suddenly remembered I have a nifty piece of software on my laptop called VPN, which gives me a secure channel right through to the university of Manchester's servers. I just tried logging in through it and .. EUREKA! I can actually see my own blog site at last! Waheyy!! It doesn't look too bad, does it?

So does this mean I've effectively broken through the "blockade"? Looks like it.

Yes ..... it's actually true: I've just successfully accessed my website and found the weather forecast for Zhengzhou!!!

Thank you Tony S - I'm sure it was you who acquainted me with VPN, ages ago.

(Hm. Maybe I should have kept very quiet about this - Shh!)

Still can't use my mobile though, but ne'er mind, eh?

Thought you might like to experience life in the street outside. Here's a couple of clips taken from the opposite side of the road junction. They both begin with the camera looking directly towards my hotel.

Hey, I'll tell you what - it was a darned good job I did remember about VPN. A moment ago I tried to check my Gmails without logging into VPN first, and guess what: yep. They've closed Gmail down on me as well now. (I typed all that in hushed tones, just in case.)

Had lunch here again. I'm still having considerable communication difficulties. There was some issue with the first dish I ordered, but no matter how hard we tried, the waitress and I couldn't understand one another. You wonder how bad it would be in a really remote place. Anyway, the dish I ended up with was very good. I think it was described as fragrant rice with meat and cabbage. Doesn't sound too exciting, but it came in one of those earthenware pots, sizzling hot. There was the yolk of an egg on the very top, rice beneath that, and the rest somewhere below. The waitress used two spoons to mix it all together. It was not spicey but tasty. The meat was mince of some description (maybe beef, maybe pork, maybe lamb, maybe dog, who knows). In a way, it reminded me a bit of meat-loaf, but less solid. A nice can of Tsingtao beer to go with.

Then I took a stroll round the area. Here is some of the some local colour.



Above: believe it or not, I think that's a bank. Just up the road and round the corner is a fair-sized market ...



























Here's my hotel ...



And the little green man right outside it.



You see the illuminated green area above the man? That's a count-down. The area gets progressively smaller, after which he turns red. Then there is another count-down before he turns back to green again. The problem is the boulevards are so wide you hardly get enough time to cross. For elderly folk it must be a problem. Well it's a problem anyway, because while I suppose most of the traffic actually does respect the signal, a lot doesn't.

The green man speaks, as well. But he has a female voice, so maybe it isn't a man at all. Let's call "Ta" a Green Person!

That's odd: I just disconnected from VPN and tried Gmail again. It's working again. So now I'm confused. Maybe it was a genuine connection problem earlier. Perhaps the broadbad here is insufficiently obese!

Now this is an interesting road-cleaning vehicle. You may have read about it in one of my previous posts, but that was before I discovered how to upload videos!



And on that "tack" (appropriate choice of words perhaps), I've noticed recently that the piped wall-paper sax music in the dining room has begun concentrating on decking halls with bells & holly and requesting Big G to rest ye merry gentlemen. IT'S NOT FAIR - I came half-way around the world to avoid that kind of thing.

Tataa.

Monday 29th October - Zhengzhou: Hotel & University

6.30 am: I spoke too soon yesterday. The smog's back with a vengeance. Might have known it was too good to last. But when I got down for breakfast I saw they'd closed the dining-room doors, which had previously remained wide open. I realised why, as I passed the outer door and a distinct chill blew in. Maybe this is it then: winter.

I think I'd better spend the best part of this morning here in my room, preparing exam questions or assignments. But before I do: when I was describing Peter Hessler's book "River Town" yesterday, I forgot to mention a couple of other parallels to my own situation here. Firstly, he was in a 6th-floor dormitory which commanded a good view of his surroundings - my room is on the 6th floor too, though I suppose my view is less attractive than his was. Second, he talks about the morning sounds. Here's a quote from Page 13 of the book:

'My appartment was on the top floor [mine too] of a building high on a hill above the Wu River [mine isn't] ... that was the view from my aerie - high on the sixth floor ... I heard the students as they ... did their morning exercises. The exercise music started shortly after six [here too], broadcast over the loudspeakers - morning-cheerful, workout repetetive music, the same day after day [here too].'

Now I have no idea whether this will work for you, because when I tried it out I was told the video was currently unavailable. At any rate, I've uploaded this clip (below), taken from my bedroom window earlier this morning. The images are not so informative, but somewhere down there, in the mirk, those exercises are in full swing. Listen, if you will, to the music. I guess it is typical of every city and town in the land. It's the same every day. Not unpleasant, and actually quite a gentle alarm clock!



More later, but for now I had definitely better get to work!!

Ow, my back! It's now almost noon, and I've been sitting at the laptop since breakfast. But the good news is I've written some essay assignments, six exam questions, and tidied up the School of Materials Presentation I intend to give later in the week. The not-so-good news of course, is that I will have to mark the tests. Never mind. That's why I'm here, is it not?

And I've got the "graveyard" slot again today - 4.00 pm till 7.40 pm - so I may not have much more to add to this post.

Righty-ho. Time for lunch. It will have to be downstairs as I don't have a great deal of time.

It was a lot quieter in the dining room than usual, probably becasue it was that much later.


Above: note the chopsticks. They don't offer knives and forks, so I'm getting more skilled now. No green tea today - just the lemon variety. That's in the glass. I was somewhat appalled to see from the bag-tag that it was Lipton's!

While I was down there I thought it would be a nice idea to nab as many staff as I could find for a photo. As I suspected, they were overjoyed to be asked ...


The lady centre is the manageress, I think. I asked her for an email address so that I could give them copies. I sent them earlier this evening.



Then there are the Reception staff ...









I continue to be bowled over by the people here. They're abolutely smashing.

So then it was the bus down to south campus for my classes. I got through all my topics early, so we had a question-and-answer session. All the questions were to do with either their coming to Manchester, or else whether I would be coming back next year - preferably with my family. And that was after they'd been told they'd be sitting an exam on Wednesday afternoon!
They would really like to see me again before I leave, so I will pop in again on Thursday for the usual time-slot (4 pm). How can I possibly fail any of them?

Meanwhile, Jennifer will deliver their exam scripts to me here at the hotel around 5.00 pm Wednesday. I'm determined to complete the marking before I leave Zhengzhou. It would be a pain to have to carry it with me - especially given that I will be back into the hurly-burly of teaching again in Manchester on 12th November!

After my class, we (Jennifer, Judith, Gao Xiao Yu and Yang Le) enjoyed "home"-cooked (but out of fast-food bags) dumplings. Very nice they were too. Come to think of it, I'm not sure I've mentioned Judith. I believe she is an English-language teacher (although she is Chinese), whereas Jennifer teaches textiles. She is also, she told me, in charge of visa extensions. Now there's a thought ... Only joking!

I have a Chinese name. Given to me by the "dumpling chef" (Gao Xiao Yu). It's a combination of phonetics and a description of my obvious qualitities of learning, wisdom etc. Listen, I only report what I'm told, in good faith. OK, in reality it probably means something like "daft bald old git".

Waiting for the bus back this evening I could definitely have done with my woolly hat, scarf and gloves. I think the time has finally come.

Good night one and all,

Wěi Bó
(If any of you can translate it, please let me know the awful truth!)

Sunday 28th October - Zhongyuan University & Zhengzhou City Centre

6.45 am. The smog's gone! No, really. Look:


OK, it's not totally clear, but the grey is quite definitely cloud. Amazing what a drop of rain can do, eh? How long will it last, though, I wonder.

A few minutes later it looked like this:

and turned into really quite a nice day. It's distinctly cooler now though. The general opinion is that summer has now ended. It may get colder. Still, I think I'm prepared for that.

We finished today's topics earlier than expected, so I showed the students my slideshow of Manchester and surroundings. They enjoyed those immensely, and were particularly excited to see our house and the pictures of Caroline, David & Peter. Yes, I'm sorry Pete, I'm afraid they saw you in full "Rank" (or was it "Phile") mode in "Snow White"! They really loved it - and of course the one of me as the drunken butler in my first play with KLT - "A Bed full of Foreigners". I thought that might put them off, but strangely most of them can't wait to get to England now.

One girl, who's name I think is pronounced approximately as "Feur", is very keen to do a Masters in Manchester after she graduates from here. That won't be for another two years . She insisted on us being photographed, so here we are. Her friend took the shots, and I reiprocated:






He did tell me his name, but to my shame I can't recall it now. It really is quite hard remembering all their names. I feel bad because, of course, they all know mine. Still, I expect that's because there's only one of me but lots of them.

Then I went back to the "teachers' room", which seems to accommodate a mixture of teachers and students at various times. This is it on a rare occasion when it had only me in it:



We collapse in there between classes for a breather and a beaker of warm water (which is about as ubiquitous as the smog, but much more welcome).

And that reminds me of something I meant to say before. Although classes start at various times (eg on the half-hour in the mornings and on the hour in the afternoons/evenings), the pattern is always the same: teach for 45 minutes; 10-minute break; teach for 45 minutes; end of class. The start and end of each of these segments is marked by a loud buzzer that sounds throughout the building - possibly the entire campus, for all I know. It's as regular as clockwork (probably because it is clockwork). This appears rather regimental and school-like, and maybe it is to be expected; but I think it has much to recommend it, as it removes any ambiguity as to when to start and when to stop lecturing. There's none of this hanging on until all the stragglers have deigned to roll in. But that isn't the main reason I mentioned it. Some time ago, my friend Chris Race very kindly lent me Pete Hessler's book "River Town", You may know of it, as it was shortlisted for the 2002 Thomas Cook Travel Book Award. To give you a flavour of what it's about and what it's like, here is what Simon Winchester has to say about it on the back cover:

'To come across a Westerner patient enough and tolerant enough to try to understand the immense, exasperating and ultimately lovable entity that is China is always a pleasure. To encounter one who is as literate and sensitive as Peter Hessler is a joy. This tender, intelligent account of two years spent teaching deep in the country's heart is the work of a writer of rare talent: it deserves to become a classic.'

Peter Hessler is an American who, in his mid-twenties, spent two years teaching English in Fuhling. Well, I've only just started to read it since coming to China. Not having too many odd moments, what with sightseeing, blog-writing and uploading photos (oh, and teaching!), I haven't actually got very far into it yet. In fact, I'm still on page 20. Given that there are over 400 pages, I guess I won't finish it, or anything like, by the time I have to leave China again; but it has already struck several very loud chords with me. The resemblance between the situation Peter Hessler found himself in and that of the international teachers here in Zhengzhou (some of whom are American, and who also have two-year contracts) is positively uncanny. And his descriptions of the idiosyncracies of China and the Chinese are spot-on. He even gives special mention to the regularity of the teaching bell that sounds - at precisely the same times as the one here in Zhengzhou. Most notably, though, he clearly had great affection for his students. That is something I'm not sure I was quite prepared for before I came here, but it is something that is impossible not to feel as soon as you meet them. It's sad to think that one day it might all change - when they become westernised! I think, though, that if I had read the book before coming to China, its impact on me would have been far less dramatic than it has been. If you get a chance, do read it. He really does echo my own feelings, thus far. Many thanks indeed, Chris. I promise I will return it eventually!

A slight diversion there I fear, but isn't that what a blog's supposed to be - a stream of consciousness?.

Now where was I? Oh yes, in the teachers' room. Jennifer suggested we go into town for lunch at a popular restaurant. Two of the students would accompany us: Xu Xiao Meng (Marketing); and Gao Xiao Yu (Accountancy). (Interstingly, not from my class). One of Jennifer's colleagues, Yang Le (E-commerce) would meet us there. It seems his father makes a mean dumpling, and would prepare some for us, to be delivered to the restaurant(!). At least, that's what I think was said. And I believe it, as they certainly materialised in a plastic bag right after we'd sat down, but before an order had been placed. (They were indeed excellent, by the way.) Afterwards, Yang Le and the students would take me to the Er Qi (2-7) Pagoda, and show me around the city centre.

But I get ahead of myself. While Gao Xiao Yu went off to find us a taxi, the two ladies and I had a stroll around outside the campus:


Above: one of many hot-food stands in the vicinity of the campus.


Above: Jennifer (left) and Xu Xiao Meng.


Above: the gates of Zhongyuan University's next-door neighbour - a rival, private university. I'm told that Zhengzhou has about five in all. Anyway, this one has "traditional" Chinese roofs on its buildings which are clearly much posher than those of ZUT's:



And so to the restaurant:


Above: before the meal. Left to right: Xu Xiao Meng, Jennifer, Yang Le and Gao Xiao Yu. I took the photo, of course.


So, Xu Xiao Meng took one of me. Behind is written the name of a very famous Chinese poet, shared by one of the restaurant's finest dishes. I can't for the life of me remember what it was!
You can see the poet's personal seal, bottom right.


Above: the first of several dishes arrives. Meals in these restaurants are very informal affairs. The central part of the table is a rotatable glass platform. The dishes are placed around its edge, and you simply dig in as you feel you want to. You just take a piece of food off with your chopsticks and put it on your side plate (or eat it directly, of course.) This is fine, but I can't help wondering about hygiene. After all, you are using the same chopsticks to eat with as you are for selecting your morsels. But this is common practice even in quite high-class joints. Needless to say, I did not voice these concerns; just got stuck in and thought: "what the heck, they seem healthy enough!". Then we took another taxi down to the city centre. There are loads of taxis everywhere, and they are quite handy because places are annoyingly far apart, and although there are plenty of buses, they are usually packed.









Above: Yang Le (left), Xu Xiao Meng and Gao Xiao Yu, with the Er Qi Ta ("2-7 Pagoda") in the background. It is called "Er Qi" because it was built to commemorate a rail-workers' strike that was terminated, with much bloodshed, by the authorities on 7th February, 1923. ("Er" means "2" - hence "February"; "Qi" means "7"; so, 7th thereof). It seems to have been one of those pivotal events that fed the rise of the Communist Party in China. Inside the tower there are rooms on each level with wall-displays detailing the history. There are also authentic (one assumes) writings by such luminaries as Deng Xiao Ping and Chairman Mao.


Above: Er Qi Ta. And inside it:





And some great views looking from the tower:











And then it's time for a drink - in China's equivalent of Pizza Hut. Only because McDonalds was full to the brim!


Photo courtesy of a waiter. It's a bit dark unfortunately, owing to our being so close to the window.

Drinks downed, yet another taxi back out to my hotel. I'd just got in when Shuai rang to invite me for a chicken curry with her and Nigel. Well, yes, naturally. It would be good to sample the Chinese variant of this popular (with us) dish. We went to a place about 15 minutes' walk from here. She told us it's a fast-food place, but their curries are better than you get in many good restaurants. She was certainly right about fast-food: this time it was China's equivalent of KFC! Shuai ordered from the counter, while we were instructed to sit. Because you pay there and then you have to order everything at once really, so she ordered ice creams for her and Nigel, orange juice for me and (N & I assumed) three chicken curries. At this point he and I were, as I said, seated at a table. After a while a waitress arrived with two curries: deep-fried chicken in a curry sauce on rice, red-peppers, carrots and cucumber. In a plastic container. On a plastic tray à la KFC; white plastic teaspoons the only cutlery in evidence. Interesting, but not exactly what we'd been expecting. And where was Shuai? We began eating. After what seemed like an age she re-appeared. We presume she was having a long conversation on her mobile, as this is what she does. Anyway, because she's on a diet she only had icecream. (Icecream - on a diet? Hmm. Oh well). We made a mental note to introduce her to our respective equivalents of The Curry Mile if she ever comes back to the UK! (Did I mention, by the way, that she did her degree in Hull? This is why she knows Nigel.)

Phew - another marathon I'm afraid. It's 11.35pm. Of course, most of you lot are now eight hours behind, so for you it's only half-past three in the afternoon. And as for you guys in Australia and the US - well, who knows what time it is there. My brain can't possibly cope with that sort of thing now.

The weather has definitely turned fresher, though not unpleasant. The view from my window a while ago was quite pretty. The glass does tend to spoil the clarity though.



I've just remembered, I've got to set my students either a test paper or marked assignments from my lectures. There are 60 of them. My suitcase was right on the 20kg mark on the way out, so I'm going to have to mark their papers here rather than carry them back to the UK. (I'm only allowed 20kg hold plus one piece of hand-luggage, which has to be the laptop and a couple of books.) I'm teaching the students again tomorrow (Monday), and I'm leaving here next Sunday morning.

Help!!