Knobcottage in China

It was New Years Day.  I had been up late, and was still in bed at 9.00 a.m.  I was spending a little time in bd sorting out the New Year's Messages from various people.  Just after Nine I got a message from Sherrie inviting me to eat lunch with her and her husband at her home!  I jumped at the chance!  Slightly later came a text asking if I minded if her niece was also there.  She is a senior three student at my school.  That was fine by me!  So I got ready and headed off.  I also had a few boxes of chocolates for my friends in the shops nearby to celebrate the new year.  I delivered these on the way, and picked up some peanut milk and crisps to add to the food already there. I knew Sherrie's flat was somewhere near the block below so when I arrived there I gave her a call and she came down to meet me.  Her flat was on the eighth floor. One of the blocks of flats in Sherrie's community The view from the Sherrie and Star's ...

After he excitement of Christmas day, I was looking forward to a quiet Boxing day, and that is what I got.  Firstly I went out and posted a book to Angela.  I had promised it to her several days ago and now I reckoned I would send it.  The post office staff were as bemused as ever.  I don't think they usually deal with parcels!  I also met the kind boss from there who had helped me so much earlier on when I tried to post stuff back to England.  For the rest of the day, I did very little, apart from tryong to catch up on my blog.  I got a call from Sherrie at a bout 4pm saying she was going to pick up my parcels and come over.  Then started he parcel saga.  To cut a long story short, there were three or four parcels for me and maybe they were all at the same courier office.  it took about an hour to sort things out, but Sherrie managed.  There was a knock on my door.  It was Sherrie with my parcels.  Three mall ones I had ...

Well the day started as any other, except that it was my birthday.  No one asked so I told no one.  It was a long day with a lots of things happening at work that I wish were not!  Anyway as the day was coming to a close, I spoke to Sherrie.  I mentioned that it was my birthday and she immediately invited me out to a meal, and a western one at that!  I met her and her husband  Star outside the ICBC bank and off we went!  The meal was a bit of a mix and match!  Sherrie ordered half and half Chinese/Western.  I ordered mainly Western, but the steak came with spaghetti!?  Star ate mainly Chinese.  It was a nice time and good food!  I also got a teddy!  Well a lucky pig! ....better picture at the bottom of the page.   Star, Sherrie, me and the pig (perhaps the last two could be in the reverse order!)       At the end of the meal, Sherrie announced that she had also ordered me a cake!  A...

I had a bad night last night.  I won't say any more, so I slept late.....until 8.30! It was then I got a text from Sherrie asking be if I had had breakfast.  Nope, hadn't even washed and shaved!  Meet me in the park at 9.15.  we will go and eat mutton powder.  I was intrigued.  What was mutton powder?  I asked for 9.45 and we agreed to meet.  It was mid autumn festival so mist people were off work.  We met in the park and went to the mutton powder shop. It was a new shop.  It sold noodles and lamb.  Powder turned out to be a mistranslation.  Fen is flour, it translates literally as powder, so mi (rice) and fen (flour) is mifen which is rice flour.  It is shortened to just 'fen', so yangrou (lamb/mutton) and fen, is yangroufen which translates literally is lamb/mutton powder!  Mystery solved.  Try reading it again if you are stillpuzzled. We each had a bowl.  Sorry no pictures.  We ate and drank , the...