Soo today was lovely, lovely Saturday. I woke up this morning and then sank into a delicious, warm, honeyed lie-in. After a while I woke up a bit and stretching, looked at the time wondering how long I'd slept in for. It was 7:30am. I used to be so good at lie-ins...
Becka, Jesse and I had planned to go shopping in 即墨路 (Jimo Street) at 12 with the idea of studying in the morning. I watched the old movie of Merlin instead. I'd thought of watching it because after reading an article about Ratzinger moaning about "aggressive Atheism" (whatever that actually is) I was thinking that his church's biggest enemy was not Atheism but Apathy. As Merlin says to Queen Mab in the film, "we don't have to defeat you, we just have to forget you." Plus I like Sam Neill :P
We trotted off to 即墨 after Captain Louise sorted out which bus to catch. First, we went somewhere that was filled with lots and lots of Shiny Things. I ended up buying two pretty hair clips in the shape of exotic birds. There were also lots of beautiful tea sets, chopstick sets and other old style Chinese things that I know Mum would love. Hopefully she'll come visit so I don't have to carry everything home for her!
Then to the shoe bit. For some reason the assistants kept trying to sell shoes to Becka. They'd sort of run after her waving shoes. Despite scouring every shop I couldn't find a nice pair of pumps to replace my dying ones. I think it was the problem of Too Much Choice. The more there is to choose from, the harder it is to pick something you like best. Then we went to find lunch and joy of joys we found a restuarant serving sweet and sour pork. You would think they sold it everywhere here seeing as it is so ubiquitous in the UK but I think it is more a southern style dish and so not so common here. We weren't sure what meat it was at first and by looking up only one character thought we were eating spinal cord. Luckily the addition of the character in from turned the meaning into tenderloin- much more palatable! After this, via a bakery where I found egg custard tarts-very evocative of home!, we went to the clothes bit. After a long time hunting I finally came away with a couple of tops and a jumper. Nothing very exciting but again the problem off Too Much Choice...
All this involved playing the game of Haggling. We got quite good at this. You find something you like, mutter glumly to your friend that you absolutely love it and will die without it- but in English so the assistant doesn't understand, then ask how much it is, look startled at the price, hand the garment back, suggest something as low as you dare, watch as the assistant wails and jabbers reasons why you are being unreasonable, then start to walk away, then watch as the assistant declares you and them to be friends and suggests a price 五块 (5 kuai- roughly 50p) above what you said. You then beam and accept. As I don't dare suggest very low prices I suspect the assistants still got a very good deal but then I got one lady down from 130快 to 70快 so not bad! Also the problem with this method is that when you actually don't like something, it can be very hard to leave the shop when the assistant is bellowing painfully low prices at you...
Becka and I commenced Taekwondo classes today. Momentous occasion. We were a tad nervous beforehand as we had no idea what we were doing and we did feel a tad silly in our Taekwondo clothes :P However we hid at the back and muddled through. Well, I muddled. Becka sailed through like a swan. After years of cross-country running I am as inflexible and as uncoordinated as a new born baby giraffe* strapped to a tree. By the end we were doing kicks and had to aim for a pad held gingerly by one's partner. Becka did it rather well, despite me wincing and jumping back every time her leg swung towards me. I, however, managed to thump her hands twice when it was my turn. Ooops.
Becka and I are going out tonight :D Hopefully good times shall be had!
P.s. the answer to the riddle was "nothing".
*长颈鹿 changjinlu "long necked deer"
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