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15th May 2009
Friday morning my classes went well. In the afternoon I cleaned my apartment before meeting John and going to Changsha. We were off to the countryside to stay with his classmate who had just had a baby. We caught a bus, and then another bus, and then a mini bus, and then walked a bit and then met his friend and got a lift on a scooter. This must have been pretty hilarious for anyone watching as I had never been on a scooter or motorbike before!
The village was nice, they were rebuilding a lot of the tatty houses with styled wood and stone to make them look like traditional Chinese buildings. It looked very pretty in the areas that weren't building sites. From what I could gather the actual houses behind were still quite basic but there was obviously enough spare income around to start to make things look nice. I felt it gave an insight into what China could be like in the future, if Changsha began to have suburbs.
We arrived at John's friend's house and went to visit the baby and had some tea. I've since learnt thanks to a presentation by one of my students that it was pestle tea. It was very distinctive (the floating sesame seeds gave it away) and very different to normal leaved tea but it was nice.
John's friend lived in a farmhouse with her husband and his extended family which follows traditional Chinese values. As far as I was aware, in the house was John's friend, her husband, her baby, her husband's two brothers, one of his brother's wife, her husband's mother and father and grandmother and possible a nephew or niece around the place (complicated!).
Their house was big and very nice, but from my western perspective people had their priorities in the wrong place. Big flat screen TV and Karaoke machine, but the toilet and shower were still outside next to the pig sty with no flush and you had to brush your teeth at the tap outside.
We all sat around the table in the middle of the house and had a very nice meal. We drank a few beers then took the scooters back to the village where John's friend ran a small café. She opened up and we had some BBQ and more food. When it started getting later we went back to the house and I slept in a very nice bedroom.
The next morning we got up early because we had to be back in Changsha centre by about 10am. We had to catch a motorbike taxi to the bus stop in the nearby town, which once I relaxed was a really beautiful experience, the countryside was amazing.
We finally made it to Changsha and met Sam and Aggie to take them back to Yiyang! I was freezing and wet because it was raining and I was wearing a skirt and flip-flops, it was melting heat the afternoon before!
When we finally arrived back in Yiyang I was in dire need of some dry clothes and a shower, but I couldn't get into my apartment. Rich had my key because Amy had been sleeping in my apartment. We managed to get in touch with Amy but Rich was nowhere to be found!
Whilst we waited, the four of us went for some milk tea. The others started to arrive and we gathered Mat, Amelia, Lisa and Amy, found some cheap hotel rooms for everyone and went for lunch in the "Student Union Building". As we decided what to order, Jonny, Keri and Steve arrive, and then Rich and David rolled up just as we were beginning to eat. Amy went back to Changsha after lunch because she had work to do, I went to get dry, and then we took everyone to see the wonders of downtown Yiyang. We went for a beer at the nice bar near Xiufeng park and had a walk around then went to a restaurant suggested by John's brother. It was really good! After we had eaten we did the typical KTV and BBQ - turns out Yiyang does BBQ in style so we got to show off a little bit!
Sunday morning we all had a slow start. Mat and Amelia left early; the rest of us had lunch then said our goodbyes. That afternoon I was ill, I had a bad chest and John took me to the hospital. It wasn't expensive but there was a LOT of faffing around. Register you're there, go see a doctor, go back to reception to pay for something, go have a chest x-ray, go back to pay for something, go back to the doctor and finally you can walk to the Chemist and go to buy some antibiotics!
I ended up being on a combination of Chinese and Western medicine, which meant about 26 tablets and 3 doses of cough syrup each day for about 6 days!
On Monday I taught my classes as normal then me and Rich went to John's house for tea, it was his last day in Hunan before he went back to Nanning to study for his English exam. We had a nice meal then went for some BBQ with his brother.
The next couple of days were spent not doing much, just resting and recovering from my chest infection.
By Thursday I was starting to feel better so had a clean up and went shopping.
Friday I had some good classes in the morning then headed to Changsha. I ate a lot of Subway and had to queue for a long time to buy a train ticket to Nanning (which didn't end up very successful, slow train, hard seat…) then me and Rich caught a taxi to Liuyang to visit Mat. We were promised a firework festival, at the firework capital of the world, but instead it was one of the quietest nights for fireworks I had heard in China! We went for a meal, then went for some beers on the street before crashing at Mat's apartment.
On Saturday I woke up early and decided to go home because I was still feeling a bit ill. I caught a bus straight to Yiyang and spend the remainder of the weekend being lazy.
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