Well, one more weekend in Wuhan is coming to a close very soon…

 But not before I watch F1!

But that also means waiting for the irritating and disgusting overtime soccer games to finish…

 On the weekend, Zhang Min took me to visit the third island of Wuhan, Hanyang. She hadn’t been there for six years and didn’t know what to look for and me being me, didn’t have a clue about Hanyang. I also forgot my map but hey, what’s life without a little adventure?

 The first interesting thing that I came across was on the bus. To my left was one Indian man. Sitting behind him was his wife and in front of him I would assume was his son. They were talking their usual language that I can’t understand. It was interesting listening to them because one of them knew Chinese and they spoke with a bit of English mixed in.

 We were on a ‘tourist’ bus that visited the interesting sites of Wuhan. As we were driving along, the Indian family were debating why it was called a tourist bus. The son then piped up, “Well, we just passed a Kung Fu place.” Knowing full well the place that he was referring to, I thought to myself, “That was no Kung Fu place. That was a hotel!”

 Ah yes, the fun thing about tourists. But the other funny thing about tourists is how Chinese people react around tourists. At one stop, this Chinese guy got on the bus and almost immediately, he took notice to the Indian family. He then asked them in English, “Can I take your picture?”

 Sure this is Wuhan and its pretty rare to see Indian people but…wouldn’t you find it weird if someone asked to take your picture while sitting in a bus? I’m pretty sure the Indian family found it slightly odd by the looks on their faces when asked the question, but they just looked at each other and just said OK. I must admit that I found it slightly odd because for the picture to be taken, I had to be in it!

 So the photos were taken and just as quickly as the Chinese man got on the bus, he got off, exiting at the next stop. You’re probably thinking what I’m thinking. This guy was really odd! I mean, you’ve heard of bird watching…but have you heard of tourist watching? That’s exactly what I saw! As my friend put it, “It’s like taking pictures of animals in the zoo!” It couldn’t have been said better.

So we arrived in Hanyang at the final bus stop only to find…nothing! Luckily, we had some sense of where we wanted to go so Zhang Min just asked the locals where and how to get to the riverside. The first response from one of the locals was, “Why do you want to come to Hanyang? There’s nothing here!”

 Actually, I wanted to go to Hanyang for two reasons; To see what its like and to say that I’ve been to all three islands in Wuhan. What we were expecting to do once we got there wasn’t so straightforward, but nonetheless, we found our way to a very interesting site.

 As we were approaching the riverside we spotted a very nice apartment complex. We all thought it would be interesting to take a look so we strolled in and were treated to something we never thought we would find in Hanyang.

 Apparently, this was the start to a very large commercialization project in Hanyang and this building was only one of many large building to be constructed. When we stepped inside a sales officer aooroaced us and started asking questions. We were interested in the place so we just pretended that we wanted to buy a house. I couldn’t speak very good Chinese so it sorta fit the facts; this is a place where foreigners would like to live. We had a very good look at a scale model of the proposed constuction area. It included several large apartment complexes, a very large shopping mall and one very tall office building.

 Seeing how we were ‘genuinely’ interested in buying an apartment he took us on a tour of their showroom and…wow. Can I say Wow! It was really very nice and it really made me think about how to decorate my room! The showroom also made it look very comfortable to live in a highrise flat. There was an entire wine cellar enclosed by glass, an indoor stone Jacuzzi and a very nicely furnished living room with a large LCD TV. In a place like this, maid service is mandatory but they also give you a bunch with the deal. One of them is the washing machine and the other is an LCD in the bathroom. Yes, bathroom.

  There was also quite nice gardens outside the windows to enhance the view. So after looking around the showroom, we were sat at the table to look into what type of rooms we would be interested in buying. The layouts looked really quite nice and he invited us to check out one of the unfinished rooms in the still unfinished apartment complex. Firstly, there was no air conditioning so it was very hot. Secondly…the pictures really make the apartment look bigger than they really are. I mean, if the pictures were really to scale, the dinner table must be at least twice as big!

 After the showroom tour we were given a tour of the club. The first really cool thing was another scale model of the proposed complex, but this one was bigger. The total area it covered was probably a good 30 square meters. The tallest building was almost waist high and everything was lighted up with internal LED’s…very cool.

 The club was also quite nice with an indoor swimming pool and a quite well equipped gym. There was also dance rooms, Mahjong rooms and pool rooms. Surprisingly though, I did not notice any ping pong rooms…

 So on the way back to the main sales building we started to discuss who would actually be buying the apartment. They couldn’t believe that I had enough money to buy one upon hearing my age (which was told to be around 20) so, we told them about my Dad who lives in Beijing in one of the premier apartment complexes -very true. We also said yes when asked if he was interested in purchasing apartments in Wuhan -not so true

 In the end, we got a nice booklet about the apartment and were off to check out the riverside.

 The first thing that I noticed about the riverside from Hanyang is how much more brown it looked! The second thing I noticed is the increased density of swimmers. There were old men swimming with rubber donuts attached to their waist and young kids playing soccer in the water. There was also one dude fishing with a very large net that was raised and lowered into the water.

 Sure, the fish will be fresh, but can you really call fish from the Yangtze river fresh?

 As we walked along we saw one of the things that is uniquely China; Kites. You can find kites all around the world of course, but can you find kites that are flying around 200 meters in the air (and more) with tails that reach all the way to the ground?

 There was one design of kite that was particularly cool. It was basically many kites of the same size and shape attached to the same string. They were about 600mm² in total area and separated by about 1 m. The kite came into our view through the light blue sky as we were walking nearer. I would guess that it was about 150m into the air. The owner was a stout man and as he held the string in one hand, he had a box full of unused kites in his other hand. He would constantly be walking backwards and pulling more kites out of the box, making the string even longer and the kites hover higher above the ground.

 It was quite a sight to see especially when it was flanked by a few other kites, one at least 50m higher.

 So on to dinner. Instead of going to a usual restaurant we decided to drop by the famous eating street in Wuhan. This street has a bunch of really good food for cheap! One of the items that I must talk about was the coal grilled oysters. The thing about these oysters was hw fresh they were; they were served in their untouched sea-fetched shells. Come to think of it…I should’ve brought one home. In Canada, they would’ve cost at least two to three dollars a piece but here, they cost only one Yuan each! I don’t remember how many I ate…but they were really good.

 There were other foods like shrimp, deep fried rice with egg, BBQ’d lamb (which was also really good) and…some other things that looked genuinely delicious! Of course, the price always makes things look better

 Now I’m off to a good night’s rest. Signing off.

It sure isn’t the nicest thing when you start to think about leaving your home…especially when you know it will be a long time before you have a chance of coming back. On that note, I am definitely trying to pack in as much as possible in the remaining weeks that I have. So…

 Today was another eye-opening day. One of my colleagues took me around to buy some traditional Hubei products in Chu Chun. One thing I certainly had in mind was some mini representation of the Yellow Crane tower. The other things that I bought sorta just happened because I thought they would be rather interesting gifts for my friends. But before I bought the things, I had to get into Chu Chun.

 Chu Chun is one of those tourist spots that you just have to pay to get in. Of course, this is china and you don’t always have to have a ticket to get in. As we were walking to the ticket counter a Chinese lady approached us an offered us to take a boat ride. This wasn’t any boat ride, it was a boat ride that would swiftly take us into the boundaries of the city…without paying for a ticket. Her price was 100 Yuan for three of us. Upon checking how much the usual tickets cost (40 yuan per person) we took up the offer.

 It was a quick ride (and so it should have been seeing how it was wholly illegal!) an it was also a very pleasant boat ride. There weren’t too many people around and after walking a bit we headed for the shops. There were quite a few trinkets widgets all around. There were also the usual Chinese fans and every other typical Chinese thing. I won’t tell you exactly what I bought, but I will say that I managed to buy my mini Yellow Crane Tower!

 So after the shopping, we headed to the beach. Not just any beach, a man-made beach! Now this was a very interesting experience for me!

 I have been to beaches before and most were quite nice. This one first of all, was in China, and secondly, it was filled with Chinese people. You must think, sure we see Chinese people in pools all the time! But if you start to think about what Chinese people like to do…then things start turning ugly.

 Lots of people here like to smoke. On the beach, its normal to see cigarette butts sitting around. In the water, you see cigarette butts floating, split open and with the bits dissipating outwards. Then you look around a bit more and see Chinese people smoking on the beach. Okay, so they smoke on the beach…no problem…right? Well that’s until they start walking into the water with their cigarette! It wasn’t the most pleasant sight but hey…this isn’t Canada.

 Did I mention that there’s also a few bottles and cups floating around too? I even saw a wrapper from a sausage @_@

 You’ve also got the little babies that either go into the water with nothing on, or go into the water with their parents, with nothing on…the babies with nothing on that is.

 So on about the beach itself. It was quite a pleasant experience I must say, and I was able to block out all the quirkiness of the beach and just go on having a swim. When reading the next part…

 You must keep in mind this is a man-made beach.

 The deepest part (about 100m from the shore) was just deep enough so I could poke my head up when on my tippy toes. That was okay but the thing that wasn’t the most pleasant was the fact that the whole floor was concrete! I was expecting something more like sand (which there was…but seemed to have washed away) but could just feel rough concrete with the painful stone or two.

 On the beach was sand (thankfully) but it wasn’t very nice and fine sand like the ones you find in Canada. It was coarse and similar to the coarseness of crushed ice. Nevertheless, it was overall a very pleasant experience. I won’t talk about the dressing room because frankly, things could get a little graphic

 Before I end this though, I have to talk about the girlfriend/boyfriend situation here. As I’ve said before, they’re all very ‘clingy’. It could not be more evident on the beach. In the water there lots of pairs stuck together. The girl would usually have their arms around the guys neck and the guy would be talking happily with the girl listening, or the girl talking and the guy with the wide smile. I can’t really form an opinion at the moment but hey, whatever makes them happy

You know the one thing that I hate about Wuhan?

 It’s the fact that I have to leave.

 My Weekend officially started on Friday night. My friend Zhang Min was at a place in Wuhan with a night market that I really wanted to check out. So, my plan was to meet her there and check out the place. Jiang Han lu is its name. I couldn’t have asked for a more eventful start to my last weekend in Wuhan…or any weekend for that matter.

 Oddly enough, as I was walking to my bus, all the street lights were out and it was extremely dark and eerie…it was a weird feeling, like a large storm was going to hit. I tried not to think too much about it and got onto my bus.

  It all started on a switch to my next bus…

 My route was to take the usual 755 bus then switch onto the 703 bus to get to Jiang Han Lu. It was an everyday bus switch with nothing really that spectacular. I got off one bus, pulled out my wallet to take out money for the next bus then got ready for the next bus.

 I was about to get onto the bus when some guy ran right in front of me to get onto the bus. Okay I thought…it happens all the time.

 The next thing is that this guy puts in a 10 dollar bill into the bus then turned around to take other people’s change (the bus ride is only 2 yuan). Okay I thought…it’s not uncommon for people to do that.

 Next…which was far from uncommon is that as I tried to get past the guy he stopped me. As I tried to push my way though he resisted as if he didn’t want me to get by. I didn’t think too much of it because I thought he was just trying to reach around me to get other people’s money. However, I was able to force my way by (he was a sweaty guy) and sit down at the nearest seat. The next thing I know is that this guy gets off the bus right before it was about to leave. I didn’t think too much about it…but I just thought it was odd...

 So I was just enjoying the ride, going past a few stops until I noticed that something was missing…

 My wallet.

 If you’ve never lost your wallet, it’ll be a little hard for you to imagine what was going through my mind. Firstly, I started feeling all around me, looking behind the seat, beside the seat, looking behind people. Them I got up and looked around the door area of the bus, but to no avail. I sat down and started to think about what was in there.

 The first thing that came to my mind was that I would still be able to get back to Canada because (thank goodness!!) I do not carry my passport with me. I think there was about 600-700 Yuan in there, along with 20 US dollars. In addition, my drivers license was in there and so was my University Student card.

 Ironically, earlier in the day I was looking forward to going home for the sole fact that I was going to be able to drive from the airport back home! Well yea…no license, no driving L. I had three business cards (two that I collected just earlier in the week), 10 passport photos of myself that I took earlier in the week and a few receipts. The more I thought about it…it could have been a lot worse. Almost everything in there was replaceable. But then came the second problem; I had absolutely no money and I still had to meet Zhang Min.

 This was actually the first time that I was meeting her in a location other than Lu Xiang. You may be thinking that I’ve still got my phone and everything is dandy. Well…of all days, my battery was very low…I mean, one bar and with the low battery symbol flashing. My Nokia phone is usually good on batteries lasting up to a full week of 24hr power on time. But it really makes you wonder why everything bad has to happen at the wrong time!

 So in my mind, I had one task in front of me. Find Zhang Min.

 If I didn’t find her, my last resort would be to kindly ask for money from some people, or in other words…beg. NOT a very fun scenario. By the time I had my mind cleared, I was about 30 minutes away from my home, so I couldn’t turn back. I also was only semi-clear about where I was meeting Zhang Min. She told me to get off the 703 bus right at the end, and then I heard her say to switch buses (which was incorrect). She then said to meet at the Mcdonalds ‘that we ate lunch at’

 Ok, simple enough. But add that with a missing wallet and a dying mobile phone battery….

 So I got to the end of the stop, cradling my phone in my hands as a lifeline, and switched buses (which thankfully, requires no money).

 I still only had a vague idea of where we were meeting because I thought I had only been there once.

 After scanning the street looking for landmarks on the bus, I recognized one place, and promptly got off. From there, it was only a matter of time that I found Mcdonalds. I called Zhang Min. Please don’t die on me now Nokia…

 Tim-‘Where are you?’
Zhang Min- ‘In front of McDonalds. Where are you?’
Tim- ‘Umm…In front of McDonalds…’

 You can see where this was leading to…it was the wrong McDonalds!

 I then started listing out places that I could see to figure out where she was. Luckily, she said that I was close to my intended location so that gave me a glimmer of hope.

 I then started asking a few people where Zhang Han Lu was. The problem was, I was saying ‘Jiang Hai Lu’ instead of ‘Jiang Han Lu’

 All the following conversations were spoken in Chinese:

 Case 1: Chinese guy fiddling with his phone on the street
Tim- ‘Do you know where Zhang Hai Lu is?’
Fiddling phone guy- “I’m sorry, I’m not from Wuhan”

 Er…ok. What are the chances of that? The first person I ask is not from Wuhan!

 Case 2: Street flower vendor lady
Tim – “Do you know where Zhang Hai Lu is?”
Flower lady- “What did you say?”
Tim- “Zhang Hai Lu”

She gave me an awkward look then mumbled some Chinese which I understood to mean ‘go away.’ She then flicked her hand at me and continued on advertising her flowers.

 That didn’t go well… So then finally, I see a friendly guy. A police officer!

 Case 3: Police officer
Tim- “ Do you know where Zhang Hai Lu is?”
Police Officer- “Do you mean, Zhang Han Lu?”
With a slightly confused look… “Yea, Zhang Han Lu”
Police Officer- “Just keep going down there”
I thanked him and followed his direction.

 I was about to Call Zhang Min and tell her my whereabouts until I took out my phone…

The screen was blank…dark….no power!!

 I was thinking to myself, why do you have to die now Nokia!? Oh, just a note…you know those chain letter that everyone sends about Nokia phones having an emergency battery inside? Well…they’re false. So I was thinking…I could ask someone to borrow their phone, but I didn’t memorize her phone number and my phone was dead…

 There was quite a few things running through my head at the moment…first of which was, “Find Zhang Min.” The second was that we said to meet at “The McDonalds in Zhang Han Lu where we ate lunch.” Luckily, as I was walking around I saw a sign with a big arrow “ à McDonalds”

 It was a slight relief, but it didn’t last too long. I got to a major road and decided to ask a few more people where Zhang Han Lu was.

 Case 4: Guy with Burberry-esque collard shirt talking to Yellow polo shirt dude
Tim- ‘Excuse me, do you know where Zhang Hai Lu is?”
Burberry Boffin- ‘What do you want?”
Tim- “Do you know where Zha….”
Burburry Boffin- ‘Go away! *some Chinese spoken very quickly*’

I also thought he said to me, “Huang Ren” which translates into ‘Yellow Person’ Don’t take my translation for fact though, because I’m not sure exactly what he said and by the looks of it, he didn’t want to explain himself. He then started to make quite a few unwelcome hand motions. A situation like that never needs explanation or translation…

 I promptly left the guys and walked away from the big street. Finally, I asked one more person.

 Case 5: Chinese teenager with a white shirt
Tim- “Excuse me, do you know where Zhang Hai Lu is?”
Teenager- “Yea, its just down there…”
He pointed towards the big road. I said thanks and started jogging.

 As I was jogging in the proper direction, I was passing a large cell phone shop. I thought it may be worth a try for a quick charge of the cell. Unfortunately, they didn’t carry Nokias (only Chinese phones).

 So I kept going…I knew I must have been going in the right direction becase I recognized quite a few places. However, I still had only a vague idea of where the Mcdonalds was. To my great surprise and fortune, I stumbled across a Holiday Inn hotel. I knew that most hotels should have people that speak English and Holiday Inn was an internationally known hotel.

 Case 6: Holiday Inn Concierge and Manager (following conversation was all in English)
Tim- “Excuse me, do you speak English?”
In my mind, I didn’t want to speak any Chinese because I wanted to speak to someone who knew good English.
Concierge- “A little bit”
Tim- “Do you know where the Mcdonalds near Jiang hai Lu is?”
Concierge- “Sorry?”
Tim- “McDonalds.” I drew a little ‘M’ with my fingers on the table.
Concierge- “Wait a moment please” He left and went into the opposite room.
Manager- “Can I help you?”
Tim- “Yes Please!” a good English speaker!!! “Do you know where the Mcdonalds near here is? Near Zhang Hai Lu.”
Manager- “Yes, there is one near…do you want to eat dinner?”
Tim- “No…I need to meet someone there. Is there a McDonalds near here?”
Manager- “Yes, just keep going down” she pointed down the road, “Then at the intersection, turn right.  Is there anything else you need?”
Tim- “No…I think that’s all…you see, my mobile has no more power…” I pulled out my phone and showed her.
Manager- “Do you need a charger, I can help you…”

 I was thinking at the moment that it would be better to just quickly run and meet Zhang Min at the McDonalds because that was the last thing that we said. I refused the offer and bid her many thanks. I was very close…

 I ran…and ran…passing various recognizable land marks and the Zhang Han Lu subway station that read, “Jiang Han Lu” It was only then that I noticed what I was saying wrong.

 As I was running, there was also a second thing running through my mind…I will not get hit by a car…Yes, it is very possible at night and when your head is not exactly on one thing. I made sure to calm myself down a bit when crossing the street and go slowly...

 Another ironic thing was that earlier in the day, I was wondering if I should go for a jog at night for some exercise. I certainly got some exercise that day!

 In about 10 minutes, I reached the entrance of Jiang Han Lu. It hit me…Ohh!!! Here!!! Jiang Han Lu is a very long walking street lined with shopping malls on the side. I had been here many times, but never remembered the name of it. It is one name that I wont forget now! I knew there was a McDonalds…somewhere.

 And there it was. The Golden Arches! I hastily looked around for Zhang Min. For what seemed like forever, I could not see her. But then, I looked through the glass and there, sitting at a table, attempting to dial a number on her mobile, was Zhang Min!!!

 I tell you, I was soooo happy to see her! I recounted my story and after a while of just sitting down and just being glad to be able to find each other, we walked around to the night shops.

 It was nice, but it certainly would’ve been a bit nicer if the cloud of losing my wallet wasn’t hovering above me…

 Anyways, it was a bittersweet ride home. We had caught the absolute last bus back (the sign says the bus stops running at 11:00 PM and it was 11:20) and it was the same bus where I had just lost my wallet on. We thought about quite a few scenarios. If we had to walk back…it would’ve probably taken us a whole day to walk back!

 It was on this bus ride that, for the first time in three months, I just wanted to go home, back to Canada, in my own comfy room. There’s no replacement for home…Canada is home. I wasn’t even thinking about my apartment.

 Something then happened that I can’t really explain. I turned the key to my apartment door, and there I was.

 Home.

 It just felt…right. I had never thought of Wuhan as a home, just as a temporary place to stay. That night, I fell asleep with quite a few things on my mind, but most importantly of all, I was home. Home in Wuhan.

I would guess that after reading my previous post on my expensive bus ride that I would be rather bummed out and not be in the mood to do too much this weekend. Well, you would be partially correct in assuming that but…it was my last weekend in Wuhan and I already had a few plans…

But hold on…I didn’t have any money! Slightly true, but I was able to borrow some money from my boss to be able to make it through the week. Not to mention the money that Zhang Min had to lend me to get back home!

The first of my plans was my Haircut.

I already said to myself that before I go back to Canada, I would get a Chinese style haircut. Zhang Min took me to a hair cut place which she recommended, and I could see why. I went in wielding a picture of what I wanted to look like. I wasn’t sure if my hair was really long enough for it because even though I hadn’t cut my hair for three months, it still seemed relatively short. Not to worry though, I didn’t know that much about my hair, but the hairdresser certainly did!

They said that if I wanted hair like the picture, they would have to straighten my hair (I have slightly curly hair). I was like okay, sure. So we bargained the price to a reasonable 100 Yuan. I must say, 100 yuan seemed like a lot because I’ve mainly heard of people getting haircuts for about 20-30 yuan. But anyways, I was in the mood for making myself look mmore Chinese so I went for it. The first thing that they did was wash my hair.

They used some sort of watery soap that foamed up as he poured it into my head. After the first wash, he proceeded to don gloves and started applying some thick paste with a brush onto my hair. Mt first reaction was…woaaaa O_O. Plus, it smelled really strong and it my first time ever having something other than shampoo or water in my hair.

He sectioned my hair and really made sure he applied all the straightening paste into every strand of my hair, moving from one layer of hair to another.That whole process took maybe…40 minutes.

Next, they wrapped my head in saran wrap and pulled out what I like to call, the ‘halo’ machine. It’s basically a heat ring that rotates around your head in an ovular motion. At first there was no heat and I thought it used some sort of UV ray or something…

Sure enough, the heat started coming and it got really hot! Like…it felt like my head was in a sauna! It made me wonder what girls go through to make themselves beautiful…

After the hair baking, they washed my hair and then applied one more pleasant smelling substance in my hair using the same painstaking method of brushing it into every strand of hair. After it was all applied, they told me to wait 20 minutes for the paste to work. After the paste had done its job, they washed my hair once again and I was seated back in front of the mirror.

The first thing that I noticed was that my hair was VERY straight and that I certainly looked more like the dude in the picture. Secondly, I noticed that they hadn’t even cut my hair yet! It was quite interesting though because it didn’t seem like they needed to. My last haircut was by some guy in Beijing 3 months ago. I was actually very impressed by how I looked

So the boss then stepped in to do the final touches. He trimmed the tips of my hair a bit then trimmed my sideburns…to great effect. I had been transformed into a FOB!

The last step that I had to do for my hair was not to wash it for two days! It’s not as bad as it sounds though, and today was actually the first day that I washed it! I can report that my hair is still very straight.

I guess I should mention what I did before I had my haircut. Wanna guess?

Drive an NSX in Battle Gear 3! Suffice to say, I was able to win my final race! So Saturday ended much too quickly and Sunday came.

This morning, I went with Chuan Chuan to have some traditional Wuhan breakfast. First on the menu was ‘Re Gan Mien’ which is ‘hot dry noodle.’ I must point out that ‘hot’ does not refer to spicy and dry really does mean dry…

I had a few other items but the Hot Dry noodles were actually very filling and I had to really stuff myself to fit in the rest of the food!

So after a very nice and hearty breakfast, I went to the computer district and bought a few plastic protection pieces for my Macbook. I was going to by a silicon keyboard protector, but the one that I really wanted was too expensive and the cheaper one was just no good. Actually, when I said no to buying the keyboard protector, they tried to sell me one that fit the Macbook pro… yea, right.

But I really think that the highlight of Sunday was my Ping pong playing back at my apartment. I can happily say that my skills have improved since coming to china (and they should since China is the land of Ping Pong). I got quite a few nice hits but the highlight was when we started to get a whole bunch of really long rally’s. Seeing how long the rally’s started to become, we set a goal for ourselves…to make 100 consecutive hits which means 200 total hits. We started off with mid 20’s then 40’s, then 50’s then 70’s…getting closer.

Then one time, it started to get really long. I had lost count, but Zhang Min was still counting. I knew it was very close because I had lost count around 80… I just kept going…and…bam! Net ball…

‘Where were we??!’ Then I got a somewhat unhappy look…

‘99’ So close!!!

But no, we had to reach 100! And so we continued. It took a couple times to get back up to speed but soon enough we had the consistency.

70…80…90…we can do it! Then it happened. 100!! I knew we had it, but I just had to continue concentrating and keep going. Was 200 possible? We kept going….and then Bam! Net ball…

We had reached 135 hits on one side for a total of 270 consecutive hits!! Quite an impressive feat I must say.

So after the ping pong match, it was time for dinner. I was going to eat at my usual place, but Zhang Min invited me to her place for dinner.

Her sister was going to prepare the food and I was actually very surprised how fast she cooked the food. She made a total of five dishes in about 30 minutes, all including chopping of the food. Jeez…I could only cook 1 dish in 30 minutes! I certainly had some learning to do…

They also tasted really good. Very impressive

We wrapped up the night by scouring through gigabytes of Chinese music and a bunch of old pictures that Zhang Min had. It was a very pleasant end to my last weekend in Wuhan