Cillian, Kevin and I miss the last bus from Shanghai Stadium to Zhoujiaojiao. The ticket lady greets our 10:03 am arrival for the 10 am bus lacking a knowing/nodding/wouldntjajustknowit acknowledgment of Murphy’s Law. I conjecture she has seen it one too many times and she just can’t let her heart break again. Whatever her brave stoicism’s source, she can’t help us. We adapt. Like in Hong Kong a few days prior, the day enjoyably dictates itself.
Nik (UK), Steffen (Germany) and I (The United States of America, population: ~300 Million) bid farewell to Alex (Serbia) and Flo (France) with a lively alfresco lunch. We debate history’s most evil men and discuss the simple beautiful life of two nearby happy shopkeeping old ladies. They enjoy each other’s company, people-watch, make the occasional sale. They are so sweet! We don’t understand their topic of conversation but knitting or doilies isn’t a bad guess. That explains why they aren’t overly animated. That or the fact that they are really old. The local diet must bestow such longevity. But let’s not oversimplify. It’s not just longevity–it’s about high quality of life while pushing triple digits.
We wander grit n’ shine Hong Kong enjoying spectacular city and harbor views around every corner. Nothing tops the dazzling views from The Peak, a mountain above the skyscrapers. (We reached there just before sunset the previous evening. We thereby enjoyed views by daylight and by night. I liken that to going to a family-oriented, buffet-themed restaurant at 10:30 am to catch the 11 o’clock transition from breakfast to lunch. Genre-pioneer Old Country Buffet didn’t invent but did innovate brunch.) Still, we enjoy the walk and Nik gives us photography lessons. Gratis. Yes, Hong Kong is both gritty and shiny. Incidentally, my niece Alina named her two hermit crabs Spotty and Shiny. (Guess which one’s which!)
With no particular agenda, we stumble into lawn bowling (think bocce, not tenpin). Nik is slightly embarassed at first to play “an old man’s game.” The indoor old man equivalent might be Bingo. Like the guy who doesn’t play his lotto numbers the day they hit, today coulda been my time to shine. Next time, it’ll be all O-41 and B-7 and G-36 and N-24 and I-12 and I won’t have any of them. Somebody else will win using four of the first five numbers called and the free space (no N-24, even the luckiest Bingo players aren’t perfect). Old McDonald’s dog draws my ire, guilty by association. Make that association-o.
We lose ourselves in the moment. A charming lady walks over from the next green. She teaches us. Gratis. It’s all gestures and demos because she doesn’t speak English. But with her language-transcending guidance, we detach from the outcome-orientation of hitting the white ball. Instead, we pour ourselves into the particulars–how to stand, hold the ball, aim, bowl. We markedly improve from our horrendous initial display. Nik and Steffen are legitimately good by the time we leave. Read into the omission of a personal pronoun indicating me if you like but, smarty, I’ll bet you need to practice a few things too.
Day turns into night and our trajectory lands us in faux fur coats at an ice bar. Our pictures emphasize how bad ass we look in fur. At least mine do. Regrettably, I lack goldfish bowl shoes and a gaudy hat. We hang with Emma and Emma, like-named campaign managers celebrating the election of their boss, the first female governor in Australia, Emma. Actually I forget the governor’s name. I think it might be Emma though.
We leave our time together in HK on a high note, a 4 am McDonald’s visit. Nik can’t fathom that the double Filet-o-Fish exists. Until now, the DFoF has apparently been the Yeti of Mickey D’s sandwiches. Well, Nessie is a more appropriate reference in the context of sea creatures. But back to the point, the DFoF is more than myth. Nik orders one and takes pics, employing his superior photography skills. Steffen endures a sprained ankle from earlier attempting a good-in-theory dance move involving an ottoman. I thought he was going to pull it off. We all did. I meet the two Irish lads Cillian and Kevin in Shanghai 30 hours later.
My friend Lyndsey emails, “what a city, huh? Paris + Las Vegas + New York City + Crack Cocaine + Steroids = Shanghai.” Missing the Zhoujiaojiao bus isn’t a big deal. Stronger than Murphy’s Law, we instead catch a bus to Qibao, a traditional town within Shanghai.
We stumble into a cavernous local tea hall. We pay 5 yuan (~70 cents) for piping hot, well-steeped, slightly bitter black tea. The paid price places us on an upper balcony, by ourselves. We move downstairs to the 2 yuan section with the many mostly male regulars who Cillian notes are, “exclusively 55-75.” They find us novel for our age and western, bingo-playing origins. We don’t understand their topic of conversation but Metamucil or kids these days isn’t a bad guess. They seem to enjoy time’s amble. We happily end up today where they are, without any particular place to be or anything in particular to do. I like the tea. Refills readily appear. Gratis.
PS-I am using the post by email feature for the first time. I never thought I would use it when I signed up for it in Tanzania. China doesn’t allow me to access wonder-lust.com though. The fear is warranted. So please forgive the lack of pictures and anything that looks weird about this post. I’ll catch up on pics once I get to Nepal.
