It was pretty weird sitting there and watching Deming put down several hundreds of Hong Kong dollars in markers and sometimes doubling them and sometimes losing them all but the strategy is pretty simple; he starts out low and once they have doubled a few times he leaves it doubled then keeps going and lets it build up higher and higher until he finally loses it and he starts over from the beginning. It doesn't make any rational sense whatsoever, but just seeing it like that makes me believe that luck is a skill or at least a property, I still know for sure that if you throw a dice a million time there will be the same amount of each number, give or take a few (not enough to make any real difference), unless the dice is fixed of course. In the end he made quite a lot of money, I don't know how exactly much and I guess it would be private information anyway.
The second funny thing was the prostitutes; it wasn't until around midnight they showed up and at first I didn't realize what they were - I kind of thought that a flashy casino would really allow that kind of business going on but I was apparently wrong - so I looked around as we boys normally do and kept my eyes and a pretty girl if I saw one and soon someone deliberately bounced into me, basically blocked my way and asked me if I wanted a massage. Within the next few minutes I was approached, a little bit more subtly but still, two more times, and after I tried very hard to not look at all and took particular care not to make eye contact with anyone. I was still approached one more time and Deming was also approached once, despite being very careful not to look from the very beginning.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Monday, November 17, 2008
yao ling ling
Last night they had a fund raiser for the local rugby team at Carol's too, for this they had hired a pole-dancer who did a 10 minute show in the evening, a MALE pole-dancer; black leather west and tight fitting black briefs, very sexy and extremely gay. To make money for the team they had a lottery going on so the players and other people involved with the team were running around convincing people to buy lottery tickets to win the big price; a bottle of wine, or a small price; random funny stuff.
Ryan and Andrew (US and Aussie friends) were convinced early on to get a ticket but I wasn't so easy to convince, eventually I also came through and bought number 21 from a guy with a panda hat. Not long after I paid my 20 kuai for the ticket Kelly showed up and complained that I hadn't bought a ticket from her so I ended up paying another 20 kuai for number 100. So when they started drawing the first round of tickets we sat there with four tickets between us, the girls with us only seemed to care for dancing so they hadn't bought any.
In the beginning they mostly gave out the funny stuff but the last one of the first round was a bottle of wine but of course I didn't get it, I think that one was for 007 actually. They did several drawings through the night but my numbers never came up, I heard 23, 19, 18, 010, lots of 00x numbers also; there was actually a lot more numbers drawn than actual gifts because two numbers out of three were never claimed. And so it came to the last drawing; they still had several bottles of wine left and we still had four potential winners. Of course there were several misses first, I heard 102, and 103, and for Andrew's 62 there came a 61. At this point Andrew was standing behind me yelling 62 and suddenly he got the reply he wanted, 62!!! Andrew was the winner of a 2006 Bordeaux and as soon as he knew it he announced wine for everybody.
When he got up with his bottle they had already started drawing for the next one, yao ling yao (101), dammit so close! But no one came to claim it, another one: yao ling ling, say again?!? one zero zero, oh yes box!
Not long after we had gathered a load of wine glasses, but even sharing a few glasses with other friends; Kelly got one for selling me the ticket of course, Aaron had one too, and Andrew and Ryan had some other friends, the girls with is are not much of drinkers so there was a lot of wine between the three of us. I got pretty well loaded before I left that night.
Ryan and Andrew (US and Aussie friends) were convinced early on to get a ticket but I wasn't so easy to convince, eventually I also came through and bought number 21 from a guy with a panda hat. Not long after I paid my 20 kuai for the ticket Kelly showed up and complained that I hadn't bought a ticket from her so I ended up paying another 20 kuai for number 100. So when they started drawing the first round of tickets we sat there with four tickets between us, the girls with us only seemed to care for dancing so they hadn't bought any.
In the beginning they mostly gave out the funny stuff but the last one of the first round was a bottle of wine but of course I didn't get it, I think that one was for 007 actually. They did several drawings through the night but my numbers never came up, I heard 23, 19, 18, 010, lots of 00x numbers also; there was actually a lot more numbers drawn than actual gifts because two numbers out of three were never claimed. And so it came to the last drawing; they still had several bottles of wine left and we still had four potential winners. Of course there were several misses first, I heard 102, and 103, and for Andrew's 62 there came a 61. At this point Andrew was standing behind me yelling 62 and suddenly he got the reply he wanted, 62!!! Andrew was the winner of a 2006 Bordeaux and as soon as he knew it he announced wine for everybody.
When he got up with his bottle they had already started drawing for the next one, yao ling yao (101), dammit so close! But no one came to claim it, another one: yao ling ling, say again?!? one zero zero, oh yes box!
Not long after we had gathered a load of wine glasses, but even sharing a few glasses with other friends; Kelly got one for selling me the ticket of course, Aaron had one too, and Andrew and Ryan had some other friends, the girls with is are not much of drinkers so there was a lot of wine between the three of us. I got pretty well loaded before I left that night.
Monday, November 10, 2008
Swedes everywhere!
Saturday 8th November 2008:
First in the hostel, which is actually not so strange, I ran into three Swedes, two of them checking in and the last one using the phone for long distance call.
Later I had dinner with my friend Eva, we went to the same restaurant where Joyce and I met dad in Beijing the first time, which is where I got sick (not because of the restaurant) and threw up on the street outside two years ago. Anyway, we sat down there and ordered some food and I suddenly noticed a group of six slightly senior persons sitting at the table behind Eva that were conversing in Swedish, couldn't place the exact location though.
Later that night I had supper with another friend, Ying, that had come in from Tianjin to meet me, we just went to McDonald's actually and had a burgers when I noticed the crowd of five that seemed to be speaking in a very familiar way, I soon discovered that it was in fact also Swedish and to be more exact whiny Swedish, just like my good friend and former flat mate Kei! hoho
First in the hostel, which is actually not so strange, I ran into three Swedes, two of them checking in and the last one using the phone for long distance call.
Later I had dinner with my friend Eva, we went to the same restaurant where Joyce and I met dad in Beijing the first time, which is where I got sick (not because of the restaurant) and threw up on the street outside two years ago. Anyway, we sat down there and ordered some food and I suddenly noticed a group of six slightly senior persons sitting at the table behind Eva that were conversing in Swedish, couldn't place the exact location though.
Later that night I had supper with another friend, Ying, that had come in from Tianjin to meet me, we just went to McDonald's actually and had a burgers when I noticed the crowd of five that seemed to be speaking in a very familiar way, I soon discovered that it was in fact also Swedish and to be more exact whiny Swedish, just like my good friend and former flat mate Kei! hoho
Saturday, November 8, 2008
A funny wake-up call
Around 12.30pm on Friday "morning" my phone started ringing, since I was meeting my friend's friend Vivi at 1pm I had already woken up from my alarm but I was still only semi-conscious so this became really confusing for me. The conversation went something like this:
Girl on phone: Ni hao.
Me: eeeh, hello?
Girl on phone: Ni hui bu hui shou putonghua? (do you speak Chinese?)
Me: eeeh, bu hui shou (eeeh, no?!?)
Girl on phone: Wo shi Luqi de pengyou (I'm Luqi's friend)
Girl on phone: Tjing tjong tjing tjong (I couldn't understand)
Me: Ni hui bu hui shou yingyue? (do you speak English?)
Girl on phone: bu hui shou (no)
The conversation kept going for a bit with her speaking Chinese and me saying "tin bu dong" (I don't understand). After a while I tried to ask her to send me a message and I think she said the same thing in Chinese, something about gei ni which means give you, and a few minutes after I got a message in Chinese, which my phone can't even show and I wouldn't understand anyway. I replied with some mix English and pinying (Chinese written with western letters) and I never got any reply.
I asked Luqi about this and she confirmed it was her friend, first it seemed they didn't know each other that well but after the confusion lay down I understood that it was a close friend of hers, just that she didn't know she couldn't speak English.
I actually met the girl later when I was out with Luqi and she was a bit embarrassed about the whole thing, but it was really not that big a deal in the end.
Girl on phone: Ni hao.
Me: eeeh, hello?
Girl on phone: Ni hui bu hui shou putonghua? (do you speak Chinese?)
Me: eeeh, bu hui shou (eeeh, no?!?)
Girl on phone: Wo shi Luqi de pengyou (I'm Luqi's friend)
Girl on phone: Tjing tjong tjing tjong (I couldn't understand)
Me: Ni hui bu hui shou yingyue? (do you speak English?)
Girl on phone: bu hui shou (no)
The conversation kept going for a bit with her speaking Chinese and me saying "tin bu dong" (I don't understand). After a while I tried to ask her to send me a message and I think she said the same thing in Chinese, something about gei ni which means give you, and a few minutes after I got a message in Chinese, which my phone can't even show and I wouldn't understand anyway. I replied with some mix English and pinying (Chinese written with western letters) and I never got any reply.
I asked Luqi about this and she confirmed it was her friend, first it seemed they didn't know each other that well but after the confusion lay down I understood that it was a close friend of hers, just that she didn't know she couldn't speak English.
I actually met the girl later when I was out with Luqi and she was a bit embarrassed about the whole thing, but it was really not that big a deal in the end.
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Pancakes
Pancakes 2-4 portions
3dl Flour
6dl Milk
3 eggs
sugar
salt
some grease to fry in (I prefer mixed oil and butter since it's easier than butter and tastes better than oil)
mix the flour and half the milk (it is easier to mix with less milk in the beginning)
add the rest of the milk
add the eggs
add a dash of sugar and a dash of salt
stir for a while, the longer the better
melt a very small amount of butter/oil in a frying pan of your size
pour a thin (about 1mm) layer of the mixture in the pan and let it cover most of the pan
turn when the whole mixture has turned solid, should be about 30-90 seconds depending on heat and thickness, medium temperature is usually the best, thicker pancakes means lower temperature, so it won't get burnt, and a lot longer time
about 30 seconds on the flip side and put the pancake on a plate to cool off
it is usually enough to add oil or butter for every second pancake, judge for yourself if it's greasy enough
enjoy with your choice of jam, sugar, syrup, ice-cream or other sweet stuff that you like (I prefer jam, strawberry or raspberry)
3dl Flour
6dl Milk
3 eggs
sugar
salt
some grease to fry in (I prefer mixed oil and butter since it's easier than butter and tastes better than oil)
mix the flour and half the milk (it is easier to mix with less milk in the beginning)
add the rest of the milk
add the eggs
add a dash of sugar and a dash of salt
stir for a while, the longer the better
melt a very small amount of butter/oil in a frying pan of your size
pour a thin (about 1mm) layer of the mixture in the pan and let it cover most of the pan
turn when the whole mixture has turned solid, should be about 30-90 seconds depending on heat and thickness, medium temperature is usually the best, thicker pancakes means lower temperature, so it won't get burnt, and a lot longer time
about 30 seconds on the flip side and put the pancake on a plate to cool off
it is usually enough to add oil or butter for every second pancake, judge for yourself if it's greasy enough
enjoy with your choice of jam, sugar, syrup, ice-cream or other sweet stuff that you like (I prefer jam, strawberry or raspberry)
Last night in Shanghai (3rd night in Shanghai)
Wenying was already home when I came back with the supplies, Linna had gone off to buy some bread since I finished the little they had that morning (they actually had Bregott and Hushållsost so I just had to eat some bread). I didn't start off directly, waited until around nine or something before I did it.
It was the first time in a very long time; I did it once this summer at home in Sweden but before that only twice in total in Chengdu. I had bought a new small frying pan since the ones they had weren't really flat and I worked with chopsticks since the other spades they have were way too thick.
Finally success, I'm pretty proud of myself actually, the pan was really awesome actually, easy to work with and nothing stuck to it at all. We sat down together for half an hour or so and finished up the pancakes with cheap Chinese strawberry jam and watched an episode of American Dad (rather Linna and I watched and Wenying was on the phone).
Good times, I can't wait until I get my own place in Hong Kong, I really miss having a kitchen.
It was the first time in a very long time; I did it once this summer at home in Sweden but before that only twice in total in Chengdu. I had bought a new small frying pan since the ones they had weren't really flat and I worked with chopsticks since the other spades they have were way too thick.
Finally success, I'm pretty proud of myself actually, the pan was really awesome actually, easy to work with and nothing stuck to it at all. We sat down together for half an hour or so and finished up the pancakes with cheap Chinese strawberry jam and watched an episode of American Dad (rather Linna and I watched and Wenying was on the phone).
Good times, I can't wait until I get my own place in Hong Kong, I really miss having a kitchen.
Monday, November 3, 2008
belittling
For some reason there are a lot of people, I should say some Chinese girls, that seems to think that I can't take care of myself. There are other things that make me feel that they are in a very extreme way underestimating me. I know that my friends only do what they think is best for me but I know that my friends only do what they think is best for me but I often feel like I'm treated like a 10 year old boy out on his own for the first time without mommy.
My first example is about my comfort levels; Wenying and Linna, especially Wenying, has seemed to be very worried about how I would feel staying in their apartment, the way she has been talking about it it has sounded like the worst little dump you could ever find. This is far from the truth; they have a quite big place; I'd say about 100-120sqm, two rather big bedrooms, a huge living room, a decent kitchen and a sizable bathroom with bathtub, western toilet and washing machine, plus a nicely sized balcony that they only use for hanging laundry. It's well furnished and clean, a bit messy though but what to do when you work 50-60 hours a week, which they both seem to be doing. My point is still that this place is probably nicer than mine and Kei's place in Sparta, even though we had some commodities like heating and insulation that every place under the 40th northern latitude in China seems to be lacking (basically anything South of Beijing). Linna explained this with that they had to make me have low expectation to give me a happy surprise.
The second thing is the over worrying, I have a mom to worry about me and she worries enough for everyone; so it annoys me pretty much when a friend I meet starts complaining about my sleeping and eating habits and tries to instruct me on how to live my life, I know that it is a lot healthier to eat regularly at fixed times, say breakfast 8am, lunch at noon and dinner at 6pm (sounds like I would go hungry for a few hours in the afternoon but that's something we get used to, isn't it?), and sleep at regular fixed times, from 11pm to 7am, or something like that. There is more to it though and this is a bit more abstract; it is a kind of feeling when you are with someone that they don't seem to think that you can't take care of yourself on your own, and since your mom is about 8000km away they want to take the role as your part time mom. For a Swedish guy (or girl for that matter) I haven't lived on my own for very long, I moved out from my parents' home when I was 23, still that is 5 years and before that I pretty much took care of myself since I went to high school and had to take responsibility for myself and what I did (it is not entirely true but at least it begins there and we gradually get more responsibility), this is excepting some elementary things like cooking, cleaning and doing laundry which are things that are picked up when needed.
Anyhow, my point is that I wouldn't go on my own to the other side of the world if I couldn't take care of myself in most expected and unexpected situation. This is not to say that I don't need help sometimes and admittedly it is sometimes only to make life a bit simpler but this is not the same thing as wanting constant help and worry about everything. I just want to say that if you want to treat someone as a child it is better if you either get a child to treat as such or make your own baby and let it grow into the child you need. I appreciate the thought behind it though.
My first example is about my comfort levels; Wenying and Linna, especially Wenying, has seemed to be very worried about how I would feel staying in their apartment, the way she has been talking about it it has sounded like the worst little dump you could ever find. This is far from the truth; they have a quite big place; I'd say about 100-120sqm, two rather big bedrooms, a huge living room, a decent kitchen and a sizable bathroom with bathtub, western toilet and washing machine, plus a nicely sized balcony that they only use for hanging laundry. It's well furnished and clean, a bit messy though but what to do when you work 50-60 hours a week, which they both seem to be doing. My point is still that this place is probably nicer than mine and Kei's place in Sparta, even though we had some commodities like heating and insulation that every place under the 40th northern latitude in China seems to be lacking (basically anything South of Beijing). Linna explained this with that they had to make me have low expectation to give me a happy surprise.
The second thing is the over worrying, I have a mom to worry about me and she worries enough for everyone; so it annoys me pretty much when a friend I meet starts complaining about my sleeping and eating habits and tries to instruct me on how to live my life, I know that it is a lot healthier to eat regularly at fixed times, say breakfast 8am, lunch at noon and dinner at 6pm (sounds like I would go hungry for a few hours in the afternoon but that's something we get used to, isn't it?), and sleep at regular fixed times, from 11pm to 7am, or something like that. There is more to it though and this is a bit more abstract; it is a kind of feeling when you are with someone that they don't seem to think that you can't take care of yourself on your own, and since your mom is about 8000km away they want to take the role as your part time mom. For a Swedish guy (or girl for that matter) I haven't lived on my own for very long, I moved out from my parents' home when I was 23, still that is 5 years and before that I pretty much took care of myself since I went to high school and had to take responsibility for myself and what I did (it is not entirely true but at least it begins there and we gradually get more responsibility), this is excepting some elementary things like cooking, cleaning and doing laundry which are things that are picked up when needed.
Anyhow, my point is that I wouldn't go on my own to the other side of the world if I couldn't take care of myself in most expected and unexpected situation. This is not to say that I don't need help sometimes and admittedly it is sometimes only to make life a bit simpler but this is not the same thing as wanting constant help and worry about everything. I just want to say that if you want to treat someone as a child it is better if you either get a child to treat as such or make your own baby and let it grow into the child you need. I appreciate the thought behind it though.
20% to boot.
While me and my friend was passing the time outside security check in the airport we started my laptop and looked at some photos for 15-20 minutes or so. After I left her and got through security I had to pass more time so I brought it up again and started up, I found it on 30% battery power left and a claim that it would last 11 more minutes, 2 more minutes and before whatever stuff had finished loading I tried to find the wireless network and my computer died, low power!
I don't know if it just is too much stuff happening, if my battery is singing on the last verse or a combination of it, either way it sucks.
I don't know if it just is too much stuff happening, if my battery is singing on the last verse or a combination of it, either way it sucks.
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