I had a very different iced coffee the other day when I was with my friend Chynna,…….I don’t normally have milk but it was a very different experience to have ice cube coffee and so you pour the hot milk over the cubes and enjoy. Not something I would rush back to have  to in a hurry but every so often would be acceptable………..

Iced Coffee

It was just a quiet drink,

That’s what we said,

And before you know it,

My wallet’s dead,

A collection of glasses,

The proof of the night,

Am no looking forward to the morn,

‘Cause right now I feel like shite,

When I surface, the sun is up,

Scratching my een,

I’m scared to move,

The lump in my throat so far unseen,

One helluva drooth,

The body aches,

My heid is nippin’,

Fuck’s sake,

The alcohol, the Trojan horse,

Creator of so much discourse,

My world is spinning,

Vertigo abounds,

Stomach heaves and hits the ground,

I remember that curry,

Gees it back,

Gees some Bru,

To ease the fact,

The cure of all cures,

This sacred drink,

I need another slug ah canny think,

Ach that’s better, I feel brand new,

A greasy breakfast and then off to the loo,

Getting blootered is way more fun,

But in the morn you see the sun,

Jesus Christ just give me a break,

I’ll no do it again, please for fuck’s sake,

I promise I’ll drink water or lemon and lime,

Or Angostura bitters will do just fine,

Nae mair booze, fur me that’s it,

I’m too old for this game am a drunkin’ git,

Hanging off the bar, just like big Ian before,

Waffling on every night, what a fuckin’ bore,

It’s time to quit; I can do this now,

I have the will power; I’ll show you how,

A month has passed I’ve lost 5 kilo,

My wallet is happy and I feel more mellow,

I even can remember what I did last night,

A novelty you know, the booze is a blight,

But I enjoyed it at the time, but those days are gone,

So now I can laugh at others while I stay strong,

And so it’s been nearly two weeks and the VPN issue is still an issue. I’ve sent numerous emails to the software manufacturer but maybe they are not getting them or they just don’t care, either way it is a bloody inconvenience. Has anybody out there used Bing, Microsoft’s poor excuse for a search engine………I think I still prefer Alta Vista………..is it still around?

Altavista

I sometimes will use Yahoo, but even that is becoming harder to contact, the noose around the country is tightening slowly day by day and the information and options are becoming less. I like to be connected to the outside world; I don’t want to be stuck in this bubble that is China. It’s not so much that I am angered, “Like how dare you China?” it’s just so fucking frustrating when you are trying to do the most simple of tasks or searches to find a simple grammar point to use in a lesson or check what the weather is doing tomorrow or today for that matter. The local search engine “Baidu” is basically useless, unless you are searching local content and there is not much local content that I wish to search for. Both phones run a lot slower here as I’ve mentioned before. When you get outside of China it feels like you have the full use of your body again, inside the firewall we are all handicapped and fed a diet of Soylent Green direct from the massive propaganda machine.. There are many things I enjoy about China, I do like living here but this is way more annoying than having a mosquito in your room.

At the end of the year or the beginning of next year I will go back to the UK briefly and see what the wind brings. I might apply for another visa for here or what I would really like to do would be to spend some time in the UK, but then it comes down to money. Maybe I could get some work there but what would I do? Even if I got a job would I be able to live there and pay the bills, I doubt it. After being away for such a long time I think it would be very difficult to step back into a job and a lifestyle in the real world. Before I leave here I wish to travel and look at the more remote places, Gansu province looks fascinating and I would give you pictures but can’t get online. Yunnan and Sichuan are also on the agenda, either way I need to have a change. I enjoy living in the centre of the city for the access to everywhere but I would rather spend more of my time away from the maddening crowds.

Today I am having a quiet day because the body is tired after yesterday’s adventure out at Lingyenshan. My legs are a bit weary and I really just want to stay at home, read my book, write some words on the computer. My flat mate has just come home and she can see that I am working on the computer but that does not stop her from playing her music loud…no…..if I do that I get told off, but then again I don’t do that because I am aware of what she is doing and out of respect I keep quiet. Chinese people are not aware of others most of the time and so they go about their business focused on what they are doing and don’t consider others. You have to guilt them into making them aware, maybe a dirty look, a shake of the head, sometimes I shout “You fucking idiot!” that makes me feel better at least and sometimes they even understand. Thank goodness their English lessons start from such a young age.

I use this behaviour against them sometimes because some days I wake up and I am just a fucking nasty bastard that thinks revenge is on the cards today. When the metro stops you just know that there will be someone waiting to get on that won’t wait for you to get off and so it’s a shoulder charge as I alight. Walking in front of the bikes and cars when I have the green man, although you do have to be a bit more careful when playing this game of chicken. The phone zombie walking down the street that suddenly changes direction and is now on a direct collision course with me, I stay online and wait the outcome. All very childish I know but it makes me feel that I might also be educating each and every one of them if they just take a moment to consider why this crazy old man did what he did. Alas thinking for your self is not really an option for many, they do what they do because this is what they have learned from the previous generation and at school To them this behaviour is perfectly acceptable and they don’t understand what I’m doing either………….but every so often a glimmer of hope in the society emerges and you will see that there are a few that can think for themselves but they keep it hidden and only really reveal themselves when they are with a kindred spirit. But some days they are few and far between. It’s the same with my flat mate, she also has these moments where she can see the effect her behaviour is having and will change but today is not one of those days and so I have come into my room out-of-the-way and locked myself in my cave to get away from the constant level of noise that seems to go with life in China.

This is why I seek out the country side or go to the lakeside to get away from the noise and the chaos, to have a place where my mind can be empty of any other distractions, distractions which I am having less and less tolerance for. And so I guess I’m saying that at the moment China is getting on me tits and maybe it’s time to leave this place for a while and recharge the batteries or maybe I will return to China but to a different location, find pastures new and go exploring in another part of this huge country, after all there is a lot of it to see. But then there is the added challenge of getting settled again which is not something I look forward to. Maybe a long holiday is the best thing for now because it’s not all bad. Maybe they won’t renew my visa.

Mind you today the pollution is high and although it’s great that I don’t have to wear sunscreen because it’s blocking the UV, I think my lungs are protesting a little due to the amount of sputum I’m bringing up. So China has many challenges and today I feel that they are all coming to me at once and when you put them all together it makes me question why I am here.

30 years ago today, the big bash in the square,

Thousands of people were there,

Shouting and chanting give thought a chance,

Change is in the air I feel it in my water,

But after a few weeks the boss was pissed off,

And said Tanks for the memories but you need to go,

They swept in shooting, cleaning, pushing to and fro,

Many fell and then the death knells toll,

The lifeless bodies crushed and broken,

And after 30 years it’s never spoken,

About the day that hope died,

But many people could not believe, many cried,

Now it’s a myth a rumour, a cancer, a tumour,

That’s been cut from the body to keep it healthy,

Keep the sheep in the dark, let them get wealthy,

Will they every know, do they really care,

Now is important, the price has been paid.