Bee Gee Confusion

Today S went back to work, so we were on our own. Feeling remarkably adventurous (bear in mind that the Carrefour is a 20-minute taxi ride away, and none of the taxi drivers speak English, and I hardly know my way from the house to the Estate entrance), I decided that we should go to the Carrefour and do some shopping. The Ayi had communicated to me (by giving me an instruction booklet, showing me a Carrefour carrier bag and making some wild sweeping movements) that she needed a hoover. Not a very big one, as the entire house is polished mahogany floorboards, with just the odd Chinese rug here and there.

So, with my shopping list (nescafe, fruit bread and hoover), off we went. The Security Guard calls the taxi, I show the taxi driver my piece of paper with Carrefour written on it in Chinese, and we're away. It was considerably quieter than it was last time we went, I suppose because it was during the week and most of the Chinese people are at work.

In the fruit and vegetable section, they seemed to be giving something away for free - within seconds, a huge queue of about 40 people had formed, all waiting patiently. At the weighing section, there was no such decorum however - whoever managed to shove their bananas on the scales first, got served first.

We got the hoover without any problem, and found our way outside to the taxi rank. I showed my 'Home' flashcard to the taxi driver (who looked remarkably like Maurice Gibb) but he just shook his head and started shouting. In a scene resembling the banana weighing of earlier, he was soon surrounded by at least 8 other taxi drivers, all jostling and shouting. I finally called S and he told me three Chinese words - Shin Son Loo. As soon as I said them to the taxi driver, there was instant calm, all the other drivers melted away, and we got home without incident. The three magic words? They turned out to be the name of the main road we live near.

Penny Farthings

Today has been another interesting day of settling in. We met with P, another of the relocation people assigned to help us. First stop was school, to get everyone kitted out in their uniforms. Very nice uniform, all navy and pale blue, very smart. D was not particularly impressed with the shorts he has to wear in summer, but he may change his mind when it gets to 37 degrees.

We went for lunch to a Chinese restaurant, this time there were no English translations on the menu, but P is Chinese and after some discussion about what we liked and didn't like, she ordered for us. We had crab omelette, prawns, potato salad in lemon mousse, spicy beef, and spring rolls. Watching D and J dive into this bizarre combination, using their chopsticks as if they'd been born to it (well, almost) - I couldn't have felt more proud.

Next stop was bikes - mine was 150 RMB (about 10 pounds), J's was 230 RMB (about 15 pounds), S's was 300 RMB and D chose a BMX at 800 RMB (51 pounds) - I thought this was extortionate but D assured me it would have been at least 150 pounds in England. Our final stop was the dentist and doctor for a tour of the facilities, then home. J spent the journey sitting with P, going through the Chinese phrasebook, learning the Chinese for I am 8 and I like Prawns.

That's Life

Today we are being taken to get D and J's school uniform, get bikes for everyone, and to find the doctor and dentist. It is a beautiful sunny day here, and as I was standing on my balcony earlier, looking towards the cream and pink buildings in the distance, I noticed a workman installing extra barbed wire along the top of the security fence that surrounds our estate.

M is for ....

We had lunch today at M on the Bund. The Bund is the famous Shanghai waterfront, and M is a restaurant on it, and according to the guidebook lunch there is an unmissable experience. According to our experience, it was entirely missable. The food was nice but nothing out of the ordinary, and the service was average. It might have been more exciting to sit outside, as then you would have wonderful views over the river and across to the Pearl Tower, but it was a bit cold for that today. I have already described the Pearl Restaurant near to where we live, but at the other end of the block, past the baker, the massage parlour and the 22 estate agents, is another restaurant called 7 Days. Their goal is to be the number one Western Restaurant. Therefore, their menu contains such things as pizza, pasta and steak, as well as other European dishes, and traditional Chinese dishes. Everyone who works there is so nice and polite and helpful, and so keen to get things 'right'. It's sometimes difficult I think - they must be attempting to cater for so many different traditions. My cafe au lait arrives, in a beautiful cup and saucer, with a lavish swirl of whipped cream - and topped with hundreds and thousands. Hardly British, but maybe entirely normal in Belgium. The Pork Chops I think I recognise as Weiner Schnitzel - certainly not Pork Chops as we know it. They have Ham and Pineapple Pizza, and Pepperoni Pizza, and Fresh Fruit Salad Pizza. We decided to leave the Pig's Claw for another day. But the chips are delicious!

Suspicious mind

Today we went to meet J's new (potentially) model agent. As I had found her on the internet -specifically on an expat website, advertising for Western child models - I was extremely wary, to say the least. We went with A. A works for some relocation company, and we have three 'free' days with her while she shows us what's what, and helps us in any way she can to settle in. I decided that it might be useful if she came with us on this occasion, to help us decide if everything appeared to be right or not.

As it turned out, the offices were lovely, complete with two studios, and it all looked extremly professional and above board. I knew that it would be a different experience here compared to England, but I wasn't quite prepared for how. B, the agent, told us that the children never work Monday to Friday - taking them out of school would be unthinkable. They don't go for castings - the companies choose who they want from the website. She doesn't bother with a contract as the children are not generally here long enough to make it worthwhile (and in England, the contracts only protect the agents anyway) - so J is free to work with any other agent if we wish. And B apologised for the fact that the pay is not so good here as in England - in fact, it's around half the English rate - except it's paid in cash, on the day. No waiting for 6 months here.

I wonder if Chinese child models are treated the same. I shall have to try and find out.

The Ironing Board

S has been used to having his washing done for him at the laundry in the apartment where he lived before. His socks came back beautifully pressed and folded, his shirts immaculate on hangers and sealed in polythene. However, our new Ayi doesn't seem to know anything about ironing. Washing - no problem - something goes in the washing basket and quite literally within the hour it has disappeared, only to reappear, nice and clean, the following day in a wardrobe somewhere (usually the wrong wardrobe, but that's another story). But poor S - his shirts are there, neatly hung in his wardrobe in an almost military fashion - but all creased. We searched the house from top to bottom for any sign of an iron or ironing board - nothing. So off we went to Carrefour to purchase the missing items. We left them in the hall and watched with interest to see what happened (remember the Ayi doesn't speak a word of English). They vanished, and appeared some time later in one of the bathrooms. They were still in their packaging. I was wondering if the Ayi actually knew what they were, or if I was going to have to explain somehow. I went to look at the ironing board, to see if it came with instructions. It was then that I noticed that although the majority of the packaging was in Chinese, there were some English translations for what I assume were its highlights. Here are the translations, word for word:

High Quality solidity substance
Using the new environmenting multiple board
Adjusting the high any time
Keeping the highest costuming est
Let them top grade

Good, that's all clear then.

The iron is Tefal, is in English, and makes much of its Extra Burst of Steam capabilities. I expect to walk in and find the Ayi cooking rice with it.

Pearl Restaurant

About 10 minutes walk away from where we live there is a new large block of shops and restaurants. It is still under development, but some of the shops and restaurants are already occupied. Tonight we went to one of the restaurants, Pearl Restaurant. There were two doormen to salute us as we entered. In the lobby, there is a large Tropical Fish display - it put Stapeley Water Gardens to shame. And these were just the fish on the menu.

We sat down, attended by at least 5 waiters and waitresses. I put my bag on the floor, and immediately, in one smooth movement, a waitress swooped down on it and picked it up, while simultaneously another waiter whisked out a chair apparently from thin air and slid it under my bag. So my bag spent the rest of the evening sitting next to me in a chair brought specially for it. I must be careful. It will be getting ideas above its station and expecting me to bring it chairs all the time.

The menu was helpfully in Chinese with English translations - and with pictures as well, just in case. There was Pig Bag with Mushrooms. The picture didn't really help much with that one. There was Pigeon in Casserole. The accompanying picture showed two whole pigeons, minus feathers, sitting in a soup bowl. They looked like they were sharing a hot tub, and to be honest, they were looking rather surprised. I assume this was because they weren't expecting anyone to take their picture at that rather inopportune moment.

The chicken's feet arrived. These were apparently an appetiser. S explained that you're supposed to suck the fat off them. I never knew chickens had fat feet. It sounded disgusting and didn't look terribly tempting, so I didn't partake. I know it's only a matter of time though! The remainder of our food arrived, and semed to be a mixture of things we had actually ordered and things we hadn't. There was some sort of seafood (squid possibly) with red peppers and mangetout, some lovely spicy chicken dish, beef (possibly) that was absolutely gorgeous, and pork (possibly) that may have been barbecued - but whatever it was, it was delicious. We also had beer and a bottle of red wine. The bill for 4 of us? 18 pounds.

Step Up, Step Up

There are several bathrooms in the house (three in fact), and one of them is en-suite. It is truly a stunning bathroom. There is a walk-in shower, that actually has two showers (in fact, I have just been to check and I think it really has four showers). Anyway, there is one which sprays water over your head in the normal fashion, and one which you can take down to spray water wherever you like, then the back of the shower has a number of jets so you can have water spraying all over you, and then there is another foot massager thing that also sprays water out of it. The whole shower cubicle thing has a deep solid base and a little seat so you can just fill it up and turn it into a mini bath to sit down in.

There is also a huge whirlpool bath, with digital controls so you can adjust the temperature and ferocity of the jets of water. The whirlpool bath is set into its own tiled unit, and has a step up to it. I'm sure if this bathroom were in England, Building Regulations would insist that the step was painted with a yellow stripe and there would be at least one "Mind the Step" sign. But as we're not in England, the step is tiled in the same deep glossy dark blue that the walls and floor are tiled in, and I keep tripping over it. I love it.

More reasons to shop at Carrefour

Carrefour is a big presence in Shanghai. I think they arrived early in the 1990's as the first Western Supermarket, and although there are others now, Carrefour is still the biggest and best-known, so that was the first supermarket I tried. S had described it to me as a sort of Chinese Asda, but I think that was possibly stretching a point. It was certainly huge, over two floors, with household goods, sporting goods (including bikes), every electrical appliance imaginable and clothes on one floor, and then food on the other. Although parts of the non-food floor could possibly be compared to an oldish Asda, the food floor was something quite different. For a start off, although they sell 'Western' food, the British are of course a small minority in Shanghai - so the majority of the Western food is American and Australian. So I am faced with things such as Kraft Miracle Whip, Kellogg's Apple Jacks and Nescafe 1+2 Instant Coffee Bag. The words are English, but somehow don't seem join together in any sensible way. There is of course a bakery section. And a fish mongery. Except the fish aisle is more like the Pondlife section of a Garden Centre - the fish are all in tanks, swimming around, and you pick your own. You can also pick your own Frog (yes, frog, they are all there, jumping around). You can also pick your own Turtle, they are all there too, climbing slowly over each other, in a sort of pointless fashion. They do of course have things cut up and ready-packaged in trays and cling-film. I bought a pack of 3 'Chicken Chests' for 66p. And a pack of 4 bread buns for 6p. And a Betty Crocker's Hershey Chocolate Fudge Cake Mix for 95p (which came with directions for baking the cake if you were at a High Altitude). There was also a Hot Deli aisle - except where Tesco would have 50 chickens being cooked in a big glass oven thing, Carrefour had 50 Ducks instead.

Having said all this, I did manage to buy lots of things. I found Lurpak butter and Nescafe coffee and lots of bread and chicken burgers and and yoghurts and orange squash and biscuits - all the normal things that fill my trolley each week - and I even found frozen chips (although the instructions are in Chinese, so I don't even know if they're oven chips - I assume not). The queue at the checkout was about 5 people long. The time it took for me to arrive at the front of the queue was 25 minutes. This gave me plenty of time to read (and write down) the Carrefour Price Promise. "If you find same item located in 3km around Gubei store, selling less expensive in the condition, we will refund the five time difference price to you!". It also gave all the Chinese people around me (I saw one Westerner the whole time I was in the store) plenty of time to stare interestedly and unashamedly into my trolley. Reason no 54 - no need to furtively peek into other people's trolleys - just stare as much and as long as you like.

Goodbye England, hello England

The journey from the airport to our new (as yet unseen) house was lovely but strange. It was a beautiful sunny day, and at that time in the morning, the roads of Shanghai were still relatively empty. Everything felt welcoming and familiar, but there was still a definite 'going on holiday' feel to everything. Arriving at the house was like arriving at a hotel. That was probably because it was roughly the size of a hotel. I was stunned. Although I had seen pictures, I wasn't prepared for this. It has been built in a curious split-level way, which results in there being 5 floors. Most of the ceilings (though not all) are probably 20 feet high. Every room has at least 3 light switches, while the living room has 15 I think - this is to control the wall lights, central lights, chandeliers, lamps, concealed lights, picture lights, spot lights...you get the idea. The furniture is about as far removed as you can get from the beech wood and pale lilac walls that are so trendy in England at the moment. It is all very heavy, carved, deeply polished mahogany, with red and gold Chinese upholstery and wall hangings at every opportunity. Probably not to everyone's taste, but I am in heaven!

S wanted to make sure that D in particular learnt straightaway that England (or at least reminders of England) were never too far away. So we had lunch in Pizza Hut, tea in TGI Friday's, and went to do some Western shopping in Carrefour. We all played Table Tennis in the garage on the newly installed Olympic Standard Table Tennis table. D and J watched an episode of Friends from the Complete Set of Every Friends Episode on DVD. Then they both played on the X-Box in the den. So, just like England really, except that our 3 course meal in Pizza Hut came to 14 pounds, the table tennis table cost 60 pounds (including delivery), the complete set of every Friends episode on DVD cost 15 pounds (yes - 15 pounds for the entire 10 series), and X-box games are 20p each.

Here I am at last

We arrived on Friday morning, Good Friday as it happened, at 6.15am Shanghai time, exactly on time. Not so our suitcases (all 75kg of them - how I escaped an excess baggage charge I will never know) - which apparently hadn't made the touch and go transfer from one plane to another at Copenhagen. We only just made it ourselves, having had to run - quite literally - from one end of Copenhagen Airport to the other. If there hadn't been trollies for the 30kg of Hand Luggage we had, we would never have made it. When we got there, the board actually said our flight was closing - I have no idea how long it would have waited for us, if at all. Especially with our luggage not being on the plane (though I didn't know that at the time, obviously). As it turned out, whoever it is that has been smiling down on us for the last three months was smiling down on us still - if our luggage had arrived with us, we would never have all fitted into the Buick that had come to collect us from the airport.

Looks like we made it

Yesterday was a day of highs and lows and somewhere-down-the-middles. The House Clearance people came to empty the house (on the right day, this time). I suppose this might have been a sad thing, but really, the house has been being emptied for the last three months, so it was no different. One of the men (the one who looked like Long John Silver) remarked that he had never seen so much computer equipment in his life. I can only assume he was referring to the carrier bag of Sega Megadrive games that was in the shed. It was certainly a good job he didn't see the house before all the computer equipment was sold, shipped or stored. Although they managed to take almost everything, they didn't quite manage to take the 20 or so wires that trailed from the computer room to the den (some sort of networking system I suppose). Luckily, I am very used to wires now. I gathered them all up and put them in the wheelie bin.

Somewhere in the middle of the day, a van marked "Agency Signs" arrived, and hammered in the Sold sign. The "O" in Sold has a little smiley face in it. It would have mirrored my sentiments better if the "L" had been leaping up and down shouting "Yippee!!!!!!"

At about 2.00pm, a car transporter appeared outside. I think all of us - but particulary B -had very happy memories of the jeep, it was certainly symbolic of all the good times we had during the two summers with the jet-skis. We all stood and watched as our little red jeep was driven on to the transporter. Mr Happy was still stuck on the dashboard, and the last we saw was him bobbing happily on his spring as the transporter drove away.

Today is my last day at work. It doesn't feel like my last day. It feels like a birthday. Such nice cards and presents - I'm so touched by the trouble people have gone to to put Chinese writing in my cards, and to get real Chinese money for my leaving present. People are so nice.

And now I must empty my desk, which I suppose is like emptying my house, except smaller. For Sale, some souvenir photos of rides on the Pleasure Beach, and a Principia System Administrator's Manual, unopened.

See you in Shanghai.

Let there be light (not)

I switched the light on in the computer room last night and all the lights in the house fused. I was extremely puzzled by this, as I'd have thought that the wiring system would fuse itself when there were 34 things plugged in (and this is 34 things in the computer room alone, remember) - not when there was absolutely NOTHING plugged in. I can only assume that the electricity in the house has got used to pacing itself, and all the little volts had somehow built up at the electrical equivalent to the door of the computer room, and were all crowding there with nowhere to go, shoving and jostling and elbowing each other and saying oy stop pushing at the back there, until the moment I switched the light on - there must have been a huge cheer as they all tried to rush through at once, at which point the Fuse in Charge shouted RIGHT that's ENOUGH and slammed the door. What the Electricity Meter is making of it all I just daren't imagine - it mustn't know if it's coming or going.

Packing Part 3 (at least)

I'm not sure what phase of Packing I'm at now, but at the weekend I actually had to start packing the suitcases. I have three large cases and between the three of us, 60kg luggage allowance. I had reasoned that since I had very few clothes to take (S had taken a lot of mine back with him on Saturday), and D doesn't have that many clothes, and J has lots of clothes but they are all very small, we would have plenty of room. But already the cases are full, they weigh a total of 57kg, and there still seems to be an awful lot of stuff around the house that I have now had to mentally mark as 'Hand Luggage'. This includes a large Photo Album, half my Doll's House Furniture and the Cuckoo Clock. I have no idea why I didn't pack all this into boxes when I had the chance. I think the next phase of Packing (whatever number that is) will probably be Unpacking What I've Already Packed and Wandering Round Wondering What To Do with it.

Squiggles, Sadly Missed

It has been a surreal final weekend. B arrived home from college on Friday to find the TV from the living room had gone. This apparently took him by surprise so much that (totally out of character) he shouted up the stairs "How much more of this house are you planning on selling?". Well, all of it actually. Poor B - he is clearly in denial. J however is not in denial at all, and so had her two best friends over for a farewell sleepover on Friday night. I can only recall how blissful D's sleepover was in comparison. The three of them ran riot all night, up till all hours, shouting and singing and chasing each other with lipgloss. Luckily, I fell asleep at 8.30pm and was oblivious to it all. For those of you still tut-tutting over my callous treatment of the hamster during its sale and subsequent departure two weeks ago, I feel obliged to point out that one of J's friends had presumably asked how it was. J came into the living room, and clearly puzzled, said "Where's the hamster gone?". I rest my case.

All Boxed in

Apologies for the lack of updates. This has been due to me spending all my lunchtimes this week filling in labels. Labels for all the packing crates I have spent the last month filling up. I have labels for TNT to tell TNT where the packing crates have come from (current address written out 30 times). I have destination labels, to tell someone (not sure who) what address the boxes are to go to. There is another space on each destination label for the address of the person who needs to be told (not sure by whom) that the boxes have arrived. This means I have written out our new address 60 times. There are also spaces on the destination labels to fill in our name, the destination city, the shipping reference number, a telephone number, a fax number and an email address. In order to fit all this information on, each destination label was 6 inches square. My roll of destination labels was over 15 feet long. And if this wasn't enough, I also had to write half of this out on the boxes themselves - TWICE - once on the top and once on the side. No wonder I am delirious.

My task last night was to stick all the labels on the boxes and seal them. I finally finished at 1.10am. But even then, I didn't quite dare to tape down the final (not quite full) box - just in case something that had to be packed might materialise overnight. Luckily, when I got back up at 5.10am, I had no such worries and stuck the lid down without a second thought. The boxes are due to be collected at 2pm this afternoon. Hopefully, by the time I get home, they will have all disappeared. For some reason, despite the yards of labels, I feel quite certain I will never see any of them again.

A week on Thursday

As S is on his way home this very minute, I do not have any news from Shanghai. Although, he did call me last night (7.00am Shanghai time) to tell me all the upstairs lights in the house had gone off. The downstairs ones were fine. The Hostess was on her way round to sort it all out.

As there are no other interesting updates, I have to return to this week's number one topic, packing. The den is completely full of boxes. There are more in the dining room, plus smaller boxes of books, stacked up 5ft high. I have one last box for Shipping, half full, and one last box for Air, also half full. Both these are for the last bits that need to go in this weekend. I also have to keep my fingers crossed that J's doll's house fits in a Packing Crate - if it doesn't, I'm in trouble. When I look at all the boxes, I'm a bit horrified about how many there are, considering we were supposed to be travelling light, but nevertheless - to reduce the contents of our entire house to 17 Packing Crates is something of an achievement.

I was hoping that now I'd filled the boxes, I could get a better idea of how much it was going to cost to send the Air consignment. I can get a rough idea by weighing the boxes - it's £2.50 per kg if more than 100kg is being sent. I don't need to worry about sending 100kg - our DVD collection alone weighs more than that. I bought some bathroom scales last week to weigh the boxes on (what with throwing my other ones away 2 months ago).

However, when I set about weighing the boxes, it became apparent that this might not be as straightfoward as I had originally anticipated. I heaved the the first box on to the scales. The box was so big, it completely covered the scales and I couldn't read the display. I tried moving the box further to the edge, but then it was resting on the floor and appeared to weigh 2kg. The next solution was for me to weigh myself, then stand on the scales holding the box, see how much I weighed now, then subtract the first figure from the second to get the weight of the box. I'm sure this would have worked well, had I been able to stand there calmly holding a packing crate while checking my weight. I couldn't even lift it off the floor. I can't even check if I've obeyed the MAXIMUM 35KG rule. I tried to get B to do it (he had brought most of the boxes downstairs for me in the first place) but he is sensitive about his weight (my side of the family have very heavy bones) and refused point blank.

So, the boxes all sit there expectantly, their weight as secret as mine, waiting for Thursday when their journey to Shanghai begins - just 7 days before mine does.

Crossed Wires

One of the things I'm not sure of is how much our electricity bill will be in Shanghai. Apparently, our house has 8 Air Conditioning Units, an industrial sized Tumble Dryer and a freezer larger than the one Morrisons keeps its chips in. S informed me that the electricity used by an Air Conditioning Unit makes a Tumble Dryer seem like a nightlight in comparison. In fact - never mind Shanghai - I have spent many happy hours here in England puzzling over how our electricity bill can be £270 a quarter. I had put it down to my own extravagant use of the washing machine, but when I ventured into the den during the course of Packing, things became clearer.

I should explain that the den was not a room I went in often, it being full of things for boys. But it started about two months ago when I remembered the Beer Fridge and went in to have a look at it. I decided at the time that it wasn't worth keeping it going for the one bottle of Bud that was embedded in the ice, so I unplugged it and promptly forgot about it. When I was mopping up the flood the following day, it didn't seem like a good time to start interfering with electricity, so I didn't touch anything else. Nothing changed until 3 weeks later, when I unplugged the large synthesiser thing to go to its new home. Then went the piano (electric of course). Behind the piano was a socket. I carefully took the plug out, and when nothing happened (i.e. the house didn't blow up) my confidence increased and I was off. I was like a woman possessed, eyes flashing and hair standing on end, unplugging wildly. TVs, DVDs, hi-fi's, computers, X-boxes, Playstations. Boxes I couldn't even identify. Plugs that didn't even seem to lead anywhere. Extension Leads plugged into other Extension Leads.When finally everything was unplugged, I stood back to survey the scene.

I have never seen so many wires in my entire life. Black wires of course. But there were blue wires, grey wires, white wires, green wires, dark red wires, all with various things on the end - some I recognised as Scart things (which is where my knowledge of wires ends), some with what looked like telephone sockets on the end, some with yet another set of wires sprouting out the end. Some with plugs on one end. Some with no plugs on either end. Some with bobbles on. Some with double bobbles on. The permutations were endless. I'd put them on a For Sale List if only I knew what to put in the description. "Wire. Blue. With Bobble".

As it is, they are now all in a large packing crate, waiting for S to come home and identify them all. I wonder, if leaving a TV on standby overnight uses enough electricity to boil a kettle, how much electricity did it take to keep that little red light glowing on the end of 8 Extension Leads?

Luckily, I don't have time to worry about it anymore. Not so for the poor person who monitors National Grid Usage for our town - he'll be scratching his head and wondering how their Consumption Estimates for March 2005 were so wildly incaccurate.

Holding On

S is quite touched that our Host and Hostess are looking after him and the house so well. However, it appears to me from 6000 miles away, that since they designed the house themselves, no doubt supervised every last detail during its construction, and finally furnished it so lovingly and lavishly, they are actually having real trouble letting go of it. I fully expect that when I get there in two weeks time, they will have decided that it's not worth going back to their own house each evening, and will have moved into the spare room.

It's the thought that counts

The war is over and the Hostess won. It would appear that the Chicken Soup Incident was the final straw - the Ayi was simply not up to the high standards demanded by our Hostess. The Hostess phoned S at work to let him know that she'd fired the Ayi, and until such time as a suitable replacement could be found, she would be assuming the role of Housekeeper herself.

S was more than a little worried by this, as he'd decided that morning that the best way to keep the Ayi happy would be to give her some work to do. With this in mind, he had carefully spilt sugar in the kitchen, scattered toast crumbs in the hall, strewn his bedcovers everywhere and left his clothes all over the floor. As a final piece de resistance, he had squirted toothpaste all over the bathroom mirror. The last thing he was expecting was for the Hostess to turn up at her pristine house and have to witness the results of his wanton destruction. I only wish I could have been there to see him miming his way out of THAT one.

I'm still Packing

but meanwhile in Shanghai, the war between the Hostess and the Ayi rumbles on. The Chicken Soup that the Ayi had prepared for tea - the Hostess actually took it away from S while he was eating it and chucked it in the bin. Very odd really, considering it was the Hostess that suggested this particular Ayi in the first place. Perhaps she should have checked out the MSG levels in the Chicken Soup before making rash recommendations.

At 9.00pm, much to S's alarm, the Hostess disappeared upstairs. Upon further investigation, S discovered her running his bath. He stood uncertainly for a moment, wondering if she would leave the room while he undressed, or whether scrubbing your new tenant's back was par for the course in China. It subsequently became apparent (and fortunately before he actually removed any clothes) that she was only demonstrating the intricacies of the Whirlpool Bath. After drawing all the curtains for him to indicate it was his bedtime, she went home.

S is desperately trying to manage without cutlery and other basic English items, preferring to wait till we all arrive so we can go shopping for these things together. He manages to stir his tea with a chopstick, but apparently buttering his toast with one is not so easy.

Late update - the Host popped round this morning to collect a book he'd left, and washed the dishes while he was there.

No time for a title

I'm afraid updates to my blog have fallen victim to the fact that at the moment, time is of the essence, and I have no time. I knew that the weekend just gone was effectively the last weekend I would have to get the packing done. At 5.00pm on Saturday, I actually felt a rising sense of panic as I looked at everything I still had to do, and thought I simply don't have enough hours left to do it in. I carried on until 11.00pm. I woke up at 6.35am on Sunday morning, and remembering it was Mother's Day, lay there for a minute considering the likelihood of breakfast in bed. I decided that although the likelihood was good, I couldn't really lie there for 5 hours waiting for it to arrive, so I got up and carried on. By 6.00pm Sunday, 12 packing crates and 7 book boxes later, I began to feel as if I was back on track. Enough of packing.

Of more interest is that S moved into our house over the weekend. The Ayi was to arrive at 8.00am this morning, so, not wishing to offend her, he tidied up before she came. This didn't leave her a great deal to do, so to ensure she wouldn't get bored, he showed her his DVD collection and the X-box. No doubt by the time I arrive she will have got her day sorted, movies in the morning and Fifa 2005 in the afternoon. The only modification she will need to make to this routine will be to lift her feet up so I can hoover underneath them.

Our Host (or Hostess perhaps) has also been on-hand to ensure S's first day in the house runs smoothly. The Ayi had prepared Chicken Soup for tea, but the Hostess wasn't impressed. She has also been round, tidying up (for I assume the third time in the day), and redoing everything the Ayi had already done. Let's hope they come to some agreement before I get there - otherwise it will be like living with two warring mother-in-laws. I will be looking for a job to get me out the house.

Linda's theory of arrivability

This is a very exciting time in my life. At least, I think it is. Unfortunately, I don't have time to stop and think about how exciting it is. I wouldn't necessarily say I'm stressed, I've done everything I can to avoid any stress, but there are just so many things to think about. Every day without fail, something arrives from the Solicitor relating to the sale of the house - another document to sign, another question to answer, or a request for yet another cheque. On average, I think each letter he sends takes me around 25 minutes to deal with - from hunting for some old Water Rates Bill to filling in a form about who paints the fence (Answer - everyone except us).

I also have my For Sale lists to think about. Although this has been a remarkably easy way to empty the house, I still end up worrying. Will all the TVs I've sold work properly? Was I right to sell the rare Beatrix Potter ornament? Where is the tiddlywink from DB's Air Hockey set?

Mr and Mrs J (the purchasers of our house) are coming round tonight to see what I'm leaving. I've told them I'm leaving the carpets, curtains and light fittings. They were concerned in case I was taking the shed. The shed? Give me a break, Mr and Mrs J.

I'm in the middle of packing too. Another reason for sleepless nights. One website recommended that I carry irreplaceable items like jewellery and photos with me. No need to worry about the jewellery since everything I own is on me already. But photos? I'd need a whole suitcase just for the loose ones. And given how easy it is for your suitcase to end up in Madrid when you're going on holiday to Turkey, I daren't think about the chances of my tea chests making it to Shanghai all by themselves.

I have devised a complex mental formula relating to packing. It involves taking the value of the item (sentimental plus monetary), dividing that by the ease of replacing it in China should it get lost (on a scale of 1 to 10), and then multiplying it by the likelihood of it actually turning up in Shanghai. This is where it gets tricky as I don't really know the likelihood of it turning up in Shanghai. Is it more likely to get lost in the sea? Or in the sky? Or even in my suitcase? Who knows. I have a roll of bubble wrap that began as the size of a tractor tyre. When I started packing, I had a theory that there was no such thing as using too much bubble wrap. Until that is that I remembered that goods travelling by air are charged by weight or volume, whichever is the greater. So, something that cost £2, was made in China and weighs an ounce, but was given to me by my great grandmother and is therefore now encased in two metres of bubble wrap, would cost me £32 to get it to Shanghai by plane. So am I better off sending it on the boat? But if I send it by boat, I won't see it for three months. Can I manage without it for three months? When did I last look at it? Two weeks ago? Or five years ago when I packed it into the box it's already in? With all this to think about, no wonder phase 2 - PACKING - is such a nightmare.

I have written all this about just a couple of the things I have to think about. There are hundreds more. But whenever it starts to get overwhelming, I stop, and remember that I now only have two weeks and six days left before everything will be done and I'll be on the plane with nothing more to worry about. Unless there's an e-mail from DB waiting for me when I get there, querying his missing tiddlywink.

What's in a name?

One of the worse things I have had to do in the course of emptying the house is to find new homes for all the pets. Considering I am not an animal-lover by any stretch of the imagination, I don't know how I've accumulated so many. The hamster was unceremoniously included on For Sale List 5, between the Cherished Teddy Money Box and the 4 M&S Wine Glasses. In an effort to stop people thinking I was completely heartless, I hastily made up a hamster name to include on the list. So Squiggles was born. Let's hope none of my children ever run into the hamster's new owner.
"Ah yes, Squiggles is fine".
"Who?"

The cat is going to my mother's. There's a journey I'm really looking forward to. My mother only lives 10 miles away, but on trips to the vet, the cat is violently sick before we've turned out the road. Wonderful.

Half the fish have been transported already to their new home. I assume they all made it. I'm just waiting for G to bring a cool box in to work (I had three, but they're all sold now) then I can give him the rest. I hope I don't get stopped for speeding that day. "Well Officer, I have a Tiger Barb here that needs to get to work. It's in a cool box here". The Tiger Barb will sit there looking uncomfortable, pretending it has nothing to do with him.

You would think that another pet would be the last thing I'd want. And you'd be right. Unfortunately, S has other ideas and phoned me this morning in great excitement to tell me he'd bought a talking bird. We had birds once before, until someone left the cage door open and they all flew away. I recalled the nightmare of bird food all over the carpet, the constant squawking, and cleaning out the disgusting cage. "Don't worry," said S, happily. "It lives outside, and anyway - the Ayi will look after it." This sounded more like it. "And - the best thing - it talks in Chinese!! It can say Hello, Welcome and How are You!" This is more than I can say in Chinese. I thought about it some more and came to the conclusion that it sounds like an ideal pet - it doesn't need me to look after it, it can teach me Chinese, and if all else fails I can call it Char Sui and put it on List 17.

Miles and miles

My car went onto 45,000 miles this morning - not bad considering it's only 13 months old. Although it's probably fair to say that 5,000 of those miles have been done by B since passing his test 10 days ago ("Just going for a drive...")

I have just calculated that since working here, I have travelled well over a quarter of a million miles up and down the M6, spent around 6,000 hours sitting in my car, and filled up with nearly 9,000 gallons of petrol.

This morning was a good example of a typically horrible journey to work. I joined the M6 at J18 at 5.25am. It was pitch black, pouring with rain and nose to tail with lorries. Just getting onto the motorway is dicing with death. I could see the overhead gantry flashing a warning in the distance. This Driver Information System appeared with much fanfare about two years ago, and usually has such vital displays as "Don't Drive Tired", "Make Time for a Break" and "Spray - Slow Down". It's not always easy to read the last one through the spray though. I've never seen "Rita from Rochdale Will You Marry Me", but I'm sure it's only a matter of time. However, this morning it was grimly advising that the motorway was shut at Junction 33. Not a problem for me since I leave at Junction 32, hooray. I aquaplaned happily onwards.

Thelwall Viaduct reopened four weeks ago, having been shut since October 2001. This is a double-edged sword, as it simply means that the Highways Agency is now able to start all the other roadworks that have been put on hold for the last three years. Already, I have two lots of narrow lanes and cones on my journey to work, with at least four other yellow signs at various locations brightly advising me that Road Works Start Here on 7th March, Long Delays Expected. I'm hoping that the delays will be to the start of the roadworks, so they don't start till after I've gone.

I thought I might video my journey to work one morning. Then, if I ever forget how the journey was, I will be able to relive the experience whenever I like. But somehow, I can't imagine that I'll be in any hurry to clock up 75 virtual miles on the M6 - even from 6,000 miles away.