A few sweaty hours and a thunderstorm later, Seantay and I were less keen to go. When Celina phoned us with two hours' notice, we expressed our weather concerns. Violent thunderstorm? Park? Don't worry, said Celina. You don't have to take the bus. We'll pick you up.
Great! So Seantay and Celina and I climbed in the back of Aiden's father's car at around 5:30 PM, with Aiden acting as our tour guide. ("This... is... Zhongshan Road!") Aiden's father and mother speak little English so Celina came with us on this venture. Aiden's father has a golden cell phone and plays children's English music even when Aiden isn't in the car. Aiden's mother has reddish-brown hair and is very motherly (as we will see later).
Yes so a brief, maybe twenty-minute drive later we were in Nanlang, Sun Yatsen's home village, "near the sea." It's just one of those things where we have no idea where we're going, what we'll do when we get there, who will be there, and when we will ever get home. It's China.
We end up at a damp seafood restaurant, standing around talking about low tide and avoiding puddles while Aiden zips around us on his scooter and flees from the live trussed crab Celina and Aiden's mother are playing with. Presently we sit down to dinner. This is our cast of characters this evening:
THE GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL: I'm convinced that our perfectly circular table had a head and that he sat in it. We were continually reminded of his greatness with words like "leader," "number one," "business trip--many American cities," etc. He asked if we wanted forks and laughed at my sorry food efforts directly across.
THE GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL'S WIFE: She had cute shoes.
THE ONLY ONE WHO SPOKE ENGLISH, REALLY: Team Glasses!
HIS WIFE: Also Team Glasses.
CELINA: In the continuous battle of Cantonese vs. Mandarin, Celina is the casualty, but she's a good sport. She watched us muddle through the evening amused, occasionally kindly interpreting or explaining or interfering (Celina, thank you for rescuing me from the ginger).
THE "WOMAN DOCTOR:" Occasional member of Team Glasses. I liked her.
CHINESE SASQUATCH: The woman doctor's hubby. He was taller than me and big, with a bristly gray beard and deep growly voice. He was a crab pro, I tell you.
The dinner began with red wine ("Are you sure?" "Yi dian dian?" "No, thank you") but it didn't stop there. In addition to the whole-table toasts starting and ending the meal (the "clink of the wine glasses and "clunk"of the Coke cans), every minute or so someone would stand up, walk over to the other side of the table, and Cheers! their friends over there. Freak. "Celina," we said, "?!" Celina: "It is the culture of alcohol."
The fare was typically Chinese and seafoody for the first bit: shrimp, chicken head, pork ribs (with INSANE quantities of ginger), small fish, eel-fish, more fish... and then they brought out the crab. A whole crab. Our earlier playmate's older brother, pink and legs in the air. Apiece.
I was at a loss. I'd never really eaten crab before and now here this was staring at me and I hadn't a clue how to eat it, let alone with my bare hands. Bless Aiden's mother. She had come to help Aiden with his food and instead helped me with mine. (And it wasn't just the crab. This dinner, my chopstick abilities were shot all to heck. I had a waitress offer me a fork, for crying out loud. Never in five months had this happened!)
But anyways. So there I am, trying to eat this crab barehanded and struggling while the Chairman of Nanlan or whoever he is is laughing at me from across the table, fighting Aiden's mother for what's left of my dignity dripping crab brain? all over myself and struggling to slurp crab juice out of a gnarly pincher the size of my nose and the Chinese Sasquatch asking me at random "Shi bu shi?" and I haven't the slightest what about, when I look over and there's Seantay, eating crab like popcorn, chatting up the businessman and politician in two languages, helping Aiden to eat and not wreak havoc with his spoon, and beaming away all the while. The girl is crazy amazing. She just thrives.
I survived, and not-so-discreetly used an entire pack of tissues trying to wipe the brain off my fingers before The Man pointed me to the bathroom ("Xi shou jian"). Strange I didn't notice it before, what with Aiden peeing in there door ajar.
After the never-ending bowls of yuntun (one, fine, two, a misunderstanding, three? post-meal?) and some watermelon with our final toast, we headed to the parking lot to thank Mr. Government Official and debate how tall I was. 1.7 or 1.8 meters was the consensus, last I understood. Seantay somehow ended up with the leftovers and we spent the ride home playing the name game with Aiden's parents. "Father Aiden" was what Aiden's father chose for himself, while Aiden's mother insisted on knowing the meaning of every nomer we proffered, despite explaining several times that English names 没有意思. Somewhere around the Mary-Mindy-Mandy series she caved, however, so we'll see if "Mandy" sticks. Thus ended the four-hour adventure, and we still have leftover crab in our fridge.
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