Generators whining, hydraulics wheezing and bucking diggers whinnying, our lane-way was torn to shreds on Friday afternoon and rebuilt within a few hours by a beautifully orchestrated team of professionals operating plant and equipment of a dizzying variety.
The tell tale white spray-painted characters appeared on the bitumen surface mid-week and come Friday afternoon as we made our way home after a long week, the assembled machinery was huffing into life and champing at the bit to get started. Within minutes the first three machines began, quickly joined by another two. I'd never seen such a beautifully synchronized operation of heavy plant: the diggers ducked and weaved under the buckets of the bulldozers, the bitumen lifters buzzed and burrowed along the edges of the tarred surface and the brutish drill-pounders did their hammering and screeching in between and around the others. You can check out the action above (with a slightly miffed Cassy picking her way through to our front door near the end!), or here later on.
Cass was book-clubbing later in the evening over at the quite wonderful Italian authenticity of "Osteria", Dazhi branch. The Italian chefs again dazzled the group with their offerings, even serving picky eaters selections from off the menu. The big occasion was the unveiling of the very new baby, Garth III, of their newest member, Stacey. She works at the pseudo embassy downtown, so she's been a great addition giving a non-school perspective of all that's happening. Her baby is incredibly cute but just a couple of weeks old, already is mirroring his rather tall parents with long fingers and toes!
On Sunday, we decided to venture down to the quasi-outdoors restaurant and market complex nestled round the back of the old Yuanshan soccer stadium. We started to get a strange sense as we approached the station and nearly everyone on the train looked set to disembark! We shuffled along in the slow moving crowd as the MRT ushers urged all and sundry to take time and take care. Eventually we were disgorged into the Yuanshan Park where there were tens of thousands of people in a crush of strident music, balloon animals, screaming kids and general lantern pandemonium! Oh, no, someone had forgotten to check the calendar and we'd arrived at the epicentre of the Lantern Festival on the middle weekend on an unseasonably fine, warm and sunny day!
The lanterns were pretty cool and, as always, we were astounded at the intricacy of the designs and the painstaking hours of toil that must have been necessary to create them. Nonetheless, we were on a different mission and we had to formulate a plan to edge round the periphery of the main mass of humans to get to our preferred destination. We tracked up through a corridor of least resistance before taking a classic "locals' knowledge" shortcut behind the complex, beside a spurting fountain attended by squealing kiddies as the jets bubbled and burst at random all around them, a manicured park and a little Chinese bridge beside a rocky outcrop, before finally getting to the back entrance of the restaurant area.
We decided to forgo our regular "Three Kings" English pub and try the Argentinian "Gaucho's" instead. We'd eaten an unremarkable meal here previously but wanted another try. As it turned out, we again choose strangely: I'll definitely go for some of their grilled meats next time as, on the way out, the cook invited me into the smoking BBQ area to take a photo and those sizzling steaks looked really scrumptious! Cassy did a slightly better job than me of choosing but I don't know why we ordered spaghetti (Cass) and fried chicken (me) in an unashamedly meat grilling heaven.....oh well, we'll have to try again!
We wandered through the sophisticated bespoke clothing and craftware market area on the way back to the main park. There is an ever increasing, eclectic mix of goods available here, everything from vintage style "Grandma" wear, to trendy hand crafted hats and clothing, to paper models and fixed gear hand-made bikes and seemingly everything in between. Again, we took little detours to avoid the huge press of people and admired the fairy tale lights of the main lantern area from "afar": Cass said it was a far more romantic view like that and I tend to agree....squirmy hordes of kiddies enraptured with colour and movement in enclosed spaces with no chance of a quick escape? Rhetorical! We did, however, dive into either end of the slightly less populated avenue of entries to the lantern competition...various schools and community groups have obviously been doing nothing else for a few months judging by the detail and workmanship in evidence!
Using a little local dexterity again, we sneaked around to the back entrance of the station to escape the stagnant lines of people trying to get onto the upper platforms from the usual and obvious station entrance. Soon whisked away home, we had a pleasant end to the weekend by relaxing with some quality TV to prepare for another busy week ahead (evidenced by the fact I didn't have a spare second to devote to "blog duty" yesterday.
Photos: fancy car with no parking sign, lights and lanterns celebrating the end of Chinese New Year, the lantern festival and Gaucho's. The spectacular shot of the plane skimming above the crowd was taken with me listening to the plane coming from behind, lining up the shot, then Cass calling, "Now!" just before it flew overhead!