Visiting God Parents and Parents

After lunch and a quick rest, we went downtown to visit Vicky's godparents.  Dr. He was Vicky's mother's middle school classmate, and he and his wife looked after Vicky a lot while she was growing up.  Their apartment was in an older part of the city and getting to the apt was interesting.  It included a walk up a 2 storey ramp around the edge of the building and then climbing to the 5th floor.  Downtown apartments are not as secure so we had to pass through an outer gate before entering their door (downtown apts also had cages on their balcony to prevent thieves).  Their daughter and her family live exactly two floors below them, so we got to visit everyone.

The next stop was Vicky's parents apt.  Sorry, but I don't have photos of people here.  Vicky's mom had cleaned (part of the new year ritual is you sweep out all the bad stuff from the year before) and had decorated with fresh flowers.  There we met up with Tiger's parents (Tony and Queenie) and we shared a family meal - Hot Pot, with a type of seaweed soup.

Hot Pot is a type of thin soup with tofu and water chestnuts boiling in it, then you cook fish balls, chicken and beef in the pot and share them.  Tony brought along a bottle of Cognac and was teaching me Chinese drinking etiquette.  He also gave me a bottle of Bai Jiu which the Chinese call "white wine" but I understand is more of a form of concentrated moonshine (yes CONCENTRATED).  Vicky promptly confiscated that.

One interesting aspect of the meal was that everything had an explanation... you eat this for long life, and eat that together so you'll stay together, then eat something else for good health, etc.  After a couple of glasses full of Cognac, it became easier to eat whatever was put in front of me.  I was, however, still able to stand for the trip to the flower street.