BADGER IN CHINA part 1

The following was written by Badger from Ireland.

O.K it's a monsoon out there today, supposed to be Summer, its bucketing down so no work in the garden, so sorry but as a request for a story has been put forward I will succumb.

China, what an amazing place! I was captivated when I was at school, probably the only subject that inspired me, like another contributor here, my life at school sucked, to use a modern term, but it was no good for me, that can be another story later.

One of the things I was required to do was a project involving a manufacturing process, we had 3 weeks in which to complete it, it started slow, like my brain, just could not think of a subject that I had knowledge of. The teacher was not best pleased that at the end of the allotted time I got zero marks, had no work, but he did show his appreciation, he gave me 500 lines as a gift, and a ruler across the knuckles five times,, this of course spurred me into activity, Mum wanted to know how I got the injury, and why I had 500 lines. ( Those that don't know what 500 lines are,, you have to write out a sentence related to your crime 500 times ). 

When she found out, she called Dad from the garden and showed him, he went ballistic, ( not his fault,, another story ) . He marched me to the teachers house, and confronted him, but got no satisfactory answer, but he did get a sneer.  I blinked and missed the action, the teacher was laying on the floor spark out, boy did I get some satisfaction from that.

I was a little nervous seeing him for my next lesson, but he was really nice and encouraged me to try my project again, I think it was a ploy to occupy me while the rest of the class progressed onto other work that baffled me, so I went to the library and found this book on China, and was mesmerised, and spent hours trying to read it, no not in Chinese, in English, my reading ability and maths was shocking for a boy of 14. However this book had my attention and I produced a project based on China tea, it was mainly a large sheet of cardboard with a pictorial display of the tea growing process, with a scribble which I told them was writing, that interest gave me a impetus to start to discover other educational needs. 

So life goes on and progress was made, a family was grown and dispersed, a few hiccups along the way and we arrive at 2010, I have nearly completed my house construction, and moved in, no plaster, no heating, no refinement, just a building site. Still, it was mine, along came the winter of 2009-2010 Christmas, on my own cooking Christmas dinner on a makeshift cooker.  In the kitchen????  Well a bucket for washing up, and a gifted cooker was O.K. I managed, but it was bl£$y cold, it was minus 18 degrees outside, and minus 8 indoors, just shows you what good levels of insulation does for you.

Along comes the Summer of 2010 and I felt like a holiday. The house had been plastered and alot of other things had been completed, and I needed a break. I had my computer up and running and was searching for a holiday destination. While I had forgotten about China, it did not occur to me to look that far away until I saw an advert for a dating site for Chinese women. So I am a man, I was curious, so in I went and looked, " umm tasty"  I thought, but it was obvious that it was a bit of a scam. Not deterred, I chose another site, and thought I would leave a profile. After 14 years living alone, I thought I could combine a holiday and a date at the same time. I met a delightful lady, and we seemed to have much in common, so no commitment, off I went to China.