Spring Hike (2)

I opened my eyes. Someone’s hand had been put on my chest. Actually, it was mine and it was somewhat numbed. This was the third time I awoke from nightmare this week. Good thing was, it’s just a dream. Joanna wouldn’t talk to me that way. But I really should watch my hippo mouth in the office.
My neck was sore somehow and my head ached. I must stop playing any web game, any Nintendo, any Sega, or anything on the internet immediately. My head had already got bumped in a traffic accident. If I kept playing games this much every night, I wouldn’t be able to find the way home or the way to the office or recognize my colleagues, Joanna, or even myself sooner or later. As a hasty avant-garde of loving Communist Party, my spare time should be used to care about and worry about the Party instead of killing zombies in the tomb and destroying tanks on the battlefield every day. I must stop playing games now. But, maybe, I could give myself a grace period, couldn’t I? I could stop after one or two days, or maybe a week. Actually, time unit for grace period of quitting games should be in month. So, that way, I could take game quitting into consideration after one or two months. But summer would come by then. It would be very hot outside. So staying at home with air conditioning and playing game would be nothing but a wonderful option for summer. Also, to quit games in fall wouldn’t be necessary. And with all snows outside, there would be nothing much to do in winter. Right, I could plan game quitting by next spring and the Party wouldn't mind that much.
I picked up the watch from bedside. It was only around 5:30 in the morning now. My radio clock had been set to buzz at 6 because there would be a hike I planned to take part in. I would have to get everything ready proactively and would get to Don Mills Station by 9:30.
I sat up in the bed. Holy! The computer had not been turned power off and my account was still on chat status. I stepped down on the floor and moved close to the screen. Right on the moment I was about to close everything out, to my surprise, one friend just signed in. It was Shannon. I sat down on the chair.
“Pleasant good Saturday morning Shannon!” I typed.
“Pleasant good morning to you!” She replied.
“It’s only 5:30. Why did you get up and come here this early?”
“That’s also my question to you.”
“I had a beautiful dream in which my manager’s boss dated me. When she tried to kiss me, I was scared awake.”
“Why were you scared? Isn’t that a sweet thing?”
“Well, right on that second, the door swung open and in came her husband.”
“LOL.”
“So, what made you start such an early day?”
“I went to bed at 9:30 last night.”
“I believe you were never a Friday night teenager.”
“True. By the way, we never met since we knew each other through that Chinese group. And you haven’t shown me your picture. I’m just wondering what you look like.”
“Maybe it’s better for you to see me in person one day.”
“So you want to stay mysterious for a while, eh?” Shannon’s typing was very fast. She continued, “I checked the weather. It’s gonna be a nice day today. Have you been to High Park? High Park is very pretty in spring.”
Thinking for seconds, I stroke the keyboard swiftly. “Yes, I’ve been there, very pretty and quite big.”
“Many people go there during the bloom season of cherry blossom. It’s very beautiful.”
“It is.” I unlidded a bottle of spring water.
“So what are you gonna do today?”
“I’m going somewhere in Hamilton for hiking with people. It’s spring time.”
“With your buddies?”
“No. I checked the notice of local community activities and then found this hike.”
“I see. How long will the hike take? Whole day?”
“No, only hours. I need to get to Don Mills Station by 9:30 as they set off from there.” I took a look at the time display at the lower right corner of the screen.
“A few hours hiking plus 2 hours driving there and back. That’s how long it will take altogether, right?”
“Right. If I still have time after hiking, I may join my buddies at an Irish pub called St. Louis Bar and Grill near Finch Station. What about you?”
“Interesting. I know that pub as I live near Finch Station. I'm not sure if that's Irish-styled though. Today, I might go to Centre Island.”
“Nice place.” I took another gulp of water.
“What are you gonna do tomorrow?”
She's such an innocent and pure girl. Whatever was in her mind would be straight displayed in her way. “Tomorrow, I will do a lot of interesting things,” I answered.
“Things like what?”
“Spring cleaning...
laundering...
grocery shopping...
cooking...”
“Ok, Ok, stop exciting me.” Shannon ended my ‘exciting’ typing.
“Oops, so how about yourself?”
“I wanna go to High Park tomorrow.”
“I see. But make sure you don’t drive there if you can’t get up early in the morning.”
“Sure. I know, parking is a big headache. I will take subway.”
“That’s wise. By the way, what did you say your name was again?”
“What? You haven’t waken up? You don’t know whom you are talking to?”
“I know, Shannon.”
“Good gracious, you aren’t dream-talking or dream-typing to me.”
Something weird hit my mind again. So I type-wrote, “nei zi mm zi ngo hai bin dou ah?”
“What the heck is that?” Following the sentence was an emoticon of “faint”.
“This is how Hongkong people say, do you know whom I am? It’s Cantonese.” I explained.
“Of course I know who you are. But I’m from Harbin, Manchuria. I only speak Mandarin and English. Cantonese is a total mystery to me, no any difference from Greek.”
“I understand some Cantonese. But I have difficulty in understanding the mixture of Hongkong English and Cantonese.”
“What do you mean?” asked she.
“I have a buddy from Hongkong.”
“And?”
“When she talks to me, she switches between two languages constantly and my nerves stay tightened all the time. I can give some examples. You wanna try figure out what the words mean?”
“Shoot.”
“Sik yuan faan, hang faan zao dim, nite view dou gei leung, gei duck yee. Ngo ho chung yee nei gan restaurant gei hei fun. Food dou ng cou ge. Yau kay hai creamy lobster soup. Ngo zui zui chong yee gei hai lobster la.”
“That’s easy. Here is the answer - a man really fancies the washroom in a seafood restaurant with a pretty night view because the washroom has a smell of creamy lobster soup. Lobster always smells good there.”
“Fairly creative.” I commented.
“I’m just kidding. You know that. What does the whole thing mean?”
“After the dinner, we went back to the hotel. The night view was pretty and cozy. I like the style of that restaurant. Foods were not bad at all. Especially that creamy lobster soup. Lobster is my favourite.”
“See? Told you that’s Greek.” Shannon added another emoticon of seemingly “dizzy”.
“Right. So, which chapter in Romance of Three Kingdoms do you like most?”
“I only read it once. My favorite episode is Three Heroes Fighting Lü Bu though. Why do you ask this?”
“Next time, I will re-write the chapter Tiger Jail Pass in mixed Hongkong English and Cantonese so that Mr. Luo can crawl out of the tomb and strangle me to death.”
For a long moment, Shannon didn’t hit me a word.
“But if one day, I mean, if one day, opportunity serves, I will summon up courage to come over to Finch Station and sing Shaanxi Opera to you.” In fact, I never knew how to sing that, but my buddy told me that singing Shaanxi Opera would be a boy's best way to scare a girl away.
“Aha, that’s new.” She typed a colon and a right bracket after the words. “But we never met in person before. We only met on internet. How can I tell which one is this China's Pavarotti from the crowd at Finch?”
“Easy. I'll be waiting for you at the exit of Finch Station,” I kept typing and hitting ENTER, “squatting down on the ground beside an OMG trash can...
yawning and stretching arms...
picking my nose and rubbing the sleep out of my eyes...
wearing a dirty shirt with buttons tied mismatch and one leg of the pants rolled up...
sneezing now and then...
spitting dark green phlegm one after another...
and scratching all the time my oily and dusty hair giving off a special scent that the professionals in Christian Dior can never figure out the recipe to make...
How picturesque! How poetic! And how romantic!”
“Eww, yuck!”
“Yep, that’s me.”
“Sure, right. Now I’m more curious about what this stinky hobo looks like.” An eye-blinking emoticon popped out at the end of the sentence.
“Traffic stopper is not even the right term to define how handsome I am. If I were Hemingway or Lin Yutang, I would know how to describe it.”
“Don’t worry. I know how to now.”
“How then?”
“Too handsome not to shock Communist Party.”
“Hey, you pick fast.” She's truly cute.
“Thanks. I’ve just got used to your kidding style.”
“Actually, as to how I look like, let me name four people, one of whom I resemble most. You pick one.”
“All right. Who are the four?”
“Did you read Pilgrimage to the West?”
“Yes.”
“Good. The four candidates are Monkey King, Sandy, Pigsy, and Tripi Taka. Which one is me?”
“Pigsy.”
“Bingo. You scored another 10 points.” I wished I could be Pigsy who was Marshal Canopy in heaven and was the most relaxed one en route to the West.
“Hehe. Then what is your specification for finding your life partner? Don’t tell me you only have a crush on Landlord Gao’s daughter.”
Paused, I asked myself what my spec was. “Actually, I don’t have any specification. Whenever chemistry or telepathy comes, I go with it.”
“Hmm.”
“But I also have one or two words to add.”
“Shoot.”
“I would think people sharing more common things would get along more easily, for example, people with similar personality, character, family background, origin culture, education, social style, value of life, belief and religion, and so and so.”
“True.” She agreed.
“Also, as you know, when we do cooking, we always go eggs stir-fried with tomatoes, and go bak choy stir-fried with mushrooms, right?”
“Right. But what’s your point?” She asked.
“But if two people have nothing match in those aspects and get together, then it would be like eggs stir-fried with bak choy, tomatoes with mushrooms. Does it make sense?”
The radio clock buzzed.

 

Notes:

01. Nintendo - Japanese game tycoon (任天堂)
02. Sega - Japanese game tycoon (世嘉)

03. As a hasty avant-garde of loving Communist Party, my spare time should be used to care about and worry about the Party instead of killing zombies in the tomb and destroying tanks on the battlefield every day - 对于作为爱党急先锋的我来说，我的闲暇时间是应该被用来为党操碎了心的，而不是每天在坟墓里杀僵尸、战场上炸坦克
04. Harbin, Manchuria - the capital of Heilongjiang Province, northeastern China (东北哈尔滨)

05. Sik yuan faan, hang faan zao dim, nite view dou gei leung, gei duck yee. Ngo ho chung yee nei gan restaurant gei hei fun. Food dou ng cou ge. Yau kay hai creamy lobster soup. Ngo zui zui chong yee gei hai lobster la - (English text is given in the paragraph that followed as above) (粤语和英文的混杂含义如下) 食完饭，行返酒店，night view都几靓，几得意，我好钟意那个restaurant的气氛。Food都不错的。尤其是creamy loster soup。我最最钟意的就是lobster啦。
06. Romance of Three Kingdoms - classical Chinese novel (《三国演义》)
07. Three Heroes Fighting Lü Bu - the famous chapter in Romance of Three Kingdoms, depicting Liu Bei, Guan Yu, and Zhangfei fighting Lü Bu, the top warrior of the time (三英战吕布)
08. Tiger Jail Pass - a stragetic fortress located between Shaanxi Province and Henan Province, China and a well-known chapter in Romance of Three Kingdoms, the chapter is also called Three Heroes Fighting Lü Bu; the period of Three Kingdoms is 220 AD - 280 AD in Chinese history (虎牢关)
09. Mr. Luo - Luo Guanzhong, the author of Romance of Three Kingdoms and the co-author of Water Margin (罗贯中)

10. Shaanxi Opera - 秦腔

11. squatting down on the ground beside an OMG trash can...
yawning and stretching arms...
picking my nose and rubbing the sleep out of my eyes...
wearing a dirty shirt with buttons tied mismatch and one leg of the pants rolled up...
sneezing now and then...
spitting dark green phlegm one after another...
and scratching all the time my oily and dusty hair giving off a special scent that the professionals in Christian Dior can never figure out the recipe to make...
How picturesque! How poetic! And how romantic! - 在OMG垃圾箱边的地上蹲着，打着哈欠，伸着懒腰，抠着鼻子，揉着惺忪的睡眼，身上穿着扣子系错了行的脏兮兮的衬衫，一条裤腿是卷着的，不时地打着喷嚏，接二连三地吐着浓绿浓绿的痰，不停地抓挠着油腻与灰尘混杂在一起的头发，头发里散发着克丽斯汀·迪奥公司那些专业人士永远都搞不出配方来生成的那种味道……这是多么的诗情！多么的画意！多么的罗曼蒂克！
12. Pilgrimage to the West - classical Chinese novel written by Wu Cheng'en (《西游记》)
13. Monkey King, Sandy, Pigsy, and Tripi Taka - the four main characters in Pilgrimage to the West (悟空、沙僧、八戒、唐僧) Pigsy looks like a terrible monster, part human and part pig, who often gets himself and his companions into trouble through his laziness, gluttony, and propensity for lusting after pretty women

14. Marshal Canopy - Pigsy's title and rank in ancient China's myth and in the novel (天蓬元帅)

15. Landlord Gao - In Pilgrimage to the West, Mr. Gao is the landlord of a plantation called Old Gao Mansion where Pigsy falls in love with a pretty girl, the daughter of Landlord Gao (高员外)