Shanghai Pink

Shanghai Pink ©

By

Michael Casey

Well my girls got home yesterday morning, a groaning taxi arrived with them and all their treasure. I was standing on the doorstep as the black taxi tuned the corner, perfect timing. I had been watching flightaware so I knew all the details of their two flights from Shanghai, if you google it will tell you all about Daniel Baker the founder.

It’s so much easier if you fly from Birmingham, no waste of 3 hours going to Heathrow, and more especially when you return tired from holiday. However you do have to take a connecting flight, but at least you are not so tired when you get home.

Once home all the cases are dumped  in your clean home. I did actually vacuum and tidy up before their arrival, before my 3 girls came home to me. After 3 weeks, I needed too, I even did all the washing up too, and put all the cups and plates away, and I washed the kitchen floor too. None of this was noticed as my wife went online to tell her mum she had arrived safely, not to mention catching up on all her messages. Sometimes I think she needs a social secretary.

My small daughter was triumphant, she had a souvenir for me in her hand. A lucky cat, a fat cat on a red cushion with a bell around its neck, this now lives behind me, on top of the  bookcase next to the hifi. My small daughter also gave me a tiny rubber in the shape of a tiny white lucky cat. So I have 2 lucky cats now.

Next the bags are opened and the contents spill everywhere, and everywhere really does mean everywhere. They were allowed 69 kilos, so they brought back the full allocation. Ma, as I call grannie in Shanghai, sends things she’s saved. Such as 2 old shirts of mine and 2 pairs of nonmatching socks, and one old pair of blue underpants, all this saved for more than a decade, from my first ever visit to China.  

How and why these were saved I cannot remember, it may have been part of the leave something behind, which would mean I’d have to come back for my future bride. I did have to leave the Eurythmics  album 17 behind, I still play it often. The album returned to me many years ago, but the shirts and socks, and the blue pants must have been overlooked. The shirts would never fit again as my chest size is 2 inches bigger and my neck is an inch bigger, thanks to 3 years working in a hotel.

More treasure spills over the floor and covers the 2 settees we have in the living room, then the phone calls begin. My wife is very popular, so she has to catch up on 3 weeks news, but she had not seen her mum for 5 years, so there was lots of catching up to do.

Then slowly slowly, like a tide too slowly retreating all the stuff is unloaded from the suitcases and those plastic/canvas blue stripy bags that Chinese travellers use on their travels. Next all the packaging is thrown to one side, luckily I emptied the dustbins the day before. Where does all the stuff come from, ask anybody with an international wife and they will say the same.

This takes a period of hours, in between the phone calls, so the tide of unpacked suitcases retreats, with pockets of wet sand here and there, or rather piles of clothes balanced and slipping from the arms and backs of the twin sofas. Meanwhile twin dustbins are filling with stuff. Grannie has send loads of stuff back  to Birmingham, some of the stuff I don’t see as I take refuge in the front room, my PC being my saviour.

We stop for family pizza, my big daughter had decided to puke on the Shanghai to Paris flight, so she was starving now, though the Paris to Birmingham flight was nice. So my Shanghai/Birmingham family have pizza, it’s a change from 3 weeks of total Chinese food.

The washing machine is switched on and the first load is started, luckily I emptied the washing machine 2 days ago, I anticipated this. 90 minutes later the first surprise, a duvet set emerges, only its camouflage green, it’s what you’d use to hide a tank with, have we got Putin’s luggage by mistake?

So I hang out all the washing, ready for the next load. As I hang the camouflage green duvet cover, with matching pillow slips and mattress cover on the line I laugh. Ma, has sent this all this way, 5000 miles just in case we could use it. It’s very Irish really, not just Chinese, my own mum would have done the same. I hang out more washing only to discover that several items are now Shanghai Pink, an old red jumper that my wife had 10 years ago has landed up in Birmingham, mixed in with all the washing. So several items are now Shanghai Pink.

The washing was left out overnight, then early this morning I switched on the washing machine ready for the day’s sun, and the second load. As least Shanghai Pink would not be repeated. Then I went back to bed for another hour, I would rise with the rising sun, and get our 2^nd load done. We never use the tumble dryer, radiators yes, as they are free, tumbler dryer no. My wife has developed an English love of the Weather Forecast, sunshine is free too.

I rise and discover my wife on the phone, so I hang out the 2^nd load of washing, laughing at Putin’s washing as I take it off the line ready for the next load. I hang out another duvet set, Ma has sent this 5000 miles too. She did have her place redecorated a year or so ago and so we are getting her caste offs, though it turns out that the second duvet set was a new set, that was stuck at the back of the wardrobe, for 10 years.

Then Shanghai Pink reappears, where is the offending item this time? There are no red jumpers in the pile, but there are 3 sets of long-johns, what looks like a child’s long-johns, 3 tops and 3 pants. They are in fact the wife’s long-johns.  The Shanghai Pink is bigger this time, my wife comes outside to laugh. Thanks to her long-johns she never freezes in Winter, and always wonders why I’m cold, and tells me off for putting the heating on.

The sun shines and the 2^nd load of washing blows in the wind, even if  some of it is now Shanghai Pink in colour, inside the house gradually the tide of clothes and suitcases disappears, at least its only in one room now.

I remember I have a can of lager in the fridge so I enjoy that, upstairs there is noise, my wife has decided to have a tidy up. There’s no room in the wardrobes for the new stuff, so old stuff is exiled to downstairs. Just as I thought the house was tidy, the tide, the 2^nd tide of the day takes over, this time old and unloved clothes will be transported to the charity shop. But first they will mount up in plastic bags behind me, it’s my job to carry them to the charity shops.

Sadly 2 of the charity shops close by have closed, so I have to walk farther away to donate/ get rid of our old stuff. If you have daughters and they are under 16 they are still growing, so the amount of clothing that ends up in the charity shop can be quite large. I do have one daughter who takes after me, and the smaller daughter takes after my wife as far as build goes, which means more trips to the charity shop for me.

I could go on but I have to cook for the family now, so we are having pasta, Aldi pasta, two packets full in one big saucepan. I switch on, make sure it doesn’t over boil, and in 15 minutes I have fed the family. One thing is sure though, my pasta won’t be Shanghai Pink.