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Published: December 23rd 2017
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After barely sleeping for a few hours, Kate and I decided to go exploring a bit into the main city of Guangzhou. We were to meet her best friend in the downtown area so we headed over to a place. We had a quick lunch and then I learned a few weeks ago that Guangzhou had the largest Line store in the entire world so I had to go. Line is an app that featured characters such as Brown and Cony.
Brown! Shortly after, we headed over one of Kate's uncle's restaurant where we had a table of 18 people that consisted of the entire family including all grandma's, aunts, and sisters. Spoiler alert, they were watching me. I also learned that the same uncle also originally opened the first Sam Woo restaurant in SoCal. The family eventually opened many places and it eventually became a chain. I remember my family used to buy the food from the place EVERY week. So the first thing I said to her uncle was, "my family literally has given you 30 years worth of money."
He said thanks.
After dinner, Kate's dad drove us back to Taishan.The next day, Kate's
dad decided to take me to see some historical sites and have dinner at one of his friends house. We headed south from his home for about 1 hour into a city called Xinhui (pronounced SHING-HUH-WAY) and the first historical site we visited was Yamen Naval site. Long story short, there was a famous battle here, 1000 boats, someone's dynasty ended, new dynasty started). There was a legit Gong at the war site, I rang that.
">GONG! We also visited the original fortress where the lookout point was for the battle. After both sites, we made a beeline for her father's friends house. We drove another hour and eventually made it into a rural village called Chonglou (pronounced CHONG-LOW), and it was quite the experience. The village only has about 800 people and it was in a very poor state. We take a private road and we come across an abandoned elementary school.
Yup, this is where the friend lives.
He isn't a squatter. He actually owns this former elementary school building. Apparently, he's an antique collector and tea brewer. His former job was interior design and he made so much money that he decided to retire and
live literally in the middle of nowhere with his wife, 3 kids, 2 nannies, and like 5 dogs. (see photos, I am not kidding, he lives in a former school). He told me that he cooks all the meals, 3 times a day for the entire family and helpers. There is no internet at the site, only cell phones with some data. He has his own fish farm and chickens, only goes into town for necessities and groceries . While he was telling me all this, I was just amazed that there were his kids running around the compound in each class playing hide and go seek.
After dinner, we drove back home to Taishan where tomorrow, we will be hosting Kate's grandfather's 90th birthday. Sleep it is!