Christmas in Qingdao

Well Christmas 2005 was like no other. It was my first cold Christmas but unfortunately not a white Christmas.
I really wanted to get out of Beijing for Christmas, since it's like the least Christmassy place ever - the town that doesn't understand Christmas more like it.

So....Devrim and Pei-San (aka Princess) came from Shanghai, and Simon and I went from Beijing to hang out at Paulie's place in Qingdao. Our main aim was to visit the Tsingtao Brewery at some point, but we never got around to do it. We did manage to check out the town, eat some dumplings and experience an automatic mahjong table at a teahouse.
The automatic mahjong table is a genius invention. You need 2 sets of mahjong tiles. You play with one set while the other set gets shuffled and stacked ready for your next game. When the first game is over, you press a button and the middle of the table opens, you push the used tiles into the hole and the new tiles rise, ready for the next game!!

For our Christmas Eve dinner, the 4 of us had the most delicious hotpot with Paulie, his girlfriend Cassidy, and friends Don, Sanga and Cindy. After dinner we head home for some gluhwein and mahjong. We were blessed with the presence of Napoleon Dynamite also.

On Christmas Day, Paulie took Simon and Devrim to the nearby massage place for a 'naked man rubdown' and foot massage - but somehow as soon as Paulie left they got into a bit of a tangle with 2 seperate bedrooms and chinese girls. Eventually they sorted things out and got what they went for. For Christmas late lunch, Digs and I insisted we have western food so we head out to what seemed to be the only German place in town (and the most western) to have German sausages and beer.

Thanks to Paulie for being such an awesome host and Digs, Pei and Simon for sharing the day!!