The three stages of a party

Having missed a 2pm meeting at the British Council on Saturday I lost 3,700rmb (£370) and so consequently was not really in a party mood. However the food and drink was courtesy of the British Government and everyone at the party on the patio of the Garden Pub in Shanghai was a native English speaker so it was possible to speak at full speed and not keep repeating myself. You cannot appreciate the struggle it is to speak to non-native speakers all day every day, it is very tiring.

The food was non-Chinese which was also a relief. I looked for the youngest people on the patio and found the boys from Hefei (a city near Nanjing). All of us were there as guests of the British Council as IELTS examiners. Being an IELTS examiner means that we listen to lots of Chinese students speaking English and grade them. The importance of an IELTS grade cannot be overstated. According to the grades we give the candidates, they may or may not get the university place they want in the UK, USA or Australia, or be able to emigrate to the English speaking country of their choice. So IELTS examiners have to be professional. Being with the only group of examiners under 60 means eating and drinking a lot, something I have not done for…. I don’t know when.

The first stage of the party is the gathering and drinking of as many drinks as possible and as we didn’t even have to get up to get another beer (Chinese slaves circulated constantly) the drink flowed freely. The second stage of the party is the shouting loud, being leery and laughing stage. The USA game was on the big screens on the patio and the humidity was still high so people were lounging around mopping their necks and cheering the good ol’ USA each time they scored or came close. However, the Hefei bunch and I concentrated on drinking. Inevitably as the beer flowed we did really childish things like swapping name badges. At one stage I challenged an American lady to go and find the most ridiculous name badge she could find, swap it for hers and come back wearing it…… Yes you can guess whose name badge she came back wearing! And No, she didn’t realise it was mine because I was wearing one with “Kevin Lewis” on.

The third stage inevitably came a couple of hours after the stock-piling of beer just before the free bar finished (11pm). Poor old Jose was the first to collapse and Laughlin had to pour him into a taxi and take him home.

Then we had a “man bag” crisis on our hands at around 2am. Paul searched high and low for his “man bag” but my suspicion that a Hefei boy had taken his bag by mistake was proved right when Laughlin returned in a taxi and came running onto the patio and swapped the bags. Good party but an expensive one for me. I went all the way to Shanghai, had the expense of a hotel and all that I could do was go to a party and then come back to NJ.