Next weekend, Emma wants to take part in a Dragon boat Race.

A Dragon boat is a kind of ancient torture device where 20 or so people are forced to kneel in an unstable narrow canoe, sweat in the midday sun and paddle down a dirty river as blisters form on their hot damp hands.
Wikipedia

I’m not keen.

It’s not (entirely) a laziness thing. The race is organised by iMandarin, a company which, for some reason, believes that I went back to England 3 weeks ago, never to return to Shanghai.

Let me explain.

Until recently I was taking Chinese lessons twice a week. They were fun at first and I learnt a lot, iMandarin is a good company and I recommend them to anyone who wants to take lessons. However there came a time when I just seemed to spend at least an hour of every lesson saying the word “Juede” (”believe”) over and over again to get the pronunciation just so.
I was also frustrated that 12 months after starting to study, I was still using pinyin all of the time instead of the cool Chinese characters (studying Chinese characters is vital if I ever want to go back to England and make fun of people’s tattoos).

I decided it would make sense to quit and spend the study time in the gym (or drinking, whichever) and decide later on about whether to take more lessons.

Instead of hurting my teacher’s feelings, I did the brave thing and made up an elaborate story about going back to England to avenge the death of my Grandfather.
He seemed to accept the story and even gave me a rather nice ceremonial sword to slay my enemies with. Obviously this tissue of lies will be somewhat compromised if I turn up on Sunday in my ice-white Speedos carrying a Ploughman’s lunch and a 6 pack of Zima.

Sorry Emma, I’m sure you’ll have a lovely time on your own.