Dancing the night away on New Year's Eve is not, as I had before believed, an unworthy pastime.
Holy fucking balls-- that beer caught up with me this morning. I very nearly had a hangover, and I heard later that Groovemaster D worshiped the porcelain gods over last night's debauchery. Oops. Of course, TinyFlutist drank us all under the table with no problem. WTF? She kicks ass, that one.
I woke up at 7 AM starving and a little hung over, so I sneaked out of the room to breakfast without waking up Rock Star Roomie. Of course, my conductor was at breakfast and commented on my disheveled state of being, whereupon I informed him that TinyFlutist put us all to shame, and that was no shame. Coffee and toast has never been so welcome, but today's eggs were the Chinese pickled variety, so no dice there. Drinkable yogurt, check.
Back in the room I caught up on some work-- the project group got a write-up in the CityPaper this week, which was really favorable and should help us drum up some audience members. Woohoo. (Note the lack of exclamation point-- even my blog is tired at this point.)
We headed over to the Jade Buddha Temple later in the morning, which was amazing-- the incense smoke was everywhere and people were praying all around us as we reverently snapped photos. Gorgeous.
The mall with the Starbucks was the lunch venue of choice, and the Korean noodle place we stopped at provided one of the best $1.50 meals I think I've ever had. Beef noodle soup with kimchee and tea for 12 RMB. Beautiful. We split up and walked around to do some shopping, and I managed to finish up my list of gifts with no stress.
RSR decided to hang back on dinner and dancing and we headed off to Xintiandi again for dinner and a little bar hopping. we really liked this are last night, so we decided to go again and check out another restaurant. Great idea, except that Chinese New Year kind of functions like our Chirstmas-- lots of things close early including restaurants and bars. We ended up at Din Tai Fung again and this time got stashed in a private room with a great waitress dedicated to our party. Did I mention how great this place was? Amazing. Afterwards the girls got some gluwein from the Paulaner kiosk and we hung around outside to watch fireworks. We even got to see some super close-up on the street that bisects the club/restaurant block! They were setting off fireworks that were bouncing off buildings and raining on roofs, but no one seemed to mind and I got some great video. (By they I mean people aided by city policemen. Public safety? Gotcha. Keep that firebucket handy.)
After the street fireworks, we headed back into the block to scope out the bar options and got sidetracked by a woman drumming up business for La Maison, a Moulin-Rouge style cabaret house and dance club. We seemed a little iffy, so she waived the cover fee for our group. Boy, did we get a surprise!! After being seated at the table, we were treated to the remainder a dance show featuring women I can only describe as having exquisite bodies-- those thongs showed off perfect asses and the abs below the beautiful bra-costumes were smokin' hot. The emcee was a gorgeous guy who entertained us with a song and his witty bater, and there was even a magician (a very, very HOTT magician) who really dazzled us with his skill at leger domain.
After the show, we moved over to the dance club on the same floor wher we proceeded to boogaloo until we were sweaty and giggling. The drinks were a bit expensive, but it was worth it for the ambiance.
I have to admit, I have a total girl-crush on Bass Boy. He's a beautiful fey boy, and a fantastic dancer. I love him all the more in that he put up with my limited dancing skills and used his much more considerable ability to twirl me around the dance floor more than a few times. He made me feel like dancing (no small feat, mind you), and I would have stayed there all night if I could have. We scooted downstairs to the Paulaner, where were boogeyed some more to the sounds of the Gems, the cover band we'd heard there the night before. One of the singers recognized us and came up to talk, and later applauded after BB and I finished a dance together. Yay!
After a while we moved on back to the hotel, leaving BB and Sassy Jo to cut a rug in Le Club and close down the place. I can't imagine having more fun on any New Year's, and now I don't want this tour to end-- everyone's going home tomorrow and many of us may never get together like this again. Ah well-- here's hoping we all stay in touch in the future... this has been the best tour I've ever done in terms of colleagues and camaraderie. Tomorrow is our flight home, and we have at least twelve hours more of each others' company. All right, off to sleep (or try, with all the fireworks). Zai jian until tomorrow, and Happy New Year!
