My Portugal Diary: Day 1

Day 1 Tuesday 15 June, 2004

This got to be my worst prepared trip ever: didn’t get the tickets between London and Lisbon until last night, and at the end of the day I’ll have to go to Milan on my way back to London. No packing was done until the first match was already over. Didn’t miss too much football though, Italy were so boring, while the Denmark strikers were not inspirational enough to beat the determined Buffon.

Flight was to leave Beijing at 11:25, and I didn’t pull myself out of bed until 9:00. Things were moving smoothly afterwards: the cab arrived just in time; check-in was done in a split of a second, and even got an emergency exit seat; ran into a couple of colleagues going to Finland on business at the airport lounge. Even managed to do some last minute shopping at the airport: cigarettes for Anyal..

Caught a film “Mystic River” on the in-flight entertainment. Sean Penn was absolutely first-class. But I’ve always liked Kevin Bacon, no idea why he wasn’t rated as high.

还看了一个中文电影，因为错过了开头，直到第二轮开始才搞清楚名字：《爱，断了线》。电影本身乏善可陈，倒是一句台词差点将我一击致命：身处80年代初的梁咏琪问身处2002年的小帅哥：“你们那个年代的人还相信爱情么？”

Continuing with Russell’s “Autobiography”, the chapter on his visits to China and Japan. People as intelligent as Russell could also be easily cheated by what is displayed there on the surface, “mystic” Chinese.

Landed at LHR around 15:30 BST, and got to my hotel nearly 17:00. Decided to stay at the same hotel near Bayswater when I was spending the holidays last September, easy choice. The facade remains the same, the rooms don’t change, and even the girl at the reception was the same girl. It is the man who comes back that has changed. 所谓“物是人非”也。

Czech Republic conceded a sloppy goal almost at the stroke of half time. Disappointed. Left for Anyal’s place. Took me more than an hour to get there.. My greetings came in the form of a question: what’s the score? Brilliant! 2:1 to Czech Republic. Better still is Baros opened the account for the Czechs. He should play a bigger role at Liverpool next season, when our new manager is on board. Hugged Anyal only after I learned that the score went my way. Bastard!

Holland and Germany played some dull football when Anyal was cooking. Van Nistelrooy scored a late equaliser. Tomomi changed into a Davids’ Juve jersey, only to find that he was substituted before the restart

The food was great, which made me think that, whoever is going to marry Anyal in the future must have a huge and well equipped kitchen ready even before phrasing the proposal

Hugged her one more time before departing, on behalf of another friend, who text me the previous night:“若见着安雅，代我抱抱，离家那么远。”