Countryside Courtyard

To celebrate our performance from last week, and to spend our whopping consolation prize of 100RMB (£6.70), Teacher Wang Lie encouraged us to go out for a meal as a class.

By now, 'as a class' meant just six students - we hadn't seen Korean classmate Ming Jingnan for weeks - so it was never going to be a huge outing, but four teachers made excuses, and our Russian classmate Karolina had a relative in town, so it was just Teacher Wang Lie, Rongshu, Anna, Enxi, Mingrui and myself.

Teacher Wang Lie made the dinner arrangements: traditional Dongbei 'farmer-style' food at 乡村大院 (Countryside Courtyard).

The restaurant sat at one end of 腐败条街 or 'Corruption Street', a new, upmarket strip filled with gaudy, pricey restaurants and hotels, where the Harbin elite - politicians, businessmen, and public servants - furtively peeled open their stuffed manila-envelopes and frittered away their ill-gotten gains. I brought up the topic with a teacher later. Mistaking my curiosity for criticism, he mused that

"Beijing also has similar districts, but theirs are much bigger".

A 1:1 scale model of a fighter jet decorated the square, and Teacher Wang reminded me that Harbin was China's industrial and technological powerhouse.

"This used to be the aircraft factory district, before it moved to the outskirts of town. That's an old, Soviet-designed model up there. China makes its own, much better planes now" with more than a little hint of pride.

乡村大院 turned out to be almost identical to 大丰收, from the food, to the decor, to the Mao-era song and dance, but everything was done slightly slicker, in keeping with the more affluent clientele.

By the door was a small, open-plan kitchen used for preparing the cold starters...

... while the entrance was decorated with various commemorative memorabilia, including a comprehensive selection of Chairman Mao-themed tourist tat.

As soon as we took our seats, Teacher Wang produced a plastic water bottle filled with his own home-brewed 白酒. I was worried about going blind, but slugged down a couple of shots anyway. It was surprisingly good - a flavoursome but lethal blend that left a slow burn all the way from wherever it touched my lips, right to the pit of my stomach.

The next table over was dominated by middle-aged drunken males...

...who thought it might be nice to play 'Use my poor English on the foreigner' with Anna. Teacher Wang was extremely unimpressed but Anna put up with it with good grace and humour.

While a two-piece keyboard and 古琴 band played, a really young waiter served tea from across the table using a teapot with a spout several feet long.

Before long, the food started arriving - hearty piles of potatoes and corn, meat and fish. Flavours were thick and unrefined, and the food heavy and satisfying.

Throughout the meal, various performers took the stage.

There was singing with a lot of exaggerated dancing and posing, some theatre, and that old comedy standby: funny fat man and attractive young lady.

Seemingly worried that I hadn't formed an alcoholic enough opinion of Harbiners, Teacher Wang followed up his home-brew by producing a bottle of Smirnoff from a cavernous bag.

Not for Harbin any nonsense about not bringing in drink from the outside: Teacher Wang called on a waitress to bring us glasses then started slugging down the potato juice straight from the bottle anyway.

On the musical numbers, the whole crowd except for our table joined in with a scary fervour bordering on the religious. Whole tables took to their feet, clapping, stamping and chanting away. Some were so excited they clamber up onto the stage, and the constant flash of cameras was almost blinding, despite this sign.

"This store does not allow photography or filming"

Mingrui asked Teacher Wang about the enthusiasm.

"Wasn't that era a bad time for a lot of Chinese?"

Teacher Wang considered the question carefully:

"Sure, but these people came out of it a success. Besides, it's a form of nostalgia" Even so, as an intellectual narrowly escaping serious persecution during that time I thought I detected a touch of discomfort.

In what has become something of a pattern, Mingrui sneaked off after eating his fill to avoid paying the bill, and the handful of Class G survivors continued to pick at the unfinished remainder of the gargantuan portions of countryside fare well into the evening.