There was work to be done however, and the grand opening was one like I've never played at before, the Chinese had built a stage in a matter of  hours, decorated it and then got the show rolling. Speeches were given by God know how many dignitaries local and international including the British Consular General who had came all the way from Shanghai just to do his bit in keeping the stiff upper lip British. Fire works went off, ticker tape was flying and you just had to wonder if all this was just for us. All of this took just about an hour which ended with us playing from the stage and into the department store. After about an hour and a half, we ventured back out again to play in the square in front of the store, but once out there we could have been forgiven for thinking that nothing had happened just a short time before hand. Everything had been disassembled and taken away, Nanjing city center was back to business as usual. That's Chinese ingenuity for you.

 About one week into the trip, a rival store tried to stem the tide of people who were going into our store by setting up a traditional Chinese opera on the main square just outside where we would be playing. This attracted an enormous amount of people and it looked like things were shaping up nicely for this rival store, but shortly afterwards we were ready to do our usual fifteen minute stint and once we started playing things went drastically pear shaped for them. The whole crowd must have followed us back in to our store, and they were left with almost nobody to watch them.

  After our stint in Nanjing, we then jumped on a bus which took us to Shanghai for the remaining two days of our tour. We stayed at the sumptuous Regal International East Asia Hotel, which is one of the nicest hotels in Shanghai, and it was only a stones throw from O'Mally's Irish bar. Where we would later do stint for the patrons of that establishment. But before we could do this, we had a party to attend at of all places " The British Consular Generals Residence". We were rubbing shoulders with people who worked in Government at home and abroad, like representatives from the Chamber of Commerce to mention but one. There were also representatives from the other foreign Embassies and we ended up having a real good time and we were being well looked after. The next day we were driven out to the sticks to play at a primary school, where we would see parts of the city that we wouldn't normally get to see. The suburbs of Shanghai are no different to that of any other major city, the streets and houses were pleasant which made our jaunt all the more enjoyable. When we arrived at the school there was a school brass band waiting to play us in through the school gates, we felt honored by this gesture, but we had no no idea what was about to unfold. We were told by Claire Lewis who is Community Liaison Officer with the British Consulate General in Shanghai, that there were 5000 kids sitting out in the sports fields waiting on us to play for them, a daunting thought for all of us. There was a stage set up for us to play on, and once on,  you'd have thought that the latest pop sensations had just arrived in town,  every set we played was given a rapturous applause and if truth be told, we were loving every minute of it. When we finished playing Cammy asked the children if they would like to come up and ask any questions and that they should feel free to do so, and for about five seconds you could feel the tension going around the sports arena, it was like a  volcano about to erupt and sure enough it only took one brave little girl to come up on her own to present us with a gift, then it was like the battle of the little big horn, only it wasn't Indians that were all running toward us, but 5000 school kids in a frenzy wanting to be first to get the autographs of the funny looking men  in kilts, from another country.  Queuing was not the order of the day, in fact I don't think they've ever heard of a queue, but it made it all the more enjoyable. After all the excitement was over it was case of checking to see if we were going away with everything that we came with, and then back to the hotel.

But at the end of the day it all became a bit to much for some of the band members. We'd put in some hard shifts on this tour, so it was to nobody's surprise that one or two of us started to fall by the wayside.( see picture on right )

But all in all and with the benefit of hindsight this tour wasn't a bad one. I think it's fair to say that we had a good time while we were there, and I for one can't wait to go back.