Birthdays, Dinner and Chinese Poker - never a dull moment

After trying to stick to the Marine Commando Diet for the last week (and losing 4lbs - hooray!) There was no stopping me at the all you can eat buffet for my Step-Mother's Birthday. Nothing says support from your Boyfriend like being snapped at the buffet. Trust me, I was a lot more excited than I look here!

I don't normally eat Chinese but my Step Mother is Chinese so only fair we have her choice, I have to say the desserts were a highlight. Not traditional Chinese offerings but scrumptious none the less; lychees and mango, blackforest gateau and a chocolate fountain with foam bananas and shrimps!! Yum!


 Seeing as it was my Step-mothers Birthday and my Dad and her had just returned from China after spending hours playing cards over late night drinks there were a few rounds of Flight played. If you haven't heard of it I can honestly say it's the MOST COMPLICATED card game I've ever played!

There's some info on it here although this was quite hard to track down on the net. Seems it goes by a few names but apparently lots of Chinese women play this kind of Chinese poker (羅宋牌九) and win hundreds of pounds! Not too shabby although after playing it a couple of times I still have absolutely no idea what's happening or who the winner is.

The Mr seemed to be enjoying it though...

The hand above is a winning hand?! You must make a 5, a 5, and a 3 and lay them down on the table not changing any cards and not moving them once you've decided. A colour run is the highest you can get and goes at the bottom, then 2 pairs, a triple,  pair etc with an Ace being 1 or 11. You are then awarded or penalised points against each other for rows 1, 2 and 3. Sound complicated?! IT IS! Thank god we're not yet playing for money!!