13/6/23 Tues: We drove to Port Louis area again, where we were supposed to meet Mike's brother-in-law John, who would bring us to have lunch at their aunt's eatery, Meme's Gourmet, just across his office building at Chinatown.
Arrived at 10.30am or so and because we were early, John told us to take a walk along Mauritius' Chinatown. There were some Chinese medicinal halls and restaurants etc, but no one spoke mandarin from what we saw. After that, John brought us up to the rooftop of his work building and we got a bird's eye view of Port Louis!
John was very nice and brought us to Meme's Gourmet even before they were opened for lunch. It was a family-run business and we had their Mauritian version of Hakka food there. They had mine bouille, wanton, fried noodle, pig's tongue, mine frit, siew mai, chou chou, yong tau foo, bittergourd and fish meat and fried taro balls. *Thanks to Mike and John for their lunch treat!* Very unassuming spread but a few dishes were very nice, like their wanton, fried noodle, pig's tongue, yong tau foo, bittergourd and fish meat and fried taro balls!
John shared a lot about their roots in Mauritius, that he spoke Cantonese and his daughter was studying in Canada etc, as well as racing and how Mike and I were coping etc. He mentioned about retiring from his family-run household item business in a few years and how his wife was a few years from receiving a pension from the bank if she could defer her retirement a bit later, but John thought that time was precious and they should do it when they deem fit... which I agreed a lot with. *人老了的时候，我也希望趁自己还健康的时候和心爱的人再多看看世界、享受人生，那才最重要。*PotaTOHs had to leave for our subscooter ride (rs7500 for two pax) at Trou Aux Biches by 12pm or so, so John very nicely helped us dabao and added more food that we liked as our dinner later. We drove up North and reached the meeting point at Blue Safari Submarines earlier than that stated 12.55pm. WL and WS took the car and explored further up North that afternoon.
We had to fill up indemnity form and the guides briefed the six of us going for the subscooter rides before we walked over to board the boat to the platform in the middle of the sea.
We were at max three metres underwater and it got quite murky at times. We only saw one species of fish around us. The two divers were there to guide Potato who was steering our subscooter, which he said was difficult because it was not very responsive. Besides my "usual job", I was just busy equalising the pressure in my ears every now and then haiz. It was only a 20-minute ride underwater, but we both felt it was an expensive and unworthy experience. *Although I can't swim, I very much prefer snorkelling to this because I'm free to move around.* Had to deal with the swaying after we were back on the deck and I tried my best to stand properly while changing my swimsuit out omg.
Glad I was not bothered by the sea-sickness for too long. At 3pm, we met WL and WS who drove back to pick us up and headed back to our Airbnb at Royal Creek Residence to rest for a bit before checking out at 5pm.
Arrived at our new Airbnb at Le Bouchon Beach, where we saw our host Charlie at 6pm. *Luckily his aunt and him were there, if not those wild dogs looked like they could have bitten me or Potato as they saw us as intruders while we drove into the two-storey place tucked inside a corner.* He helped us carry our luggage into his place and did a quick introduction. *Very impressed with his multi-level security system for the villa.*
We took the smaller room on the second floor and gave the big one to WL and WS. Somehow there was a lot of flies at his place this winter in Mauritius, but Charlie didn't know why too. We had to clean up the dining area before we could have our dinner at 7+pm. *There were too many dead flies in the swimming pool and around that area, so I didn't bother to swim nor take a dip either.* He sponsored a bottle of rose wine too, so we paired it with our Hakka dinner haha. *The stay costed us S$318.44 for four pax for two nights.*
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