Ships and shoes and sealing wax, cabbages and kings are all standard units of measurement in East Turkestan. Ships and shoes measure distance; there are one hundred and eight shoes in a ship. Sealing wax measures depth (1 tin of sealing wax = 1.2 fathoms), kings measure liquid volume (1 king = 1.4 pints), and cabbages are a unit of time (roughly 3/8 of a sunny afternoon). It is not at all uncommon for an East Turkestanian man to bicycle eight ships to a pub, drink nine kings of East Turkestanian beer, complain about the government, walk three shoes toward the door, black out for several cabbages, and wake up half a tin of sealing wax down at the bottom of a river.