l| a time to be silent and a time to speak |l

8 Jul 2010
Final Countdown & Gulangyu

Today is our last day in Xiamen (well, sorta – we’re returning on Sunday evening to catch our flight to HK the next day) with the relatives. The’s gathering is smaller than yesterday, fitting neatly in two cars. Actually, we have been staying in a village called Shi Jin Zhen (石井镇) that’s about 40 minutes away from Xiamen city. So today is an excursion out to the city and an offshore island about 5 minutes ferry ride away called Gulangyu (鼓浪屿 ‘Drums Wave Island’). I’ve heard and read briefly about this island and hoped to visit on this trip. Some special things about this island are its reputation of having a “world class” piano museum that supposedly holds 100 over pianos; no vehicles allowed except electric buggies, ambulance and police cars.

We stopped over first to have another yummy lunch at a restaurant just below Volvo-cousin’s condo. There were yabbies, stir fried shredded lotus root (aka French Fries by my fave 5-year-old cousin), fried cabbage with pork, chix soup, cauliflower with garlic and special steamed rice each in a bamboo bowl.


Then it was a time of bonding over repeat telecast of World Cup semi-finals – Germany vs Spain – with mandarin commentary. Ha. Watching a repeat telecast really loses the excitement by 90% and while I was rooting for Germany, I thought Spain deserved the win (from a non-football watcher’s POV).

Gulangyu was almost like what I had imagined, idyllic and scenic. Reminds me of Macau, except the populated beach with coarse sand and rubbish lining the shore shouts ‘China!’. Ha. Quite a nice nature getaway from the village and city. Except, I didn't really enjoy the 'underwater world' cum show of seals... Not after watching 'The Cove', especially.







And this pretty much sums up our stay in Xiamen plus Shi Jin Zhen （石井镇） (name originates from the marble found in this region and the 50-odd marble factories). Packed but generally comfortable three-day stay. Now it’s onward to Shantou, another distant relative visit tomorrow.