Almost another month has gone by and I have experienced my first public holiday (Labour Day) trip in China - to Xiamen. To say that it's a bad time for foreigners to be travelling in an understatement: it appeared like a good portion of the 1.3 billion people were on the move. Fortunately, I had plenty of help from some of my ex students, some of whom are now back home in Xiamen. One student who travelled with me was kind enough to make all the required pre-booking arrangements, amongst which was the brand new fast train from Fuzhou to Xiamen: very comfortable and very fast (250kph).
Having reached Xiamen station it was impossible to get a taxi: there was no taxi rank and what taxis were available were rushed by mobs of people; moreover, the taxis are choosy as to where they want to go! My friend and I split up, to double our chances, but when she found a taxi he did not want to go to our hotel! I then took charge and the next taxi that stopped to drop off passengers, I threw my bags into the empty seat and sat in the taxi while the passengers were still getting out. As the driver was looking at me dumbfounded I called my Chinese companion and said please just tell him where we want to go (not IF he'll take us there) - it worked.
A short ferry-ride from Xiamen was the must-see island of Gulangyu, with its old, historic, European-style buildings along very narrow (no cars) streets. The highlight was climbing to the highest point of the island, atop a huge rock. At the end of the day we "queued" up for the return ferry, along with a massive crowd of literally thousands of people all converging towards just four single-file entry gates: for almost an hour my 5-foot friend and I were like penguins, shuffling along while being pushed from every side (mind you, in return I did my fair share of pushing too!).
Having survived that ordeal we teamed up with some friends who were taking me to dinner. As it was impossible to catch a taxi, we opted for a crowded bus to go some 6-8 km... the traffic was so bad that it took the bus one hour to go around a big block, in order to go to the other side of the road, followed by another hour of continual stop-starts to reach the restaurant!
On the second day, a student's friend became our guide who took us to a beautiful park (wanshi garden), south putou temple, and the famous and impressive Xiamen University. Opposite the university is an inviting Australian-style beach with very fine sand. We hired bikes and rode for miles along the esplanade.
On the last day we did some shopping along Xiamen's popular walking street where my friend bought herself a 24ct gold pendant and I bought just a few bags of Xiamen's famous (and delicious) strips of dried pork. As usual, I wasn't going to buy anything without bargaining. My Chinese friend had previously found out that the 200gm bags were 14 yuan per bag, so I asked the sales girl if she would sell them to me for 10 yuan a bag if I bought 10 bags, which she flatly refused; I then offered to pay 60 yuan for 5 bags which, again, she refused but said 12 yuan per bag was as low as she could go! You should have seen the look on her face when she gave me the bags, got her calculator out and found that 5 x 12 = 60! All in all, it was a memorable and enjoyable holiday for me and my friend.
My teaching future is somewhat up in the air at the moment: I can continue to teach low-level students in Fuzhou, via my current employer (where age is not an issue with them) or stop teaching in China where most good universities have an age limit. This was highlighted to me recently when I was recommended, by another teacher, to apply to a good university in Zhuhai (close to Macau and Hong Kong), where the professor's response was one of: we are impressed with your application and would have liked to hire you "but here in Zhuhai, the authorities does not give work visas to college teachers" of your age. Maybe its time to put the feet up and relax (except I'm too young for that (ha ha)), or maybe, do some voluntary teaching in Africa?
In the meantime I have my hands full coping with my 240 Marketing students, many of whom speak very little English. Fortunately, there are some good times fraternising with some of the better students who are always keen to make a foreigner feel welcome.
Until the next report, hope all is well with you... Renzo
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