This is my last week in China so it’s only fitting I spend
it in China’s ultimate holiday destination – Hainan Island or sometimes called
China’s Hawaii. I have been to Hawaii and I can only see vague similarities. I
feel like I am getting a decent farewell because a couple of great things have
happened, the top of my list is that I have finally been reunited with my two
favourite tea’s, blueberry and a mixed fruit, I haven’t seen blueberry tea since
Harbin and the fruit tea was last sighted in Beijing. I have no idea why I can
suddenly buy it but I am stocking up. The other great thing is the hostel is in
a street that sells a Guilin noodle breakfast I have come to enjoy in Yangshuo
and there is also a place that sells the chicken dumpling soup that Nina enjoyed.
Besides thinking about my stomach the location of the backpackers is pretty
good, very close to the happening beach, in the middle of the Russian hotels
and restaurants. The Russian contingent is huge signs and menus are Chinese and
Russian no English. Today I took a bus trip to the next bay along (Yalong), the
resorts own the beaches but it’s not really policed so I just wandered past the
sign saying resort guest only. The beach is a bit nicer and like the one here it’s
a people watching paradise. A couple of my favourites are the ‘matching pyjama
sets’ these consist of large groups (20) Chinese people all dressed in gaudy
shorty pyjama’s with patterns on it, I tried to get a photo of a couple while
pretending to photograph an island, love these people always happy, friendly
and good natured. Of course there are hybrids of these, such as matching
T-shirt sets or simply couples wearing the same tops. Another group I love to
watch is the ‘floating ring set’ these people obvious can’t swim (as most
Chinese people can’t) the scary ones are the ones that declare they were taught
to swim one afternoon!! Anyway these people step into their ‘floating rings’
and brave the waist deep water, honestly I won’t turn my back on an ocean that
is bringing in a set of waves to the shore but this ocean I don’t even bother
to check anything, they are not really waves just big ripples. The ‘floating
ring’ set squeal and laugh at every ripple then look around like they are have
just survived something extraordinary. Probably they look like me when someone
understands my Mandarin. Then my
absolute favourite the ‘big kids playing in the sand’, no child anywhere to be
found and these people are well past their 20’s. I found a memorable middle age
couple studiously building an ordinary sand kingdom. He was working with a
small plastic spade on the moat at the water’s edge and she had the bucket and
her hands to construct the castle, I would have loved a photo but thought it
would be too rude.
Last night I was invited to join a group of friendly Chinese
people for dinner. We caught the bus into Sanya city and enjoyed and all you
can eat cook your own type place. We started with a couple of stir fries then
moved on to some hotpots. Loved the little bottles of cool drink, the dinner
cost 59 Yuan each ($9) which strangely I thought was expensive as usually when
I go out with Chinese people the prices are suddenly lower, maybe it’s because
we are all tourists here.
