Sightseeing & relatives

Gulangyu gone wrong

The Chinese breakfast at the hotel was very greasy.  But it didn’t put off the domestic tourists from filling up big-time on the food.

After breakfast, we headed out to try some change SGD to CNY at the Bank of China across the road.  I was surprised it was open being a public holiday.  But with a long queue, I gave up waiting and decided on using the ATM.  The first was empty, the second being refilled but eventually I got some money.  That was 45 mins of our short stay in Xiamen wasted.

It was close to 1100 when we crossed the road to the ferry to Gulangyu, formerly an international settlement, only about 8 mins away by ferry.  But I bought the wrong ticket and ended up being on a tour boat that went around Gulangyu before dropping us there.  That gave us a glimpse of Jingmen Island which is governed by Taiwan.

Gulangyu is a pedestrian-only island.  Mum had heard of it as a child and I was eager to show her what a pleasant island it was, having visited personally before.  To my disappointment, it was noisy and crowded, possibly due to being China’s big holiday period around its National Day.  The heat and humidity didn’t help.

We wandered around the island by foot, a little limited by Mum’s age and condition.  We returned to the town square where we found a food court that was chocka and further along, a McDonald’s with a gawdy faux old-style décor.  We had a simple lunch of delicious fish-ball stuffed with pork mince in a soup.  Mum had found a shop selling dried seafood and bought some dried abalone and sea cucumber at prices that were much cheaper than in Singapore.  [Edit:  The sea cucumber turned out to be inedible because it gave a stinging sensation in the mouth; probably using chemicals to clean it.]

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Making contact with relatives

We returned to Xiamen after 1400.  We promptly made contact by phone with Seok Kheng (Ah Kheng), one of Mum’s relatives whom she had never met but I have.  One of the reasons for bringing Mum to Xiamen is to meet such long-lost relatives who have been separated from the family since the 1940s.  Despite being based in South-East Asia, Ah Kheng returned to China at age 12 for holidays and couldn’t leave when the Communist government took over.

Ah Kheng came to our hotel after 1800 and Mum had a good chat with her in the lobby.  The family has had some issues over property.  With the booming development in Xiamen, Ah Kheng was at risk of losing her home (my maternal great-grandfather’s home), which could be sold for development into high-rise apartments.

Ah Kheng’s son-in-law, Li Jian De, came to the hotel later in the evening and took us out for dinner in a very fancy big restaurant.  The most special dish for me was noodles made not from starch but from fish-paste, which is normally fashioned into fish-balls.  Oh, the noodles had such a lovely bouncy texture.

After dinner, we took a stroll on the reclaimed island park (Bailuzhou?) that had water on both sides.  It looked out towards the new part of the city, which was very brightly lit up with neon everywhere.  The temperature was lovely, unlike the warm muggy welcome that we had upon arrival last night.

When the relatives heard that I had plans to go to Zhao An to visit long-lost relatives on my father’s side, they offered to drive me there.  I knew I couldn’t impose on them.  It is more like an obligation for them to offer.  They were kind enough to take me to the bus station to check the schedule and buy a ticket in advance before returning us to the hotel.