Wai Ling Ding – One of Zhuhai’s Islands

This past weekend InternChina, the organization with who I came to China with, organized a trip to beautiful Yang Shuo (Guilin). I’ve heard a lot of great things about this place and I was really excited to there.

Unfortunately, the travel agency canceled the trip due to heavy rain in the area. Instead, InternChina planned a trip to one of Zhuhai’s many islands – Wai Ling Ding Island. As the water of the sea in Zhuhai is brown and probably poisoned due to the chemicals from the factories around, the islands are a good alternative with nice and clean water.

Wai Ling Ding is an island south of Hong Kong and a popular vacation spot. The boat ride took about 1.5 hours, the sea was a little rough, and a lot of passengers had to throw up. Luckily, I was sitting all the way in the back at the window, and I just slept the entire time. We were all happy to finally arrive.

Upon arrival, we went to the beach to find the camping area. Most of the people from the group decided to camp at the beach, only me and 3 other people preferred the hotel. I was already covered by mosquito bites and not eager to get more, and the provided camping equipment was limited to a tent and a very light mattress (can’t even be called a mattress). The hotel was located close to the beach and was an average one or two-star hotel. We didn’t spend much time in the room, so it served its purpose.

Wai Ling Ding looks like one of those small fisher villages with many fishing boats and a small center. Unlike in other Chinese cities, on this island everything was in walking distance. The beaches seemed to be man-made, because the coast line is covered by those beautiful orange/yellow stones. All in all, the scenery is beautiful.

After setting up the tents and doing the check-in at the hotel, we all had lunch together at one of the typical Chinese restaurants in the center. The weather changed completely in the afternoon. All the clouds were gone, and it was sunny and hot. We went to the beach where the tents were set up, and played volleyball, went swimming and relaxed in the sun or in the shade. When I was about to leave the water, I saw two big jellyfish. They were about 10-15 centimeters long, so I didn’t go back into the water again.

Instead, I bought a fruit juice and a delicious Hong Kong waffle for a snack. I wanted pineapple with mango but the guy at the stand told me that this isn’t a good mix, because both fruits have a strong taste. I ended up getting a mango and lemon juice. It was really refreshing.

In the evening, we walked around the island to find a nice spot to watch the sunset. We found the perfect spot but the sunset wasn’t as incredible as we hoped for, because there were some clouds. Then, we headed back to the beach and had dinner at one of the barbecue street food places, directly at the beach.

After a nice shower, at least for the ones that had a hotel room, we stayed at the beach around a bonfire and had some beers.

The plan for the next morning was to get up, have breakfast, walk around the village, and then get on the boat back to Zhuhai. It started out how we planned it, I enjoyed one of those amazing Hong Kong waffles with a mango/papaya juice. But when we were heading to the port, we got told that there were no tickets available anymore for that ferry, although we booked them through an agency. We still had 2 hours until our ferry took off.

Most people weren’t happy about the delay, because everyone was tired and not prepared for another beach day. Some of us walked around the island, others grabbed lunch or went to the beach. Eventually, our boat arrived, and the sea wasn’t as rough as when we came to the island, so people felt much better. I basically slept during the entire journey again. J

Weekend Trip to Hainan – Day 3 & 4

Day 3

On Monday, we just wanted to spend a day at the beach. We decided to go to Haitang Bay, because we read that it wasn’t very crowded. The beach is over 45 kilometers long and it took as an hour taxi ride to get there. We went somewhere close to the new Duty Free Mall, because we thought that there must be some places to eat around as well. But no. The mall was surrounded by construction sites and hardly anything else. It seemed that they were building two huge resorts to attract more people to the mall in which you can find Western luxury and premium brands.

We still went to the beach and it was beautiful. There was literally no one. We went swimming and enjoyed the great weather. After a while we left to go to the more popular place which wasn’t completely deserted.

For dinner we went to a nearby street food restaurant that offered seafood, because Hainan is known for its seafood. On the side of the restaurant they had different aquariums with fish, crabs, shells and other seafood stuff. Most of them were still alive. We told the waitress that we wanted some mussels, oysters and a fish. We chose the fish we wanted and she took it out of the aquarium with a net. Before I realized what she was doing, she smashed the net with the fish inside on the ground, so the fish died.

We sat down on one of the tables and chose the rest of the food to share. There was a sticky coconut rice dish that I wanted to order, because it is also a specialty of Hainan. Soon, one after the other dish arrived and we started eating. We ordered so much that we were hardly able to finish it all but it was delicious. My favorite were the orange mussels and the spicy bean dish. After dinner, we walked around for a bit and bought two scarfs that we could use for the beach.

Day 4

On our last day, we got up a little earlier and visited a pearl museum. In Hainan or in the South Sea they cultivate and breed many seawater pearls, white and black ones, because the temperature of the sea is ideal.

It was interesting to learn something about pearls. I didn’t know anything about them expect that Chanel loved them and that they are quite expensive. After the museum they had a big shop where they sold any kind of pearl jewelry and skin care products with pearl powder. Pearl powder is used by Chinese women to maintain beauty and youth. It’s supposed to whiten your skin – a reason why I did not buy any. J

Later, we took a taxi to Yalong Bay which is a 7 kilometer beach, where all the expensive resorts are located. We had coffee and a snack at the Starbucks and looked at the few shops they had in that area. Then we headed down to the beach and sat under some trees that didn’t belong to any hotels. It was too hot for being in the sun. The waves were a bit high but we could still swim in designated areas. The water was almost crystal clear. No wonder this is the most popular beach in Sanya. It was the perfect place to spend our last day in Hainan. I got an ice-cream and a coconut from one of the street vendors. Unfortunately, the milk of the coconut had gone off, so I wanted to exchange it. When my Chinese friend asked him to do so, he answered (without tasting it) that the coconut is good and she probably never had a coconut before. Well, the street vendors are obviously not part of the 5-star resorts.

Before we left to go back to the apartment, we had some dinner in the restaurant/shopping area. The restaurant we chose, offered steaks and other western dishes. The images of the menu looked delicious. What they served, though, was a little disappointing. The steaks tasted more like burger meet. I definitely would not recommend this restaurant. We got some soft ice which made us happy again. Then we went back to the apartment, jumped in the pool to get rid of all the sand and tried to get a taxi to the airport (3 taxi drivers refused to take us, because the airport was close, so they didn’t want to use the taxi meter). The flight back to Zhuhai was less pleasant but this couldn’t change that we spent a great weekend in one of China’s most beautiful places.

Overall, the landscape and scenery in Hainan are beautiful. However, the region is definitely still being developed. There are many construction sites although it seems like there are already plenty of resorts and hotels, and a lot of them were half empty. Although it is just one city, it is really big and for a tourism destination the infrastructure is not sufficient. Only Yalong Bay has a shopping area with restaurants. But, directly at that beach there are no cafés which is too bad, so picnic is the solution. ;) And there is much else to do than going to the beach, for example we could have visited the rainforest or one of the small islands if we had spent some more days there.

Weekend Trip to Hainan – Day 1 & 2

Over May 1^st holiday, I went to Hainan with 3 friends for a long weekend. Hainan is the smallest Chinese province and an island in the South Chinese Sea. It is also called the Hawaii of China because of its beautiful landscapes and beaches. For a long time, Hainan used to be an exile place for criminals and disgraced officials, whereas now it is a popular tourism destination, most of the tourists are Chinese or Russian. We went to Sanya which is the tourist city of the island. It is located at the Southern end of the big island.

Sanya City

We left Zhuhai on Saturday, April 30^th and remained in Sanya until the evening of May 3^rd. The airport in Zhuhai is really far from the city. It took us a while to get there but then everything went smoothly. Already after exiting the plane, we felt the tropical climate. The temperatures were always between 25 and 33 degrees and it was very humid but sunny! J

We stayed at the Palmena Apartments which were very close to the Sanya Bay. From our balcony we were able to see the blue ocean. The residence had a pool which was one of the reasons why we chose this place. The area was quiet but a little far from the city center. The apartment was clean and had 2 rooms and a kitchen.

Shortly after our arrival, we packed our towels and walked down to the beach. It wasn’t the cleanest beach and I got bitten by small mosquitos, so I didn’t want to stay there. After walking along the beach for bit, we soon realized that there was nothing – no restaurant, no café. So, we took a taxi to the downtown to find a place for lunch. We had sushi and enjoyed an ice-cream at the Sanya beach which was the most crowded beach we encountered during our time there.

Sanya Bay

On Saturday night, we headed downtown again but to the Dadonghai area to check out the Dolphin Sports Bar & Grill which was rated very high on TripAdvisor. We arrived there quite late for dinner, and because they had a special night, and it was already crowded, we decided to eat somewhere else first, and then go back for a couple of drinks. 

We came across a square where they set up different food stands with a sitting area in the middle, and a stage with live music. We got a noodle soup and a beer from one of the stands, and sat down close to the stage. After dinner we walked down to Dadonghai Bay Coastal Bar Street and enjoyed a Pina Colada at one of the bars there. It was already a little late but the place must be really nice in the evening.

Then, we went back to the Dolphin Sports Bar & Grill and enjoyed ourselves there for a few hours before taking a taxi back to our apartment.

Entrance of the Nanshan Park

Day 2

On our second day in Sanya, we took a taxi to see the main attraction which we saw already from the plane: the 108 meter tall Buddha statue which was situated in the Nanshan Culture Tourism Zone. It was a 45 minutes taxi ride, the bus ride would have taken us much longer.

Statue of Guan Yin Buddha

Apart from the statue and the Buddhist temple, the park – in the middle of the Nashan forest – has little to offer. Its purpose seems to be to attract tourists and to make money (entrance fee of 120RMB). But this is just my opinion…The statue on a man-made island has been added to the area recently and it reminds me of the statue of liberty.

Still, we spent a couple of hours in the park, because the park had a lot of green areas to relax and enjoy the great weather. Also, the sites were far from each other and we discovered the park by walking, so it took us a while to go to the temple which lay at the end of the park. There was a bus but for that they charged an additional 30 RMB.

Picture with other tourists...

We decided not to go to the second biggest attraction on the island, the Tianya Haijiao, because they charged again 100 RMB for two big rocks on the beach with some inscriptions. It is said that this is the “edge of the world” and hence, very popular among Chinese tourists. We did not really want to go to another crowded place and thought that this area was not worth the entrance fee. Instead, we headed back to the hotel and enjoyed the pool for a bit.

At night, we went to Casamia – an Italian place on Sanya Bay and enjoyed a pizza and a glass of wine on their terrace. Although we were full, we still went to the city center to have ice-cream at a coconut themed place and took pictures of the city lights. The city comes to live at night. You can see many locals on their motorbikes, sometimes an entire family on one bike. It seems to me that Asian people do not like the sun, so they stay inside during the day and go out as soon as the sun is down.

The Story Behind the Fisher Girl Statue

Here is a short post about Zhuhai’s iconic Fisher Girl. The Fisher Girl Statue is the symbol for Zhuhai and you will see it on every city advertisement. Of course, there is a myth around it.

Legend says that once upon a time an angel descended to earth and was amazed by the beauty of the earth. She wanted to stay and became a fisher girl. She earned her living with fishing for precious pearls and she used her powers to help the villagers. One day, she fell in love with a young fisher named Hai Peng.

Upon hearing some bad accusations, Hai Peng forced the fisher girl to give him her bracelet which was magical in order to prove her love for him. She told him that the she received the bracelet from the eight palace mistresses when she was the daughter of the South Sea Dragon King. Its purpose is to protect her against the thought of abandoning immortality. If she removed it, she would die. Unfortunately, Hai Peng did not believe her and removed the bracelet. She died immediately.

Hai Peng was so sad, he went to the Jiu Zhou Huan Elder to ask what he can do in order to bring his true love back. The Elder told him that he needs to go to the Jiu Zhou Island to get the Resurrection Grass which then must be fed with man’s blood. Hai Peng succeeded to find it and grew it with his own blood. It took years for the grass to grow and finally, when it was ready, he was able to revive the fisher girl with it. She became a true mortal. When they got married, she found a gigantic and magical pearl which she gave to the reverent Elder as a thank you.

Isn’t this a nice story? The Chinese tourists think so as well. This is why there are always many tourists around the Fisher Girl taking pictures. Very close to the statue, there is also a nice park with beautiful flowers and a lake with small boats that you can rent. When the weather is nice on weekends, there are also some street musicians. This park is worth a visit as well.

Two of the Theme Parks in Shenzhen

Window of the World, Splendid China & the Folk Culture Villages

As mentioned in my last post, we visited 3 different parks of which one was combined. On our first day in Shenzhen, we went to the Window of the World. It is a theme park in which they replicated the world wonders, famous historical sites and natural landscapes of the world. Some of them are built at the ratio of 1:1, others of 1:5 or 1:15.

We started our journey in the Asian district which was quite big. Then we passed India and Australia and made it to Europe which buildings were very familiar to us. I liked how they rebuilt Venice’s San Marco Square. How they imagine the Netherlands was funny (see image with the many orange wind wheels). Africa was basically represented by Egypt with its pyramids and the Sphinx statue and by many wild animals.

When we came to the American continent, the sun slowly went down. It was kind of weird to see all the different sights from the US in such a small area. I especially liked how Cristo Redentor from Rio de Janeiro was now looking over New York City. You probably noticed that this city version still has the Twin Towers.

At last, we walked up the Eiffel Tour. It wasn’t as high as the real one in Paris, but we still had to walk up around 300 steps. The view was really cool. We were not only able to see over the entire park but we could also see a part of the city of Shenzhen.

Overall, it was really interesting to see the world in just a couple of hours. We walked around for over 2 hours and probably did not get to see everything but we were quite exhausted afterwards. We tried to guess where the different sites were located for real. In the European and American area we did very well but none of us has traveled much in Asia, so there our guessing was pretty bad. However, I saw some places that I definitely want to visit in the future. 

Splendid China & the Folk Culture Villages

On Sunday, one of my friends and I wanted to visit the Splendid China while the rest of the group preferred a relaxing day at one of the parks.

The Splendid China is a huge miniature park of all the famous sites and landscapes of China. The Folk Culture Villages represent the 25 minor Chinese ethnic villages that were reproduced. A couple of years ago the two parks got united and now you pay 180 RMB for visiting both. It is one of the largest theme parks in the world. There is a train, even a boat and other transportation means to make it easier for visitors to visit the park. We went for the option of walking, because in this way we could do everything at our own speed and had time to take pictures.

We started at the Splendid Village, because it was the main reason for choosing this theme park. In that part of the park there are supposed to be 82 miniatures and a bunch of tiny clay figures (about 50,000) are placed on the different sites.

The Great Wall was going through half of the park which showed how impressive it really is. There were also many other sites from the Beijing area. I’m really looking forward to going there…

After 3 hours of walking around the Splendid China, we finally made it to the other the Folk Culture Villages where they have many shows and performances. We started to watch an Oriental Show and looked at some of the ethnic house. After we watched the “large horse war show" about the Mongolian culture which attracted a lot of people and is probably one of the highlights shows.

We could have spent more time at the Folk Culture Villages and learnt more about the different ethnic groups. It is just a huge park and we have already done so much walking.

In both parks they had those yellow and orange fish and I was really wondering what the story is behind them. I found out that they are koi fish and that there are many legends around. Koi fish have an ability to swim against currents and upstream. Therefore, they are often associated with good fortune, success, ambition and courage. Depending on the color of the fish, they symbolize something else. For example, a silver colored koi stands for success in business. The Chinese also used to raise them in their rice fields, because they provided fertilizer and during hard winters they survived by eating the fish. So, it is also a symbol for prosperity. In Feng Shui it is tied to the yin yang symbol which you can recognize on the picture below. The black and white tear of the yin yang are supposed to be two koi.

This was a great cultural experience. We’ve learnt about the history, the culture, the art of China – and this in a fun way.

Weekend Trip to Shenzhen

This past Monday was a holiday in China –  the Quingming Festival or Tomb Sweeping Day. From that day on the temperatures are supposed to rise and the rain period starts which indicates the ideal time for sowing. It is not only an agricultural holiday but on that day Chinese people also pay respect to the dead. Tomb sweeping is the most important custom of the Quingming Festival. Many Chinese go back to their hometowns to pay respect to their ancestors. They clear away the weed around the tomb and plant new flowers or just bring a fresh flower bouquet.

For me, this meant that I did not have to go to work. Although according to my boss usually these holidays have to be compensated on a Saturday. Luckily, he did not insist on that, so I do not need to go to work this upcoming Saturday.

Me and some other interns used this long weekend to visit another city. We decided to go to Shenzhen which is just an hour ferry ride away from Zhuhai.

Shenzhen is located above Hong Kong and has over 10 million inhabitants. Only 30 years ago this big city used to be a fisher village called Boan Country. In 1979 it was given the name Shenzhen City and the first Economic Zone in China was established there in 1980. Today, it is also called the Silicon Valley of China due to the many technology companies that are based in the area. There aren’t many historical sites or beautiful landscapes but there are several amusement & theme parks. I guess that’s their compensation. I will talk about the ones we visited in a separate post.

From the ferry port Shekou we took the subway to our hotel which was located in the Luohu District, at the other end of the city. It took us over an hour to get there but the subway was air-conditioned and the cheapest transportation mean.

We stayed at the Sunon Hotel which was supposed to be a 4-star hotel, although I would classify it as a good 3-star hotel. Without knowing we chose a great location, because there are many shops and restaurants in the area. After the check-in we enjoyed lunch at one of the street food places. We ordered different dishes and shared them. My favorite was the honey bread.

The Dongmen Pedestrian Street is supposed to be the No.1 shopping center of the city. As you can imagine that attracts tons of people. The shops are small and typical Chinese, so bargaining is highly recommended. I felt a little bit overwhelmed by all the different shops and I didn’t even know what to buy, so we just walked around. You could see many fake products, some of a better and others of a worse quality.

My friend and I wanted to get our nails done. We let a Chinese girl in the streets talk us into it and followed her to a complex with many small shops. At one place you could even get colorful hair extensions and wigs. We sat down in the pink seats and then tried to tell them what we wanted. We were afraid that they would give us fake nails. Instead, we figured out after some time that they wanted to sell us the more expensive gel nails and massages. With much effort and a call to a friend of theirs who knew some English, they understood that we just wanted regular nail poslish. They did a really good job in filing our nails. My nails were done by a man which surprized me a little. The painting part was less pleasing. The polish must have been quite cheap…Nevertheless, it was a fun experience.

Before taking the ferry to go back to Zhuhai on Monday, we went to Sea World for lunch which is very close to the port. Sea World has nothing to do with the American Sea World. It is another attraction park but there is also a plaza with many Western-style restaurants and other entertainment spots. There is a big ship in the middle of the area which probably gave the area its name. We had Mexican food at the Tex-Mex while a thunderstorm suddenly came up. But the food was good and a perfect end for our trip.

Hello Kitty Café – A Must Go in Asia

I thought the best way to spend a rainy Sunday afternoon a few weeks ago, is going to the huge Huafa Mall in Zhuhai and looking for the Hello Kitty Café I read about somewhere.

At the Huafa Shopping Center you can find Italian fashion brands like Patrizia Pepe as well as American brands like Tommy Hilfiger and of course many interesting Chinese brands. As every large mall they also have a cinema and a lot of restaurants and cafes.

It took me a while to find the Hello Kitty Café and I almost gave up. They do have a map of the shopping mall and it indicated that the café is located on the ground floor. I walked through the entire ground floor twice but I could not find it. When I was about to leave, I noticed that there were some restaurants on the outside of the mall. I finally found it and by looking at it is hard to walk by. There are pink chairs surrounded by beautiful pink flowers in front of the café and a big Hello Kitty sticker is smiling at you from the window. 

The Bonbon Hello Kitty Café has created a real Hello Kitty world. Hello Kitty is a popular icon in China. I have seen many teenager and young adults walking around with a Hello Kitty bag that you would give to a 5-year old. I guess whoever came up with the idea of this restaurant knew how many fans such a theme restaurant must attract. The décor includes a lot of pink and cream yellow. Even the furniture is in Hello Kitty style. The tables are oval and some look like cookies. The pictures speak for themselves… 

It is not a cheap restaurant but it was lunch time when I was there and I was hungry, so I decided to get the seafood spaghettis and a watermelon juice. It wasn’t the best seafood pasta. That is not the reason why you go there, but it was definitely not bad. Eating spaghetti out of a plastic Hello Kitty plate made me feel like a child again.

I was curious how the cappuccino would look like. Would they be able to create Hello Kitty design with the milk foam? Yes, they were. And of course it came in a Hello Kitty cup.

Taking a picture with the cartoon cat is a must:

I wasn’t the only one in the restaurant. There were two mothers with their kids and they ordered huge ice-cream bowls. It looked yummy. 

This is for sure a highlight for every girl, not matter of what age. J