Authentic Chinese Life

My trip to the Fujian Province gave me hope that China could eventually become a “normal” country.  While many other Chinese scenic spots felt too touristy, the Northeastern Fujian Province was largely unspoilt.  I have been to several areas in China where you hear love songs while riding a lift to the peak of a mountain.   However, every place we visited in Fujian seemed very authentic. 

We spent our first night in a small coastal town called Fuding.  The town felt relatively quiet besides the literally nonstop construction all around the city.  Because the city looked underdeveloped, modern buildings felt completely out of place; specifically our hotel.  Imagine a nice looking building in the middle of a relatively poor Chinese neighborhood.  The town was undergoing a transformation, and the entire neighborhood felt like a big construction site.  Even though we traveled on one of the busiest days of the year, we did not see any tourists in the area.  As a result, we were able to haggle for our hotel room.  The woman at the reception asked for 350 Yuan. 

We gave her 100 and called it a deal.

Since few foreigners ever make it to Fuding, we attracted plenty of attention wherever we went.  People would literally laugh in my face and loudly call their friends to look at the laowai.  A group of twenty men were playing cards right below our hotel, and they tried to convince us to gamble with them.  Fortunately, we didn’t know how to play and decided not to gamble. 

Later on, we were bombarded by illegal taxi drivers wanting to drive us around.  We found someone to drive us to the beach.  While the beach scenery was phenomenal, the ocean was quite polluted and it took away from the experience.   I was really surprised by the number of illegal taxis around town.  It was as if most people in the town were either in construction or had nothing to do.

We decided to travel to the mountain the next day, and just getting to the mountain was quite the experience.  Locals told us we could take a bus from the bus station next door.  However, the problem was that 35 people wanted to ride a tiny bus with 15 seats and almost no standing room.  To make matters worse, this tiny bus was the only bus that would be traveling to the mountain that day.  Consequently, all 35 of us followed the bus around until it completely stopped and opened its doors.  Chaos ensued.  A man blocked the door to make sure his baby could board, but he was pushed out of the way after a minute.  Despite all the tense pushing, shoving, and yelling; everyone sat on each other once we were on the bus.  It was as if we became a big family once we got on the bus.

I’ll post more about the trip tomorrow.