Fujian Province and the Hakka People

This weekend we took a tour of a minority group in the province north of us. Fujian Province is one of the homelands of the Hakka people. The Hakka are scattered in southern Asia & famous for their three to four story round houses. We took a nice night train to Yongding & arrived at 4:40am, whoa. Well, we are awaken every day at 4am to the sounds of fishing boats leaving Shekou for the ocean. Chug, chug, chug every 4am. We also visited a small city called Xiamen. The Hakka at Yongding built these round houses for protection & also it prevents wives from "cornering" their husbands. They still live in them & they are built from mud, gluten, straw, etc. & rammed into shape. The people are very hospitable. The first floor and court yard is for cooking, eating, storage, threshing, socializing. The younger folks live on the third & fourth floors. The area is mountainous & gorgeous! Sure beats Shenzhen. Xiamen is on the coast & directly across from Taiwan. There are several small islands around it & the tiny relaxing island of Gulangyu. It was a world wind trip but nice.

Construction Everywhere!

China's new national bird is the crane, the construction crane that is! Our part of the city is under massive construction overhaul. Shekou and it's port will be transformed into a fancy neighborhood of high rise buildings and other structures. This will take place over many years but the construction pollution is already getting on everyone's nerves. It seems everywhere you go, you are forced to take to the streets as sidewalks are torn up to update the infrastructure for these new buildings. Our school and surroundings will be replaced by newer bigger buildings. So in a couple of years, school admin hopes, the school will be in Chi Wan, Shenzhen, where the old port is now. The site is an old bicycle factory and all the four campuses will be under one roof. The entire area of Chi Wan will be flatten for this construction boom. So goes the rent! Nationals and expats agree that this is going to be an area out of our price range so those who can will look elsewhere to call home.