Vacation to Tropical Hainan

Ahhhhh vacation! I just got back from the tropical paradise of Hainan Island, which is said to be the “Hawaii of China.” It would more adequately be named the “Hawaii of Russia”, however, based upon the outrageous number of Russians occupying the land (which I’ll tell you more about…later).

Now, I could spend this blog telling you about how amazing the vacation was (which, I should add, it definitely was). I could fill pages bragging about the ridiculously cheap hour long Thai massages we had 3 out of the 7 days, about the sun, bronzed skin, tropical beverages and fruit, Western food, fun hostel, great company, etc. etc. etc., but let’s be honest. There’s nothing fun in reading how great someone’s vacation was. While I’d love to brag about the great time I had, it’s more fun to read my retelling of the not-so-spectacular moments, and that’s what I’ll share with you today. :)

Okay, soooo like I said, Hainan was AMAZING and much needed. Before this trip my stress/tolerance level was pretty much peaked at its max and I could tell my body and mental health was going to have some serious damage if I didn’t give myself a break. Right before leaving, I dropped all of my exam/paper work/final scores off at my dean’s office. Mind you, the night before she had called me while I was in bed to ask me if I would be able to take some documents to Hainan and edit them for the textbook. I told her, of course, no. I gave the excuse that I wouldn’t be bringing my laptop, and that I’d probably be on the beach the entire vacation. Okay, so the day of the trip came, I entered my dean’s hole and handed her the necessary end-of-the-semester paperwork. She then introduced me to a lady whose name escapes me, but apparently she works at another school and is going to “observe” all of my classes next semester. Not sure why, that’s all I was told. Why question? So whatever. It was the day of my big vacation, so I didn’t care what the school wanted to throw at me for next semester. I handed my dean my USB stick so she could remove some of my last-minute documents, and what did she do? Naturally, she put on butt-tons of documents for the textbook, looked back at me and said “every hotel in China has a computer. You can find one and give these back to me when you get back,” then handed me my USB stick back. Well. Tsk. Well. I didn’t do those documents. This is part of my New Year’s “improve my mental, physical and spiritual health” resolution: just say no, Val Flynn, just say no.

Okay. So Hainan, like I said, is FULL of Russians. Not sure why the Russians love Hainan, but they do. A Russian comrade I met explained to me that he thinks they all go there because 1) it’s Communist and therefore the Russians find comfort in familiarity, and 2) it’s the closest tropical island to Russia. It was nice being surrounded by white people. At first Jonny, Sara (my traveling buddies) and I were in a bit of culture shock at the number of white bodies surrounding us. Honestly, where we were at there were more white people than Chinese. No one stared at us, and instead of Chinese people waving and saying “Hello!” the Chinese smiled and spoke Russian to us. The island was clean, (very clean), there were no beggars, no strays, big buildings, convenient hang outs, and Russians. It was weird and very twilight-zone-esq. And the Russians were very amusing people. I’ve found a new fascination in their culture and occupied much of my beaching to Russian-watching while pretending to read. It was entertaining. As a generalization, of course, they like to wear thong bikinis and take sexy pictures of each other. Mom’s, daughters, dads, brothers, small children, the works. Very amusing.

So in spite of how smoothly and relaxing almost every thing was, every trip, naturally, needs at least one small disaster in money spending, and Hainan was no exception. Sara and Jonny decided that, since the hostel offered so many travel opportunities, they really wanted to take a day and venture into the island and do one of the cool things offered. We had already heard bad things about snorkeling, scuba diving, and monkey island, so that left them with the Rainforest of Hainan. Initially, I wanted to save money and wasn’t going to go on a trip with them, but when “Rainforest of Hainan” was mentioned, my interest was sparked and, let’s face it, who would resist a rainforest in a tropical island? I was no exception, and 250RMB later (since I only make about 1,000RMB p/month, it was definitely a cut in the budget), Jonny, Sara, myself and Alec, a forty-one year old Russian who later became our comrade, boarded a taxi and headed two hours northwest of Sanya.

Now, when I say that we boarded a taxi, I literally mean a taxi, just like the ones in the US. Alec was no small guy (by any means) so we insisted he ride in the front while we three volunteers crowded in the back. Two hours later, our racist driver (he tried cutting down all of the minorities in China during the entire drive), who didn’t speak a word of English and had no idea about any spots of interest in this “rainforest”, drove us through and explained that there were three places to see. He would drive us to each of the spots, we would get out, take some pictures, and then leave. And that’s exactly what we did. It couldn’t have been lamer. This “rainforest” was pretty much someone’s back yard, there was construction everywhere, and literally, we drove through it in a taxi, we stopped for 15 minutes (literally. he gave us a time frame “you have 15 minutes and then return here. I’m going to smoke”), took pictures like we were really somewhere special, and then crowded back in the taxi to repeat the process two more times. It. Was. Lame. But every trip needs a lame rainforest of sorts. :)

Well, like I previously said, Alec became our new comrade. He was a recently divorced traveler who entertained us with funny stories of Russia and of his life. One of the musings that we Peace Corps volunteers noticed prior to this (during my “Russian-watching”) was that Russian women, while stunningly beautiful in their youth, become, no exaggeration, extremely, morbidly obese (but they keep the thong bikini, of course) after about the age of 30 or so. We asked Alec about the cause of this, not sure if it was a genetic thing or a cultural thing (‘maybe Russian women are expected to get fat after they marry?’), and Alec explained that it was both. I won’t bore you with the details of that, but I will give you a quote by Alec. Please picture this is a Stalin-esq accent “Take me, for example. I had liposuction twice. In my breast.” while grabbing his man-boobs. It was hilarious. I love Russians. Maybe I’ll visit there someday. Then again, Russia is pretty darn cold.

Okay, soooo let’s see. I met two Chinese boys (one a 22 year old who couldn’t speak any English, and another a 25 year old reporter from the north whose English was decent) who both decided they were in love with me, professed their love in the most movie-esq barf-romantic manner (seriously, this trip made me loathe the immaturity of a great number of Chinese men), told me they were going to move to Guiyang to be with me. Both of them. I didn’t give EITHER any impression (actually, I was quite blunt in my distaste for their immaturity) that I was interested or available. But it seems the meaner girls are here, the more boys want them. Either way, it added to the hilarity of the trip.

Okay, last funny thing to mention: In order to get to Hainan in the cheapest manner possible, we took the following route there: 27 hour train from Guiyang to Guandong Province, 3 hour taxi to the south of Guandong, 2 hour ferry to Haikou, Hainan, 4 hour bus to Sanya. It was a LONG 36 hour trip, and the route home was, of course, the same reversed. During the entire ferry ride Jonny, Sara and I occupied our time discussing the Beijing Peking Opera and our severe distaste for the screechy-nails-on-chalkboard noise. I don’t know if any of you have ever experienced the Beijing Peking Opera, but it hurts my ears and many Chinese people like to play it like pop music.

When we got to the south of Guandong and were trying to find a taxi to take us back to the northern train station, we found a guy who said he’d get us a ride lined up. Ten minutes later, an unmarked car pulled up, we negotiated a price, and then piled in the car. Instantly, however, we were bombarded with English techno music “do me. do me. do me. yeeaaahhh do me. I like it hot. hot. hot. do me. do me. do me.” The taxi driver then flopped down the passenger sun visor and to our astonishment and disgust, there, where a mirror should have been, was a TV showing white women stripping to the techno music. We stared in disbelief and sat uncomfortably for a few minutes. (**Flashback for a moment** Last year, when I was interviewing schools for an AmeriCorps placement, the principal of Central Alternative High School asked me “if you were any animal in the world, would you be an animal with thick skin or thin skin?” At the time I had no idea what he was asking and answered “um, thick skin.” The principal scrutinized me for a moment and then said “I don’t believe you. I think you have very thin skin.” He was right.) . . . . Now, after putting up with enough BS during these past few months, my thin is about as thick as steel and I find myself outright telling people when I dislike something. I gave this taxi driver the benefit of the doubt for about seven minutes and then, when the video started getting progressively raunchy, I decided this perv wasn’t going to change the channel. I asked him outright “Why are you watching this? This is disgusting.” He, apparently, also had thick skin because he looked off the road directly at me (driving in China is a skill which none really possess) and said “because my friend told me two white girls were getting in the car. I thought you’d enjoy it.” Unfortunately, no one has taught me how to say “shove it” in Chinese, so instead I answered that “no, American girls do not like watching perverted movies in Chinese taxis.” He then, go figure, put on the Beijing Peking Opera.

I’m now back in Guiyang, where it is outrageously cold. During the time away, apparently Guiyang got below freezing, because I came home to frozen shampoo and honey, dead plants, and even now, one day later, I can’t get my cement-walled apartment warm enough to take off my winter coat, hat or blanket. Thank god for more travels next week (I’m going for an in-service in Chengdu and then I’m going with 3 girl friends to backpack Yunnan province for a couple of weeks).

Last thing I’d like to mention, it turns out that the past speculations I made of China are, for the most part, false. The speculations I’ve been making are of Guizhou, since that’s where I live and travel. I’ve been told countless times that “Guizhou is ten years behind the rest of China” (I’ve even been told “twenty” by a few critics, but let’s give Guizhou the benefit of the doubt). Having only been to Chengdu, which was entirely occupied by training and didn’t give me a chance to venture out at all, I ignored this repeated comment. It wasn’t until this trip, however, that I realized how true this statement is. The rest of China is, for the most part, a completely different world. There is China, and then there is Guizhou. That is all. Now it’s time to put my gloves back on and stop typing because I’m REALLY cold. Have a wonderful day and, as always, I absolutely miss all of you!

xo