A Casa in Cina

L told me a funny incident yesterday - he was getting out of the lift when the doors opened and a monkey was standing outside on the ground floor. He was in shock and nearly shat himself. Last weekend, mom said everyone was amused by the AVA guys who were trying hard to catch some monkeys on the loose at the wet market. I don't know where they come from but they seem to be settling well in the neighbourhood.

Funnily I didn't see any monkeys at Hainan even though they had a widely publicised Monkey island (i kid you not!) All I remember were thousands of balmy coconut trees and rice paddy fields. The heritage trail was an amusing tale and I'd need more time to write about it (sorry was busy with a preview for a French auction house last week!). Firstly L was supposed to go with us but was rejected at the Budget terminal because he didn't know about the 'letter' from the China Embassy to say he can get a visa upon arrival. We were devastated. I wouldn't have gone if I hadn't booked the hotel at Sanya. Anyway we only had ourselves to blame becos we should have done our research and covered all grounds.

Mom and 2nd aunt (dad's side) were equally disappointed as they were hoping to show off L to the folks. Imagine bringing an angmoh to this remote rural village. He'd be a circus freakshow or hometown celebrity. Either way, it'd be hilarious. Anyway I'm cheating on my blog entry for this trip, and have cut and pasted the story I did for a food and travel magazine below - enjoy!

Hello To Hainan
Nothing quite prepared me for Hainan, even though I’ve heard several accounts of our ancestral village from my family. The travel literature on this ‘Hawaii of the Orient’ is also rather cursory and limited on the internet, so I could only envision this lush tropical island south of China (approximately four times as big as Singapore) by piecing imagery from the many Miss Universe beauty pageants that were paraded against the sunny backdrop of Sanya’s beach resorts.

Understandably this glamour factor, together with its all-year warm weather and many fine beaches of Sanya, are the main reasons why most tourists flock to Hainan. Since this was my first time in my ‘homeland’, I roped in my mother and aunt – both veteran visitors to Hainan. We would travel from Haikou in the north and eat our way to Qiong Hai and the nearby ancestral village Hui Li. Sanya would be the icing on the cake.

To begin with, Haikou is a bustling modern cityscape that is no different from Hong Kong with its maddening traffic and grim concrete terrain. I couldn’t mutter a word of Hainanese but thankfully my Mandarin (or ‘guo yu’) came in useful as we bantered with relatives over a feast of pork ribs and papaya soup, stir-fried beef and tofu, braised pork belly, baby sea cucumber with kalian vegetables, eggplant on sizzling hotplate and the ubiquitous Wen Chang chicken. Food is indeed a great ice breaker.

Apparently the inspiration for Singaporean’s Hainanese chicken, this local breed of Wen Chang chicken is a definite winner with its tender, flavourful and lean meat – simply boiled and served with a chilli dip (other frills like the ginger dip, dark soy sauce and rice cooked with chicken stock are Singapore inventions). At other meals, I got to try the other famous local specialties – Jia Ji duck and Dong Shan lamb – but alas, the He Le crabs were not in season.

At the morning markets of Qiong Hai (similar to those found in Vietnam and Laos), farmers showcased a wide variety of fresh produce, live stocks and rice – essential ingredients that contribute to the uncomplicated Hainanese cooking. Even favourite breakfast choices of Bao lor fun (thick succulent noodles in a meat gravy) and piping hot claypot porridge are unfussy and comforting.
Outside the cities, Hainan is simply green and verdant. Closer to the ancestral village of Hui Li, our taxi ride got bumpier as we passed by rice paddy fields, pineapple groves, guava trees heavy with fruit and troops of ducks wet from the rain. Once we got there, a curious crowd of relatives and villagers came to welcome us. Some of them had chosen to remain in the village and make their living as farmers. Their houses were austere by our standards but they should be proud of their abundant vegetable plots, fruit trees, and animal stocks of plump geese, chickens and ducks.

After paying our respects at the ancestors’ altars, I was quite amazed to learn that all the family records were still being updated and we could trace our roots to our predecessor Lu Duo Xun more than 1,000 years ago. He was a politician, historian, writer, diplomat and philanthropist who fled the warring states in mainland China in that era and had come to settle in the village.

We considered it a huge privilege to be able to trace our heritage and are also grateful for the opportunities that we have now, had it not been for my grandfather who left Hainan at the tender age of 14 to seek a better life. As we sat down to a sumptuous home-cooked lunch washed down with plenty of fresh coconut juice, our two different worlds were united by a common lineage.

I wasn’t prepared for what I had experienced so far on the trip but more surprises awaited at Sanya. For starters, one would think we were in Russia, given the prolific Russian street signs and adverts found there. Apparently Sanya has long been a tropical haven for Russians to get away from the cold, and is also an alluring beach destination for waves of well-heeled mainland Chinese tourists decked in shocking Hawaiian prints.

With the boom in tourism and property market, many international hotel chains, from the likes of The Hilton to The Banyan Tree, are claiming their stakes at Sanya and changing the landscape at an alarming rate. But for now, the public infrastructure and urban planning still have a long way to go, compared to the more matured beach destinations in Asia. Sanya has a lot of potential, especially in the region of eco tourism with its rich natural resources of volcanoes, hot springs and ancient forest reserves.

It’s a shame we didn’t have time to explore these natural treasures but we did enjoy our last days in Hainan lapping up the fine powdery beaches, dining on the wonderful live seafood and relaxing to traditional Chinese massages. We also lugged back exquisite dried seafood, Chinese herbs, preserved fruits, coconut candy and coconut-laced coffee so we could share a taste of Hainan with our loved ones at home.