I was trying to talk Andy into writing this blog and his version of it was:
We went to Xiamen.
It was fun.
We miss you.
Love u long time. (something that our tour guide wrote in an email before we arrived to Beijing and he has been quoting ever since.)
Seriously though, I have convinced him to sit down with me so we can write it together.
Friday evening, November 2nd, we left for Xiamen, China in Fujian province. Xiamen is directly west of Taiwan and slightly north of Hong Kong. We flew Xiamen Airlines which gave me a bit of anxiety since I had never heard of it and generally-speaking unknown Chinese airlines are quite sketchy (see “Christmas in the South China Sea” blog from last December). The flight was very turbulent but fortunately it was on a very nice plane (Andy: Yes a brand new Boeing 737 Model 800). We were actually impressed with the airline and the subsequent airport in Xiamen.
We were traveling with some of the members of the Shanghai Boat and Yacht Club (SBYC). Many of them were going to be competing in the (Andy: China Club Match Race) yacht race the following day. After we arrived, we checked into the Sofitel hotel and found out our “special room rate” rooms were not available and thus we needed to purchase a suite…so typical. Luckily the rooms were very nice and still quite inexpensive.
Andy is going to type now.
We met some fellow SBYC members for dinner at an Italian restaurant. The food was excellent, and the beer was even better. Alecia and I found our favorite beer “Schneider Weisse” at the establishment. We were blown away by the low cost of the meal. It was less than half the cost of a similar meal in Shanghai. After dinner, we joined up with Peter and Susan from the club for a drink in the hotel bar.
The next morning I got up at 7:00am to take a stroll around the neighborhood. The ocean was near, and I was eager to take a look at the park on the edge of the water. At 9am I met up with a some guys from the club to head out to the race. The “GAWs” (Girlfriends and Wives) slept in a little later and enjoyed a nice breakfast. Except for my wife, Alecia, who was out running laps around the shore and lake in town. She hardly got to eat any breakfast, which would not bode well for her mood later in the day. 
If you want to read the details of the sailing race, you can check them out at www.sailinganarchy.com. Look for the article called “Nation Building”. You can also see Alecia and I on the spectator/committee boat at http://www.sailinganarchy.com/fringe/2007/images/china%20cup%201.jpg. You can see me standing on the blue boat in the back. Our club sail boat is the one in the foreground.
The day was a lot of fun. I have always dreamed of seeing a real yacht race in person. Even though it was not the Americas Cup, it was very exciting. We were watching the race from the committee boat, which was actually a Chinese fishing boat that the organizers rented out for the day. The one mistake I made was not to bring any food or water with me on board. Luckily the other GAW’s brought some KFC. Alecia came up to me after eating a chicken sandwich, and told me “Well, I figured it was either you or me for the chicken sandwich, and I figured you would have wanted me to eat it.” Alecia made a wise choice. For all of you men who have been around a hungry woman, you know it is better for you to starve and keep them fed.
We were told it would be hard to grab a cab from the marina. A couple friends of ours from the club (Katia (from the Ukraine) and Karril (from Russia)) wanted to catch a cab, so we headed out to the highway with them. I would have preferred to stay and wait for the shuttle bus, but I have learned in the past that a cold/hungry woman gets to do whatever she wants.
After 15 minutes of waiting in the cold, we finally got a cab back to the hotel. At around 8:00pm we went out for a nice seafood dinner with the other club members.
On Sunday, Alecia and I got up and headed over to Gulangyu “Expat Island” to check out some tourist sites. Back in the early 1900’s all foreigners doing business in China could not live on the mainland. The island is about 500 meters offshore. It has a lot of old villas and is now a national park. No cars or bicycles are allowed on the island. Alecia and I jumped on the overcrowded ferry and headed for the side of the boat quickly. We always figure if the boat goes down we have more of a chance to get off if we are standing at the side.
Once we were on the island we headed off the beaten path and spent a couple hours wandering around the outskirts of the island. It was a pretty cool place. There were a few beaches and tide pools along with a lot of old run down European style villas. At one point on our walk, one of the electric oversized golf cart tour vehicles drove by and pointed out to everybody in the car, that “You can see a couple foreigners on your left.” It is always fun being the odd person in the crowd.
After the island we headed over to a Brazilian steak house for lunch. Normally these places serve all you can eat meat on a sword. This place was no different. The only catch was that they served more “localized” meat. At one point they came out with some animal stretched across two swords. It could have been a cat or small dog. We were never really sure what it was. But it did taste like chicken. They also brought out squid on a sword.
After lunch we found a cab to take us back to the sailboat races. We managed to make it in time for the last two races. Unfortunately, our team lost by 3 seconds. Oh well… there is always next year.
Alecia will now type again:
Wow, I leave the room for a few minutes and my occasional hunger-induced grumpiness is published on the web for all the world to see… Luckily I know for a fact that I am not the only woman with this problem.
I think Andy did a great job of summarizing our trip. I will say that we figured out that the animal on a stick must have been a rabbit as we saw a list of all of the things they were bringing around on swords that day and rabbit was the only one that fit the physical characteristics that we saw of the animal.
All in all Xiamen was a great place to visit and we enjoyed our weekend there. It was the first Chinese city we have visited where I actually felt relaxed. Maybe it was because of the relatively few inhabitants (only two million) or it could have also been due to the surrounding ocean and inland lakes that were quite beautiful. I contend that it would be a great place to invest in as I see it as the Chinese version of San Diego. It is quite unique because the north side of Xiamen Island has very windy, ocean conditions great for sailing, while the south is very warm, excellent beach weather. All of the climates you might want in one area…
Besides our weekend trip, we have been doing much of the “usual” in town during the week. We have made some nice new friends lately from the sailing club, the gym and yoga class and have enjoyed spending time with them lately. I will be coming to Boise in December for business so I have been busy buying requested items from co-workers and family/friends. Last Friday night we had a poker night at our apartment which was a lot of fun. Then Saturday I spent running and going to yoga class, then shopping with my yoga teacher after class. Andy was out at at the lake enjoying Calypso on a beautiful day. Saturday night we went to our French friends house for a wonderful dinner with other members of the sailing club who had also been in Xiamen. It was fun to talk with some other people about their experiences in China and we, of course, enjoyed the fantastic food. Sunday, our friend Alan joined us on Calypso for a very long race. There were three Dragons out on the lake and we actually rounded the first mark in first place, which was our personal victory of the day. We had to take that as our victory as the other two dragons ended up passing us at various later stages of the race. Yesterday, my new friend Jennifer introduced me to a new pedicure shop and then we had dinner together. Finally, tonight Andy and I did a bit of shopping for some people in Boise then tried a new, fabulous sushi restaurant down on the Bund. It was a bit pricey but worth it as we have not had sushi rolls so good since we left the United States.
This coming Saturday we leave for a one-week vacation sailing around the islands near Phuket, Thailand. We are very much looking forward to our time in the sun, on the beach and on the boat. I also cannot wait to try authentic Thai food! Our good friends Claudia and Patrik will be on the trip so I really look forward to getting caught up with Claudia, as she has been in Germany since July. We do not know the two other couples on the boat that well (besides our planning meetings), but they did most of the planning and they seem quite nice. We expect it to be an incredible experience and we look forward to sharing it with you all upon our return. Until then…
Happy Thanksgiving.
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