Goolanggallygoogoo

Thursday a.m. here in Xiamen and I am beginninng to feel like my Britta self. Had a power sleep after a lovely swim in the pool last night and I am ready to roll for China Adventure day 2. Chris just put on a mini puppet show with her most recent purchase-as if she were talking to our guide Mr. Min Peng. So good to be with someone who can make you laugh so hard you cry-daily. He is rather molded by "the party", and so has his own required agenda. We are strategizing on how we will get our way today in the tour of Hazel's birth city. He was trying to tell us we would only go for a few hours and come back to Xiamen for lunch as Zhangzhou restaurants-"not so sanitary." Chris knows that this is her day so we have researched and made our own agenda for a full day. He also told us only 2 hours on the island which has already proved to be very wrong. (Sidenote--I have decided to keep a tally of twin count. Yesterday as we strolled through the streets of Gulangyu (a colonial island with no cars) a woman looked at us and said "twins" and nodded her head yes-that makes 3).
Ah the island...we walked down the waterfront and were approached by a few men that persuaded us to let them take us by junk to the island-Chris bargained and got the ride for about $6-seemed like a good deal. It was refreshing to be on the water with the spray hitting us in the midday heat and felt kinda wild to be on a boat not really knowing where/if we would land. The island is a Colonial island that allows no motorized vehicles. It has an art and music school, a military base keeping watch on Taiwan, a few museums, a gondola, bird aviary (probably stay away from that flu factory) and a population living and working within these very old and architecturally beautiful buildings that are seemingly melting back into the landscape. We both felt as if we were in a movie or some place vaguely familiar. (Midnight in the Garden of good and Evil, The Secret Garden, BUena Vista Social Club, Grey Gardens) It has the narrow streets of a European city winding through the hills with walls hiding secret magical gardens and decaying buildings. The flora was tropical and verdant. Vines crawling up colonial columns and creeping in stained glass windows. Rusted iron balconies and flower ladden courtyards. It felt to me what Havana looks like-having never been there. Part of the walk there was instrumental tunes of "Strangers in the Night", "Bridge over Troubled Water" and a few other favorites blaring on pathway speakers. We spent at least two hours wandering, peeking, taking photos of the people and their daily life and getting the intense stares and attention of a Rose Queen. At the end as we rested on the seawall, a teen girl was having her boyfriend take her picture and I was going to be the background-right as he took the photo she ducked so it would be of me-is it the red hair? the skin? the size? puzzling but we just smile and say Ni Hao. We will definately head back for more exploring tomorrow or tonight. We took the locals ferry home for about $1 each-oh well, our private junk was pretty cool. And those Curry Crab Pringles made an amazing dinner-seriously.