Saturday Night in Xiamen

Well, even though we were tired, we ventured out Saturday night. You can see us in the front of our hotel. The hotel faces the water, but also faces two major construction sites. It is a very nice hotel, but is Asian. It caters to Asians and we found that we are pining for the breakfast we had in Xi'an (you know, the one with the chicken broth syrup and warm bread for toast). This breakfast makes that look like a feast from a westerner's perspective.

We were hoping to get to Easter Vigil mass at the local catholic church. It is located on Gu Lang Yu Island. It is a very pretty island that was settled years ago by catholic missionaries. On the way to the ferry boat for the ride to the island, we marveled at the bright lights of the big city. I can't wait to get home and replay the video from 1995. We stayed at the Holiday Inn Crown plaza. It was the tallest building around and considered upscale. I remember the video I shot from the window in our room. There was nothing but single story buildings around. When you walked out the front door, there was very little there. Mainly , Xiamen was street front shops, small buildings and was very "non" modern. It was clearly on its way...there was some building going on and it was designated a "special economic zone."






However, I did not think it was physically possible to build all the sky scrapers they have built in this town in just 13 years. It is really unbelievable. There are massive highways and overpasses...they are constructing two additional bridges to connect various districts of Xiamen separated by the sea. It is a bustling city.

We hopped off the ferry and headed to the catholic church. It was packed and the mass was in Mandarin. But we gave it a shot. They conducted a candlelight processional which was pretty cool. We participated for a while, but the crowded conditions (standing only), lack of understanding of anything being said, and the humidity caused us to throw in the towel. We had been doing well eating some very delicious Chinese food all week. But, to celebrate the end of our first week, we hit McDonald's for some greasy burgers. You can tell from one of the night photos of the skyline that western fast food is big here. Note the tall building topped by a Pizza hut sign with KFC and the golden arches clearly visible.







This island is fantastic, lots of great shopping and is really a tropical paradise of sorts. We will come back on Monday to shop and look around.

In preparation for going to the orphanage tomorrow, we wanted to stop and get candy. Linda insisted she had seen a candy shop. So we went searching for it and found the place she had seen. Ashley and Becky were clearly the hit as you can see from the pictures of them posing with the ladies in the shop. They all insisted on getting pictures with the celebrity blonds.

Unfortunately, this is were we discovered what they were selling was not exactly what we were looking for in candy. This was a FISH store and those things they were giving us were FISH CANDY. To be polite we bought a bag and decided to stop at the grocery store on the way back to the hotel for the real deal.

Its off to bed to get some rest. We have to leave early tomorrow to meet up with the director at the orphanage.