Hello World!
Happy New Years! I cannot believe it is 2019 already. I am beginning to see what the elders meant now when they say as you age the years fly by.
With Hainan, my bro Ming and I decided that we wanted to go there because it was locally known in China for being the Hawaii of China. The funny thing is that I have never been to Hawaii and have flown over it countless times to go to Asia. When I hear the word Hawaii my head imagines the nice warm sun protruding on my sunkissed skin with a mild layer of roasting. I also imagined a strong Salty breeze flowing along with the relaxing roar of the ocean waves.
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
A little backstory of Ming and I. He is a local Hong Kong native and I am a native American. We both used to study Engineering together at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Over the years we became very close and we are like brother now a days. As we became adults with our degrees he went into the work field and I decided to pursue a PhD in Engineering at University of California, Irvine. A post of my first time in Hong Kong in 2013 was posted before just look under the Asia tab. Eventually we talked and found a date to where we both can meet up since we have not seen each other since 2016. I was already in Japan so I planned to go to Hong Kong and then we would fly together to Hainan but a Super Typhoon hit Japan the day I was supposed to leave and caused catastrophic damage to the Country especially in the Southern Region. My flight was cancelled to Hong Kong and I had to wait a day or two to go so eventually a flight went to HK but it happened to be on the same day that we planned on leaving HK to Hainain so I pretty much got to HK airport and just waited for Ming to meet me there so we can fly again. The good thing about the trip was Hainan is only 2 hours by flight away from HK. It is a tiny island that is extremely close to Vietnam .
So we arrive to Hainan and it was a breath taking view, just watching as we approached the runway. One I have never seen a city in China with such great air quality. I was thinking that it would be a small village because people in China refer to it as a small town but it was a sizable city that is probably because of a small town in the USA has a different standard than a small town in China. We found an Airbnb to stay in in some part of the city by the beachfront. As we got out the airport it was so hot there like I felt like we were in a sauna. HK is already a hot, humid place and Hainan was even hotter. The building we stayed was large it had at least 30 floors in it and we were like on the 20s floor but it looked half abandoned. It was strange because it was almost nobody was in that building considering how big it is. The first thing I spotted was a dead roach the size of a flash drive and we struggled trying to pick it up.
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
We did not really plan out what to do in Hainan so there was a vendor lady that advertised water parks, theme parks, and water tours to us and we planned from that. It was pretty cheap but the process to buy in China is so difficult for no reason. For example we bought tickets to Romance Park and the lady did not give physical tickets and Ming and I were confused on how we were supposed to get the tickets. They wanted to send a ticket link through the phone but we did not have service in Mainland China. So we went to the cellular store and the salesman would not sell us the phone card because we did not have a mainland China ID which years ago I never had a problem getting a SIM card in China but now it is hard probably because of the tougher policies China have been implementing to monitor everything. So the salesman took our money and said that he can get us the SIM card from another store and we had to follow him in a Taxi. So at this point Ming and I are looking at each other thinking “This Mfer is trying to play us”. After experiencing this people would understand why we felt like we were getting played. However he got us the SIM card at the other store location somehow and it worked out. After that we returned to the lady and got our tickets sent through Wechat and then we caught another Cab to Romance Park. That taxi was cheapest taxi we ever took in China. Something with Hainan the Taxis are significantly cheaper than the other cities in China.
We arrived to the Gate of Romance Park and saw these colossal statues of an ancient statues. It was very cool to look at. we went to redeem our tickets and the people told us that we could not redeem the tickets until 2 hours passed from the time we purchased the tickets from the lady at the Airbnb and I was what? It did not make any sense at all to us so we just sat there until it was time and then went into the park.
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
The first thing we went into was the ICE Park which we had no idea this damn place was literally a winter wonderland. We were wearing shorts and tank tops since it was like 105 F outside and people were looking at us like you do not want to go in there. Luckily the gave out some long coats and legging for us so we do not freeze to death in the summer there. We dressed up and went in and instantly felt the frigid temperatures. It was astonishing seeing the inside of this Ice world. It was a winter wonderland. We decided to let our inner youth out and started sliding down the ice slides and the snow tubes. It was really fun and cold. They even had a haunted house inside of the ice place that everybody was scared to go in because we did not know what might jump out of the dark room.
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
After the Ice world we went into Wild World which there are wild exotic animals everywhere. This was pretty cool it felt like a mini zoo with many animals that I have never seen before.
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
We walked around the park more and noticed that the women were dressed in these really extravagant dresses and the men were wearing some type of traditional garments. I asked about the dresses and was told that it was traditional thing that the minority group there did. In Hainan the people are considered minority groups because they look darker than the Han Chinese and have a special history and culture there. I think the minority group there were called the SongChen.
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
The last thing we did that night was go to a performance. There was group called the SongChen Group company that hires lots of acrobats to do amazing stunts that I only can barely compare to Circus Du Solei. This acrobats were on a whole another level in this because they actually interacted with the crowd and the stage would move the crowd around it was crazy. I thought I was crazy like how are we moving so much? Watching this performance gave me a huge education on this minority group about their history that was really an outstanding way of presenting history. They had at the end all of these fish fall from the ceiling and light up and they had mermaid slip and sliding above our head to Katy Perry. Ming and I were so breath taken by the whole performance I am glad that we went. It was like 30 USD for the tickets.
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
We watched a songchen group performance and it was amazing this is the ending part of it. I have never seen a performance like that in my life.
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, September 8, 2018
More of the SongChen performance
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Tuesday, September 11, 2018
For the Next day we decided to go scuba diving the whole day. Oh man that beach was amazing. We were not sure how things worked with the water resort day because it is China and the do not explain things when you purchase things like that. One of the activities we did was jet skiing which was we just got to take turns taking a lap around the Ocean. Then we did some type of islander dance that we dressed up in pompoms and danced . I could not get Ming to join in he was like hell no. Then we went Scuba Diving which was interesting. Trying to put on the scuba suites were hard because were already wet and smelt horrible. I could just imagined somebody’s sweaty body and pubes all in that suit. As we put on the gear we could see the workers fixing the oxygen tanks and they were smoking while opening the valves right next to us. I told Ming bro we better pray nothing explodes. Those workers gave no regard to safety. We both went underwater and Ming’s Oxygen tank was not working so he had to get another one. I went under and there were so many different fish in there and swam with me. I felt like I was a underwater king having all of those follow me. Then a big ass sting ray mimicked every move a made it was directly below me at arms reach and it stayed with me the whole time. I was getting scared because I saw that long ass tail on it and thought about the Crocodile Hunter that died from a stingray. This giant pool of water was at least 50 feet deep.
DCIM100GOPRO
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
DCIM100GOPRO
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
For the last thing we did in Hainan was go to this super large fish market and bought hella fish and crabs. We ate good that night. So in this specific market there are a lot of restaurants around the area but they do not have the food. You have to go to the fish market and buy the food and take it to the restaurant so they can prepare and cook it. Talking and negotiating for the fish was another whole animal in that market. All of the seafood is alive and they just scoop the fish up and tie to a plastic bag and it is just flopping around when I am carrying it until it dies. I felt so bad for the fish, I did not know how to react to everything that we bought was still alive and moving. I have never heard of that anywhere that seems just like a special Hainan thing. We told this lady that we wanted our food mild and she was like okay and Ming and I cannot tolerate spicy food. This food was so good but it was super spicy and I was like how is this mild? We were sweating buckets. Another thing in China is that they love to give you dished wrapped in plastic which would give the impression that they are clean but they are not. So you usually ask for a wash bucket to wash your dishes with the hot water they give in the tea kettle. They gave a mop bucket that was dirty Ming and I was like eww. So we ended up eating the food slowly and drinking some mango smoothies while trying not to pass out from the spiciness of that food and this man was sitting across from us and he stared at me the whole two hours we were there. I felt so uncomfortable like he was not even being discrete about it he just flat out stared at me while drinking liquor. before he left he say something in Mandarin to me like to offer a cigarette but I told him I do not smoke but thanked him.
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
Posted by De'Von Jackson on Saturday, January 12, 2019
I am so happy that Ming and I planned this vacation it gave us time to catch up on our busy adult lives and just have fun. Hainan was an amazing place that I want to visit again sometime soon and try other things that we missed from that trip. I highly recommend people to go there and visit.
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