Fuzhou and Family - Bad Mix

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January 1st 2009

Published: January 1st 2009

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midnighttan

Fruit Stall

Sell when the selling is good!

29th of December 2008 - 1st of January 2009

First of a little bit about the port city, Fuzhou (population approximately 6,608,000) is the capital of the province of Fujian. It is located on the north bank of the Min River (the largest of Fujian’s rivers). Some more interesting facts about this city are:

- It was used as the main line of resistance (unsuccessful) against the British fleet arriving from Guangzhou in the 19th century.
- A short-lived republic (democratic) was established in the area after the Manchu army surrendered in the province.
- It is also the main home of the Snakeheads (people smugglers) and also the main port in which illegal immigrants arrive to foreign shores.

Okay, now that you have a little bit of a background, let me give you my impressions - the city although much improved from six years ago is still absolutely filthy (with the wet weather also not helping matters). It isn’t helped by the distinct lack of things to do and our overprotective aunts, whom insisted that, we (my sister and I), were to be escorted around by someone of the family and not wanting to be rude we

Fuzhou: Typical Street

This gives you a better idea of what the atmosphere in Fuzhou is like

obliged. As you may have guessed this got real old after the first hour. Eventually we just went out against their wishes.

Going out, not much to see, did a bit of shopping and a bit of house keeping as well. Fixed up my plane ticket back to Sydney (which was a huge effort on the part of my uncle - THANK YOU), our accommodation in Hong Kong and our local phone sim cards. The things we still need to sort out are my return visa into Guangzhou and our final itinerary in Malaysia.

My second day in Fuzhou wasn’t so fun - seems like a contracted a bad case of gastroenteritis and was bedridden for a day after a sleepless night of being green around the gills of which I will spare the extra details.

New years eve was a bit of a bum since Fuzhou isn’t really a party town and the locals really don’t take it very seriously. On the bright side, we did manage to score a ton of pirate DVD’s, which will keep us sufficiently, distracted, but doesn’t quite live up to drunk girls and booze, oh well there’s always next year.