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Published: November 22nd 2009
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Kinmen Island
On the left is still China, while the island with a shape of a dogbone is Kinmen - Taiwan. The distance is ~1 hour by boat. Kinmen - Taiwan
During our dinner discussions with Hiroshi he mentioned to us an interesting thing. Apparently there is a tiny island East of China which belongs to Taiwan. You can reach Kinmen Island by boat in 1 hour from Xiamen city.... yes, Chris got very excited of having a chance to collect an additional country stamp in his passport... and it did not take for him much time to convince me that a break in Taiwan would do good to us, so next day after our rise on the nice pig and duck wake-up call melodies we headed to east instead of south to catch the last boat from Xiamen to Kinmen island (Jinmen is the chinese name). Surprisingly the bus ride was really disgusting, our luck was not with us. For some reason the felllow travellers were all using their red-colored "throw up bags" provided by the bus company... Still dont know why as the road was not really curvy and we had not experience this "bus-sick phenomenon" before. Unfortunately we did not have our ear plugs with us for this short 3 hours drive... so we tried to drift our thoughts away and were strongly focused
Fish hotpot
Offered by our patriotic friend, whose name is still unknown to us. But the food was good! on the banana fields that we passed. Anyways, at the end we made it to Xiamen. After riding through the city with a friendly cab driver we had our quickest ever departure from a country and our arrival to Taiwan was equally swift.
The 'grand' Taiwan sightseeing tour
We stayed on the island less than 24 hours, but still we saw a lot. And this is because at leaving the boat in Taiwan a local traveller approached us inquiring what the hell we caucasians do on his island, as they basically never get visitors.... So we told him our story of "hit and run" trip to Kinmen which amused him a bit. And at the same time his local patriotic feelings strengthened and he felt he was responsible for our well-being on the island... He offered to help us to find a hotel at a reasonable price and we also got a free lift to town with his friend and 2 kids... Moreover, he wanted to make sure we see the local sights and try the local delicacies before we depart, so he invited us for dinner and for a night sightseeing in the city... we felt
One more country in the pocket!
... and 4 stamps within 24 hours. But Agi did a couragious attempt to prolong the hours , by first failing a Mexican flu test: her temperature was 36.7. So a second opinion was needed. She passed the second attempt and was welcome again to enter China. a bit uncomfortable with all the hospitality, but at the end we accepted the invitation. He was very glad, took us to a cosy local restaurant to where he also invited his other friends to join us (and experience the company of ours.... we felt we were more a sight than them for us). Had a great meal, tried the local beer and spirits and after our meal he drove us around in town and also to the beach... Yes, we felt a bit releaved when we got back to the hotel and he told us that he could not join us for the day after as he had stuff to do... I dont want to sound rude, but there is a limit in hospitality, if it's too much, that's also not too good... but once in a while it's OK.
Next day we wondered around in town, tried to buy some local stuff with our chinese yuans but apparently nobody wanted to accept these. And even the ATMs were not happy with our VISA cards so we did not spend much.... but finally we found a souvenir shop where they accepted credit cards, so we could buy some
Beach view at night....
And our patriotic friend actually mentioned that he brings girlfriend to this spot at night... He also said that foreigners are hired to clear the mines... He actually had a Chinese girlfriend, but no more. Is there a connection? local goodies (peanut biscuits are gorgeus, and they also famous for their dried meats), so we packed up before taking the boat back to Xiamen.
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