..And here we are China! We flew to this small Island called Hainan and my mom booked a hotel far from tourists hoping to see real China. And she got it no doubt. First thing we encountered was that nobody understood the word “taxi”, until my dad drew a picture and got recognized, we were happy we got it solved. Since we booked the hotel online in Vancouver we had a confirmation with the address printed in English not in Chinese and that was a problem we didn’t think about. The second thing we learned was that everybody tried to help, the taxi driver even tried calling some friends who could maybe read English and find our hotel. As we were spoiled during the trip, where everybody was taking dollars, this time we needed the bank. Well the first bank was closed due to Christmas decorating but thankfully the second one was there for us. Eventually we found the hotel (far far from everything in the middle of nowhere) and after the first night where we couldn’t communicate with the hotel staff, again dad was showing the taxi drawing and I heard my mom saying for the first time “I want to go where tourists go”.
So my mom started calling random numbers which were on Chinese tourist pamphlets in the hotel hoping that somebody would speak English, but no luck there. At around 10:30 at night we received a phone call…seems like somebody must have helped us and made an English speaking person contact us. That night we arranged for a taxi to pick us up in the morning at 10am to go to the office and see how to get to the more visited part of the island the day after. We were ready at 10; taxi arrived at 11….We managed to book new hotels and transportation to a new place. 4 hours later we were in our new Hotel where we still didn’t have much chance to ask questions in English but at that point we were pro using our hands and sounds (mom making chicken sounds to order chicken for dinner)
We spent 7 days on Hainan Island, we saw the rainforest, long stretches of beaches, fishing villages, fascinating night markets and mommy went to the monkey island. I stayed with dad in the pool. For Christmas dinner we found an Italian restaurant, pizza and pasta had never tasted as good as they did that day.
We met wonderful, warm and generous people who were giving me gifts and lots of smiles. Jala, our guide for 2 days, who happened not to be a tour guide but working in the office, helped us a lot. Mom is still in touch with her via email. We left China after 7 days back to Singapore and then back home.
During my travels I met wonderful people, lots of smiles and generosity. I was like a little celebrity for them and they were celebrities for us …I guess it balanced out. Oups that was a long post…Hope you enjoyed it all.

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