People have been asking me what we did in Hainan Island. The answer is ‘hardly anything’.
(Edit: And NO, there wasn’t a Rain concert in Hainan Island, in case anyone is wondering.)
Afterall, we were there for effectively three days. We spent one night and one morning in Haikou and the rest of our time lazing in the Kempinski resort in Sanya, drinking Chinese tea.
(The ride from Haikou to Sanya takes between 3 to 4 hours, depending on whether you travel by bus or a taxi.)
In between our tea sessions, we visited the beach, I picked sea shells, my colleague made full use of her bikini in the pool, I snoozed on the deck-chair by the pool.
We also checked out the resort’s spa. I’m not very fond of visiting spas but don’t mind getting a good body scrub once in a while.
Except for the time when we accidentally locked ourselves in the balcony and had to shout like crazy for help, we didn’t have any particularly interesting encounters. Thankfully, a hotel staff heard our cries and got someone to rescue us from our own idiocy (and a faulty balcony door lock).
Oh, we met a rather interesting Russian lady at the resort. Interesting because she speaks Mandarin quite fluently, albeit with a strong foreign accent.
I have never had a conversation with a Caucasian in Mandarin!
We chatted for a while and she told us that she studied in Haerbin for four years and that’s when she learnt to speak Mandarin. Her family has been spending the first 5 months of the year in Hainan Island the last two years so as to stay away from the harsh Russian winters and to let her children study Mandarin in China.
After talking to her, I felt a strong urge to polish up on my Mandarin. It is in a deplorable state.
