I arrived in Haikou, Hainan  last Friday evening via Air Tiger after an hour delay (acceptable) at the Budget Terminal. The rain poured once I arrived  and lasted for three days one and off and I realised that the rainy season is from May to September here! The air however is very fresh here due to the close proximity to the ocean draft.

Haikou is the capital city of Hainan island, the southern most city of China. It has 7 million population and is the smallest city in land size of China (30,000 sq km). Of course, everyone knows by now that Hainan, Sanya  is famous for it’s beautiful beaches and seafood. Much of it’s economy is focused on tourism and many people are also working in tourism-related jobs.

I came to Haikou almost by accident as it is the cheapest city in China that I could find on Air Tiger ($200 return) and I also could book it just two days before I flew.  Guangchow, my usual stop-over city in China, is fully booked and double the cost of the ticket of Haikou.

For me, Haikou is like Singapore twenty years ago with its drub housing blocks and care free relaxing environment. People do not walk as fast as Peking or Shanghai. 

 Many Singaporeans in my plane also travelled  there to golf over the weekend before returning home on Sunday. However, Singaporeans do not make up a huge percentage of their tourist population. The Koreans and Japanese are their biggest clients. It is no wonder that I saw many Korean restaurants here.

Thus,  Hainan is more famous for attracting tourists and retirees to it’s slow pace of living that many young people after graduating seek out better economic opportunities in big cities like Guangchow or Shenzhen.  The low pay of people working here also does not attract it’s  natives to stay on and start a family here. For example, anyone starting out work in menial employment such as in hotel or tourism only draws around RMB800-900 a month. Some draw as less as RMB600-700 making it almost impossible to save up after deducting living expenses.

Thus, I find that many people in Hainan have seek out opportunities in Singapore as even if they are paid $500 a month, it represents a huge jump of icome for them after currency conversion. A manage can only earn about RMB2000 here after working for many years.

I also find that local entrepreneurs are a boom here as many start their own one-man  stall hawking anything from umbrellas (RMB5 for one) to Chinese pancake. It makes sense to do your own business when you can only earn RMB700 a month working your socks out ten hours a day.  Sometimes, when you have no choice, you tend to take calculated risk and do something on your own. This could not be mentioned of Singaporeans who could earn decent wages by working for a company. Hopefully, for me, I will treasure whatever work that come to me in future after learning about the plight of the local Hainanese people here.

I will be going to Wuhan to meet some friends there before journey by train to Jingmen where I taught for a year last time. I have many friends there and they are also excited to meet up.

I will try to update loyal readers here about my journey in China for the next few days. Pardon me if I can’t update too regularly as I need to seek out internet cafe here (RMB2 an hour).

Now, it looks like raining again and I better left this place before it pours and I get stucked here.

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