A charming isle humming with history

It’s just a tiny 1.91-sq.km. islet and yet a day is simply not enough to really understand what Gulangyu Island is all about.

My knowledge of Gulangyu – a mere 10-minute ferry ride away from Xiamen – was sketchy. My grandmother’s accounts about Gulangyu were like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle generously dipped in nostalgia... of how she and her sisters were sent off to this tiny, quiet island to study and how, after school, she would sneak behind a big jar after school and listen to her aunts gossiping. Curiously, she kept saying there were no cars on that island. Little did I know then that I would see for myself this interesting and very much welcome fact.

True enough, when our bunch of media people stepped foot on the island (courtesy of Cebu Pacific, which now flies twice a week from Manila to Xiamen, and Honey Holidays), nobody heard the roar of a motor car. What was busily running – for those who tire easily or are too old perhaps to go on a walking tour – was the battery-operated shuttle that resembles a golf cart and could accommodate 12 passengers. For 50RMB (about P350), one could get a half-hour ride around the island. With our pocket money reserved mainly for mini shopping sprees, we decided to take the longer – and definitely more scenic – route by going on a good two- to three-hour late afternoon leisurely walk. Had we more time, however, we could’ve hiked up Sunlight Rock, a good two hours away by foot, and the place to be if you want to see Xiamen’s pretty harbor and skyline.

With an estimated 16,000 population, the island’s main source of income these days is tourism, followed by fishing. According to our guide, Leon Chen, the Gulangyu of old attracted quite a lot of foreigners, thus its image as an "International Settlement." Strolling around the island’s four-kilometer paved road, one would marvel at the well-preserved colonial type buildings and bungalows.

The former British consulate is the first building that greets visitors and a few meters uphill is what used to be the Japanese consulate (built in 1898) which has since been transformed into a dormitory for retired professors of Xiamen. The 87-year-old Catholic Church on the island stands as imposing as ever. Other buildings that were built on the island include the Dutch, American, Spanish and even the Philippine consulates.

With such an international flavor, it’s no wonder that Gulangyu attracts even overseas Chinese who are quite well-off. A perfect example would be a well-traveled businessman from Malaysia who decided to build a European-style villa in the 1920s now referred to as Huang Rong Yuen Hall, located right across the Art Vocational University of Xiamen. If you happen to pass by this villa on a late afternoon, you’d see several visual art students perfecting their strokes with the grand villa as a favorite subject.

Gulangyu could easily be the Greenwich Village of China as arts and music schools pepper this tiny isle. Apart from the hundred-year-old People’s Primary School, the island is home to the Xiamen #2 Middle School which offers courses in dancing, singing, TV and movie acting. The Xiamen Music School produces music scholars every year and all day long you could hear students rehearsing their pieces hoping that one day they would be able to get into, say, the prestigious Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra and perform on the island’s huge Concert Hall.

But what sets the island apart from other tiny isles is its well-known Piano Museum. Often referred to as the Piano Island, it is said that Gulangyu has more than 1,000 pianos. This means that there is one piano in every five homes. Can you imagine the Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Chopin, Liszt, Wagner pieces being played each day come rehearsal time? If the hills are alive with the sound of music, Gulangyu is a living, humming isle of music.

In July, visitors and music enthusiasts are expected to troop to Gulangyu to witness the Piano Festival to be held at the Piano Museum. Built by a Chinese-Australian philanthropist/musician, the museum is home to over 70 centuries-old piano collection from all over the world. With such an extensive rare collection, it’s no surprise to either hear oohs and ahhs, or a hushed awe-struck silence from visitors, especially musicians who probably are drooling and wondering if they would be given just a few minutes to stroke those fragile ivory keys. Well, tough luck for there’s a hands-off policy and the place is teeming with hidden cameras that a furtive touch would have the guard breathing down your neck even before you finish singing do-re-mi.

Pianos after pianos – an 1864 Steinway & Sons; an 1829 Bisendorf from Vienna, Austria, said to be favored by Liszt; a Pasquale & Co. 1899 street piano, which is also called a barrel piano; a 1906 Maendler-Schramm harpsichord; an 1824 Broadwood & Sons piano; a late 19th century pianola for those who can’t play the piano; and many more – greeted us at every turn.

It would have been a dream come true had somebody performed a Chopin piece, with a breathtaking view of Shuzhuan Garden and the sea.

The Shuzhuang Garden is a perfect alternative for the sightseer who’s not really interested in the museum’s ebony and ivory keys. According to Dr. Bill Brown who wrote the highly popular Amoy Magic: A Guide to Xiamen, the garden, located in the southeast side of the island, used to be the private garden of Shuzang Lin, a Taiwanese businessman who built it in the early 1900s. One is taken into a leisurely walk past a Zen-like pond with an option to explore a labyrinthe made from corals, then directly to a pathway called "9 Bend 44 Bridge" that offers a spectacular view of the sea, as well as the rocky outcropping of the island. A huge rock midway has red Chinese characters carved on it, which our guide Leon translated to us as "The sky is clear and the sea is very deep." Well, it’s true, we were blessed with clear skies that day and one quick look at the waters below would make a non-swimmer think twice about leaning over the concrete bridge too much.

Now, a stay at Gulangyu won’t be complete if you don’t check out the quaint but colorful shops along Longtou St., the isle’s main street. The shops alone would make you want to stay overnight as they’re overflowing with things to give to friends and family back home. There are rows of shops, past the 517-year-old banyan tree, that sell dried fish and seafood. One shop owner invited us for a cup of oolong tea and had us sample his store’s dried fruits and all sorts of seafood pica-pica ranging from the sweet to the spicy-sweet to the spicy. Peanut cakes wth poppy seeds, seaweeds or just plain sugar abound, and so were hopia-like sweet cakes in different flavors. Further down the road are more shops that sell summer caps, socks and "foot gloves," Hello Kitty items, Japanese swords, Russian matrioshka nesting dolls in beautiful designs (one shop even had a Holy Family and Eskimo family dolls), shell and beads crafts, Chinese paintings and calligraphy, and so much more. A visitor is expected to haggle and the discussion could get animated especially if you know that the other shop is selling the same stuff for half the price.

Gulangyu at night is pleasant what with the cool breeze and a great view of the lighted Xiamen skyline. We would’ve wanted to stay longer but our ever-patient guide gently but firmly put his foot down. Fair enough, for he let us loose around the shops for the last couple hours when we were supposed to have been given only an hour. Tired but beaming with joy with our small treasures, we boarded the ferry and silently looked back at this tiny isle grateful for the experience. Cliche as it may sound, it was like traveling back in time and being in a place where wooden carts laden with firewood were pulled past elegant colonial-type buildings and Chopsticks-playing could be heard from white-washed stone houses with rounded pillars at dusk. Gulangyu, despite the modern influences, has retained its old world charm. More than its old structures, it’s the old folks quietly sitting by the door, or maybe it’s the absence of the usual city traffic and noise that make the difference. All one has to do is look out towards the city across the bay and instantly be brought back to "reality," but somehow nobody remembered, nor bothered.

For lack of time, our trip to Gulangyu almost got cancelled. In fact, half of our group didn’t get to see this quiet isle, opting to shop in the city. But I remembered my grandma’s stories and I promised myself not to let this opportunity pass to see the isle of her childhood. I’m so glad I went.

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Cebu Pacific flies twice a week, Tuesday and Friday, to Xiamen. For more information, call 852-2328.