Mosquito killer

Summer is almost here, and the daytime temperature has been over 30 degrees the whole week, bringing back one of the more annoying features of living in a subtropic zone: mosquitoes. The local variety is of very small size, and makes an almost undetectable sound, so you only notice them when it's already too late to take pre-emptive action. The most annoying are the visits to the area directly around your ears, when you suddenly hear the high-pitched buzz, and start slapping yourself on the head in a futile attempt to ward off the attack.
I have a small bottle of mosquito repellant on my bedside table, which is effective to some extend if you douse your naked feet in the fragrant liquid while working on the computer, and sprinkle it over your body before going to sleep, but it does not deter the little buggers for good. So, I decided to buy one of those high-voltage tennis racquets which are designed to electrocute flying insects by swatting them in mid-air.
The local Carrefour supermarket wisely stocked up on this great invention and offers two kinds, one for 29.90 RMB, and another for 45.50. The cheaper one actually has more advanced features (integrated LED flashlight for nightly hunts), but was maybe of a lesser known brand. I didn't know either, so just got the cheapo. It has build-in rechargeable batteries, and a retractable plug which lets you plug the whole thing right into a wall socket for recharging. It's a wonderful instrument, I have to admit. Well worth the investment.
The first night I killed three mosquitoes who dared to fly around my quarters in a matter of minutes. I was surprised by the loud bang and the blinding flash of light accompanying the electrocutions, much louder and brighter than I expected. Judging by the amount of energy released, the designers of this fine piece of equipment surely did not try to save money by using a under-rated capacitor for delivering the high-voltage charge to the unsuspecting victim. It must have had no idea what was happening to it. I did not find any remains after the kill. The blast must have vaporized the whole beings into oblivion. So much the better!

Vintage cameras

While sitting on the bench outside the Absinthe bar in Zeng Cuo An one day, enjoying an ice cream with a South-African I had met a few days before, a Chinese man carrying a Leica M2 grabbed my attention. I had never seen a Leica in the wild in China, and certainly not a vintage model like this M2 (even in Europa they are a rare sight). Of course I didn't know immediately it was an M2, but when he sat down for a chat, I noticed the marking, and asked him how old it was. The camera happened to be build in the same year as me, that was a nice coincidence, haha! He had just bought it second-hand from a seller in Hong Kong for 4000 RMB, and was using his first film today to try it out.  He had spent another 3000 RMB on a second-hand Voigtlander Nokton 35mm f/1.4 lens, but this lens was not that old, they are actually still manufactured. Not at all a bad deal for such a legendary camera, in my opinion.
Cai (that's his name) is a geography teacher at the middle school in nearby Shangli, just a 15 minute walk from where we were sitting. I pass his school almost everyday on my way to Xiamen University.
I do occasionally see young people carrying an 80's era Pentax or Canon analog camera, and it always makes me smile. My South-African friend did not seem to be too interested in vintage cameras (he builds fiberglass racing kayaks at Epic in Hanzhou), but Cai took a great portrait of him. As a true photography enthusiast, he only shoots in black and white, and then develops the film by himself, and uses a negative scanner to transfer the images to the digital domain. It's a painstakingly slow process in this time and age, but perhaps it makes you focus better on the art of photography, compared to the current digital method of shootings hundreds of pictures a day and just delete those that didn't turn out too well. Both have their merits, I would say.

photo by Cai

Nostalgia

One of the most striking features of contemporary China is the lack of old buildings, which is surprising, as China has such a long and rich history. Compared to the most beautiful cities of Europe (which is very subjective of course, but I count Amsterdam, Paris, Rome, Barcelona, Prague, and Budapest among those), China's cities are almost completely void of antique architecture, apart from the occasional palace, temple, or bell tower. In the countryside you can still see some traditional stone or wooden houses, and even bridges, but these are becoming rare, being rapidly replaced by a tidal wave of three- or four-storied houses which are build in a matter of weeks as concrete skeletons filled in with brick walls, usually covered with bathroom tiles (but sometimes left bare), and more often than not decorated with faux-European balconies, and stainless-steel bars in front of each window. The same applies to Zeng Cuo An, where most of the lovely stone houses with tiled roofs have been demolished in favour of a taller building occupying the same spot, but offering three or four times the floor space. The top floor is usually added a few years later, constructed from prefab panels made of steel plating glued to both sides of a styrofoam core, with a zigzag folded steel roof. The wall panels are painted in a pale greyish yellow, reminiscent of 80's era personal computers. I'm currently living in such a box, set on top of a relatively small single-storey concrete house (see photo below).
When Ling Ling arrives in Xiamen in a couple of months from now, we can hopefully find a nice old house to live in, or a spacious loft in an abandoned warehouse, but more likely we will have to do with a regular apartment in one of those tiled edifices.

Zeid's coffee corner

One of my laowai friends opened a small coffee bar on a corner of Minzhu Lu. It's a charming place, breezy and light, with a nice floor of original Portuguese tiles, still found in some houses in this part of Xiamen. Minzhu Lu is a street on the South-East corner of the island, opposite the Gulangyu islet, the former foreign concession, and now Xiamen's most famous tourist attraction. It is an old neighbourhood, but dotted with some modern apartment towers, and the elevated coastal highway winds its way through the neighbourhood as well. A place in transition, like most parts of China.
I visited on the first day he opened his doors, and already some local Chinese found the place attractive enough to sit down for a coffee, which is a good sign. It breathes a Mediterranean atmosphere, with wooden folding chairs, small tables, and soft light emitted from tubes hidden behind white fabric at the underside of the canopy, a smart idea. Zeid bought a second-hand professional espresso machine and grinder, a Spanish brand, although most likely 'made in China'. The coffee tastes fine though :-)
I walked down to the cafe with kYra who lives in the same street and brought her new dog, a golden puppy barely two months old, soft and cute, named Mogui （魔鬼） or Devil in English.  It takes its time sniffing up everything in its new neighbourhood, and there's a lot to sniff at on Chinese streets. What is normally a short walk from number 173 to number 77 takes almost an hour with the dog. However, the slow pace let's you take a good look at things you normally walk past, so I took the opportunity to take a lot of photos.

Kittens and ice cream

I was actually only going to get an ice cream cone, but arriving at the Absinthe bar this afternoon, which still serves the best ice cream in the village, I was confronted with a rather large crowd of ice cream afficionados waiting in line, so I decided to sit down on a bench for a while and watch the show.
The Absinthe bar were the first to start selling soft ice, but this spring it dawned upon the other shop owners that it can be a lucrative business, so in good Chinese tradition many others started copying the concept, and also installed a soft ice machine. Now there are at least five outlets, but none of the others can match the quality of the creamy offering at the Absinthe bar. The quirky cafe is getting rather famous with the young crowd of travellers who frequent the guesthouses of Zeng Cuo An, with numerous write-ups on Chinese blogs and travel websites.
While sitting on a bench, I spotted the two tiny kittens which were picked up earlier today by barista Fu Rong. She took the job of feeding the cats while looking for a potential new caretaker. It was unclear where the cats were born just a few weeks ago, but it could not have been far away. I wonder if they really were astray, or just lost. I had a brief flash of wanting to take them home myself, but quickly remembered the reason I have no pets. So I just sat there, waiting for Fu Rong to get up and get me an ice cream so I did not have to disturb the little rascals playing in my lap.

Free at last

It was already in October last year when these stenciled images appeared overnight on several walls in Zeng Cuo An. At the time, I didn't know for sure who it was, and I actually thought it could be Julian Assange, of Wikileaks fame, at the time under house arrest in England.
The above image was found on the same blue wall which still hosts a portrait of Ai Wei Wei, also frequently held either in jail or under house arrest, but only now I realize whom it depicts. It's Chen Guang Cheng, the blind civil rights activist who used Hillary Clinton's recent visit to China for a remarkable and highly publicized escape from his house arrest in Shandong province, and subsequently sought refuge at the US embassy in Beijing, until being promised a free haven at an American university. Before his spectacular escape, he was probably unknown by most of the Chinese, being effectively held out of the local media. But now, even the official Chinese media acknowledge his departure and even promised an official investigation into the supposed abuse by local authorities inflicted upon him and his family. Way to go, China!

A loft in Xiamen

My friend Lin, studying fine art at the Art College of Xiamen University, is staying at the studio of one of her teachers for a few weeks, located in an old warehouse on the seaside. A large space of about 200 square meters, with concrete columns and a 4 meter high ceiling. Windows open to the seaside, the view partly blocked by the elevated highway running along this part of Xiamen Island's coast on pillars above the sea.
The same building houses the studios where the resident artists of CEAC work, but it's slated for demolition, and the tenants have already received an eviction notice. It's really too bad that places like this can not exist for too long. I would love to live in a space like this. It might lack the comfort of a modern apartment, but this amount of space and sense of freedom are not found in a typical highrise in the city.
Since I planned to go to the seaside afterwards, I had brought my hammock, and to my delight there were some hooks mounted in the ceiling beams which I could use to suspend it  from. My ropes are pretty long, and with the help of a ladder I could attach my hammock and offer Lin (and myself) a relaxing slow swing.
Lin is actually going to Amsterdam in September for a three-month exchange with the Gerrit Rietveld Academy. Unfortunately I won't be there to show her around and introduce her to the local art scene (since I decided to stay in Xiamen longer), but I'm sure she will find her way, and have a wonderful time in Amsterdam.

MAAS at CEAC

The Chinese European Art Center had another opening this weekend, and a rather interesting one. Dutch artist Bart Drost presented his MAAS initiative, which is a private artist residency at his house in Nijmegen, The Netherlands. Bart invites artists from China or other Asian countries to live and work for up to three months at his house to offer a taste of Western society, in return for an Eastern contribution. He came to this idea after being a guest lecturer at the Tan Kah Kee Art College of Xiamen University last year.
The CEAC gallery shows some paintings by Bart Drost himself, and work from various artists who have been working and living at MAAS during the past year.

To Zhuhai once again

The extended weekend preceding the May 1st national holiday gave another opportunity for a short trip to Zhuhai to meet up with Ling Ling. It's becoming almost a monthly affair, this being the fourth trip since the start of this year.
The men at the ticket office must know me by now, but they didn't offer me a frequent flyer discount. On the contrary, the price of a one-way sleeper bus ticket has been steadily increasing, from 220 RMB in January, to 250 in April, and now I even had to pay 280 on the way back from Zhuhai. Granted, that was on the national holiday itself, so there's a slim chance that the price will fall back to 250 RMB on my next trip, as yet unscheduled.
It was hot and humid and overcast in Zhuhai, as it was in Xiamen, so we spent a lot of time in my comfortable hotel room, with occasional outings to coffee bars, restaurants, and a park or two. Zhuhai is rather boring, so I'm happy that Ling Ling decided to move to Xiamen. I can't wait, and she is also eager to make the move as soon as possible. It will be the beginning of a whole new era :)