Tour to Fujian 4.2 -old Amoy (福建之旅4.2--舊日廈門)

Cont'd

Our tour of Fujian concluded with a brief tour of the old Amoy which had been there long  before the 2nd World War (which in China meant the defensive war against the Japanese invasion which started in 1931) with suitable postwar and post-1978 modifications.

At the head of the street, we saw this sign which says that it's a Chinese cultural historical heritage street.

We were given some free time to roam in this equivalent of Causeway or Mongkok pedestrian only street in the old Amoy city centre. It seems that the lazy and slow moving Panda has now evolved into a martial arts acrobat in Amoy! 

This street is now a no-vehicle allowed pedestrian walking zone, where young people and women and out of town tourists can congregate in two or threesomes to chill out by stuffing themselves with all kinds of snacks and beverages and where shopaholics can give free rein to their uncontrollable impulses.

As in Gulangyu, there are all kinds of shops selling personalized tea bags and cakes. This one emphasizes that it has the personal touch of one Miss Zhao.

 Its interior

This one sells the more traditional crispy pastry as well as the Hakka tea-cake 

  The name of this all-variety snack shop should be familiar to the people of Hong Kong

All kinds of cakes, biscuits and snacks 

 a store selling dried shrimps

This shop sells dyed marinated and fried duck's tongues

 

And duck heads

   and chopped duck necks, something I first discovered when I visited Tsingtao in north China. It seems that when it's tasty, it would sell anywhere.

 

As Amoy has got lots of compatratriots from across the Taiwan Straits, the shop owner is quick to capitalize on its "Taiwanese specialties"

 As on the island of Gulangyu, the beverage shops here wish to capture the tastes, the style of thinking of those products who came into this world under the famous "one-child per family" policies advocated in the PRC of the 1970s.

The Amoy municipal government allows special stalls to be set up right in the middle of the streets close to the kerb. Hence many such stalls dotted its kerbside.

 This one specializes in cold drinks and beverage

while this shop inside the kerb sells strawberries, and other fresh or sweetened Chinese hawthorns.  

 But it has competition: same price but claiming that it does it the old Beiing style.

 Right next door, there's a shop for fish balls plus sweet dumplings.

This one sells a hollowed out local fruit, rather like a mini-size coconut

Outside the Taiwanes specialialty shop, there's another kerbside snack shop

and another kerbside restaurant serving cold fruit beverages

 Fried egg puffs

This one specializes in cold seaweed jelly, a traditional sweet dessert.  

  It emphasizes that it uses the authentic traditional method to prepare the seaweed

  It looks to me like what we'd call in Hong Kong "Big Vegetable Jelly" (大菜糕)

When I step back into the cobble stone paved street, I noticed that its name is written in ancient calligraphic script. This one says "Dachung Road".

I also noticed that like in Tsingtao, different government departments would have their own logos on the lids atop their own special manholes. Each manhole lid has a different design. This one belongs to the electricity department placed there since 2001

  This one belong to the Xiamen Electricity Corporation done in 1996

This one belongs to the Municipal Development Board

This sewage manhole belongs to the  Xiamen Water Works Corporation

In the middle of the street, I found this plaque about the gate to the "Little Horse Trail" previously used by Koxinga (1642-1662) to train his cavlary.  Koxinga was a native of Nam On, who led 25,000 men from Xiamen to the Woliao port in southwest Taiwan in 1661, when the island was still under the control of Holland and drove them out. When the Dutch East India Company sent further mercenary reinforcement, they were defeated too, Therefore in 1662, the Dutch surrendered the island to Koxinga and ended their control of the island after some 38 years.

There were benches in the middle of the long pedestrian street for tired feet.

  Another set of benches behind some potted plants

More roadside benches

Perhaps not a bad idea to take some big prunes whilst resting

 

And how could there no stall selling that famous hot and saltish sea invertebrate locally called "cold sea asparatus" (Phascolosoma esculenta) @  ¥10 a big portion.(two cups) and   ¥ 5 a small portion (one cup)?

And another Taiwanese favorite: a scaped ice fruit dessert.

 dried fish fleece, squid fleece etc.

This is the entrance to the famous Jukou Street (局口街) linking Ximing Road West (思明路西) and Chungshan Road (中山路) . It got its name because it was at the mouth of the government magazine where the rifle bullets (銃藥局) of the Qing dynasty was situated. At that time, the street was filled with antique shops, shops specializing in framing Chinese ink paintings and tea houses. Now it's one of Amoy most famous "ladies street" for selling cheap clothes, trinkets etc.                               

Over the top of the street, there are a number of carved black wood panels depicting various scenes of the soldiers engaged in battle.

You can see here there some soldier is sounding the horn, whilst others are rushing forward flags held high in battle, protected by the Tin Hau depicted above the middle of the panel.

.

In this panel, the men are amusing themselves playing some musical instruments with the lady songstresses behind them.

 

In  this one, an official appears to be acting as a magistrate approving something with a Chinese ink brush in his right hand, assisted by soldier on his left and right.

In this one, several guests appear to be visiting a friend who came out to welcome them

.

 This is Sephora. it used to be owned by a Jew as a private club. Now it's been turned into a shopping arcade.

 

This is the famous Chinese City (中華城). In the 19th century, it used to be owned by another foreign company. It is now run by a big company which has transformed it into an integrated shopping arcade where the best brands in watches and luxury sports car are sold. In addition, there is a skating rink and a cinema, many themed restaurants at its interior. It also houses the big French Carrefour supermarket.    

 One can see a European style dome at the corner of the building.

There are also other old  European style buildings in the street too. 

 

This is another such building

 

it used to house a Protestant church right at its centre

But their ground floors are now used as shop. 

Behind the old building, taller new buildings are dwarfing it.

This is another old building, the Mido, now a hotel, shopping arcade and cinema.

There's a cinema ticketing office right at its entrance

More old buildings in the less busy part of the same street, near its end.

The old buildings are modified and now have dome-shaped skylights.

They are now putting up new temporary stall immediately outside the department store to sell cheap stuff to create a crowd flow.

In the middle of the street was found this sign about the Southern Chinese Opera Sound.

  and not far off, there was a demonstration of such a sound

Some of the actor and actresses

The actresses were strutting about the stage singing and talking in turn. 

They tried their best to put up a good show in this not too convenient venue.

 An innovative signs in the middle of the street: the old under a more modern garb.

Looking back at the street we toured

Another section of the same street.

 

at the rim of the fountain were these words with double entendre: "the source ran deep"

Our local guide took us to a very "local" store to taste its renowned oyster egg pancake

and its famed sweet  peanut paste soup

Before that, glimpses of Amoy at night

The seafront buildings

The same building from a little further off

More buildings

Across the sea, Koxinga is looking towards Taiwan
 

One of the tallest buildings in Amoy

We had some typical Amoy food at this restaurant.

And after that, it's back to the airport

Christmas decorations hanging from the roof



a panel

Coffee grinder on sale

Coffee beans on sale

Chinese men on sale

ethnic minority on sale



umbrellas on sale



fans on sale




artificial jewellery on sale



Tian An Mun on sale. Is the Chinese "soul" not on sale too?

Reflections

More reflections

The airport restaurant

Waiting lounge



The way back

City of lights

Another city of light

Hong Kong at night

 The airport at night & home