Written by Eddie Smith From British
I was invited by the Haikou FAO to attend a Hainan Cultural Festival in Memory of Madam Xian. Knowing very little about Madam Xian or indeed what to expect from the day, I boarded a coach in Haikou for the drive to Xinpo County, the coach was full of a very interesting mix of foreign students and assorted foreign residents.
I have been lucky to have lived and worked in many countries some beautiful, others less so and what makes a place memorable to me are the people. The drive to XinPo County was great fun because of the people on board particularly the students from South Korea and Uzbekistan. The students decided that there should be singing as we drove along and various people stood up and sang on a microphone at the front of the bus, some songs were in Chinese and others in peoples own languages. I stood up and sang an American blues song of my own composition "The Chinese mattress blues" which seemed to be appreciated. The singing was another example of the people making a place memorable and is what should happen when people of different cultures and background come together.
We arrived at XinPo County and walked to where the event was taking place and as in common in China there were firecrackers everywhere, the Chinese people love noise and smoke when celebrating a festival! We went to the statue of Madam Xian who was surely one of the earliest examples of feminism, along with the English Queen Boadicea and learnt something of her history.
The next stop was the temple which was full of people offering prayers and showing their thanks to Madam Xian. Further on there were people accepting written prayers which were burnt so that the prayer went up to heaven. The burning was accompanied by many firecrackers probably to ensure that the gods were awake!
I have always found Hainan to be a very friendly place and Xinpo County is no exception with everyone smiling and happy to see such a strange group of foreigners.
The fun really started when a large number of costumes were produced and the many students dressed up and performed their version of the dragon dance very enthusiastically. I took many pictures but the one that summed up the multicultural nature of the day was one of a student from Uzbekistan who arrived wearing a leather biker's jacket and jeans and put on traditional Chinese yellow robes to take part in the dragon dance. In the picture she was wearing her Yves Saint Laurent handbag with the YSL logo. American fashion, with a French designer handbag topped by Chinese satin, all from a girl from Uzbekistan, truly international.
The day ended with a parade through the town with the foreigners joining the Chinese, much banging of drums and more firecrackers. A great day with interesting people from several countries is what living in another country is all about, thank you Haikou.
