Yesterday I shared a few photos on threads that I found of Xiamen on Google.
During most of my time there I didn’t have a phone, and even if I did, it would have been an iPhone 3 or something, so not the best camera. As a result I hardly have any good photos to go along with all the stories I have.
The techno parties in a cave or mountaintop or abandoned building, my friends pet peacock, the “free hostel” on top of a dormitory scheduled for demolition, all the nights playing guitar, eating barbecue and drinking beer while staring at the ocean, playing music with world class guitarists in a stone house at the foot of the mountain…
Most of those moments are lost to all but memory. A friend of mine is currently producing a documentary and trying to collect whatever he can find from that era. I truly can’t wait.
Until then all I can do is trade pictures and grainy videos with friends and search google to show what it was like.
There was something surreal about Xiamen. I wouldn’t be surprised if it developed faster than any other city in China, and unlike most popular destinations, there were very few foreign tourists. Everything felt transient and there were secrets throughout the city, shops that weren’t listed anywhere, places popping up and closing in just a few months, and Buddhist temples only accessible through alleyways or service roads.
It serves as a local tourist destination for people from nearby landlocked cities and that is enough to make it a major tourist destination despite not being on much of an international radar.
In the early 2000’s it attracted a lot of backpackers turned residents from all over South China who couldn’t afford to go overseas and people looking for a slow life and so that made up a lot of the long term residents who weren’t born there. Then it became popular among couples on honeymoons and students for graduation trips. Finally it experienced what felt like a gold rush.
People wanted to start businesses and cash in on the growing economy and landlords exploited that. They charged way more than anyone could hope to sustain and fooled tenants into thinking it was a good deal, and since many of these people came from rural areas and couldn’t imagine how things would turn out, they fell for it.
Our friends tried their best to keep finding cheap places to start businesses but in the end almost all of them who couldn’t afford to buy property ended up leaving. A few interesting shops remain and it’s become a central place in a lot of pop culture (dramas and media) but the freedom of a place under the radar has disappeared.
When I first arrived, a couchsurfing host told me “there’s nothing here so you can do anything”. That was in 2011 and by 2018 when I left, no one felt that way anymore. The tattoo studio on the mountain, the rock jam bar in the back of the village, the foreign comedy club, the microbrewery, our music and art studio, and most of the laid back hostels closed shop and headed to greener pastures.
The more people tried to exploit the place, the less fresh it became. A subway system was built which made it easier to live in, and it’s definitely still a decent place to work a decent job or travel, but it’s no longer a place for artists and wanderers or for young people to start a business.
The easiest way to understand it is my own apartment. I had an apartment 10 minutes from the ocean and 20 from the city that cost me about $80 USD a month. Now that same apartment would likely cost $1200-$1500. It may be slightly more furnished but you can imagine how many people were completely priced out of living in the city. The cafes and bars faced the same kind of pressure from increased rent and landlords who abused legal loopholes and lack of oversight to void contracts at any time.
Here are some of the pictures I managed to find:
A bar on the pier that was really into folk music. Friends would go there to sing songs together 4-5 days a week 😝 most people finished work early and ate and drink together on weekdays. ⬆️ I preferred mixed styles of music but this place was great to have there anyway.
The city center, quite far from where I was, on the ocean, but nothing was really far. You could get there in 20 minutes by bicycle.
There were 3 villages full of cheap motels like these ⬆️ one village had about 400 motels at one point, and probably still does though the cost
A secret road that led to a pedestrian tunnel under a mountain. Apparently it used to be a railway to the old train station.
While there were fancy complexes built and most of the main roads were perfectly paved and lined with palm trees, the local motels slapped on paint jobs, laid down a few bricks and started charging 5-10x more per night thanks to the difficulty people had finding a place to stay on the weekends.
I am pretty sure this is a “factory” where my friend kept a pet Peacock named Bob Dylan. I shit you not! He rented it as a music studio and some temple he visited offered him a pet peacock and he thought it would be fun so he kept it there for 3 months until he realized how hard it was to take care of.
The university was beautiful but somehow became a tourist attraction in itself. When I arrived in 2011, outsiders could join events in the school so I took a capoeira lesson with an Argentinian exchange student but after it became a tourist spot they stopped letting us in.
Something else surreal about Xiamen. Because it was developing so quickly and there were so many overly eager investors, there were tons of abandoned or half abandoned projects.
So I discovered an amusement park which was half destroyed by a typhoon and never rebuilt but still open to the public. There was no security in the back and so locals knew to just walk right in and there was a hotel that was converted into an apartment building so people actually lived inside the amusement park.
For me this was shocking, coming from America and living in Japan where everything has zoning or laws against the use of certain kinds of buildings for things other than their intended purpose. But it was fun as hell! I loved that vibe.
There was also a massive outdoor shopping mall which was bustling at the center but completely abandoned on the basement and second floor as well as the further edges. The construction on the mall was only 1/3 finished. It looked as if they planned on building a beautiful Moroccan themed Vegas Esque interior but instead it was just loose bricks and piles of sand in between a black market pet shop and an unpopular photography studio.
20% bustling 80% abandoned shopping mall ⬆️
50% abandoned 50% open for business amusement park ⬇️
My favorite thing about Xiamen were the mountains and all the hidden secrets in side streets that were at the foot of mountains. Mountains separated many parts of the city which made a buffer zone for development. For that reason some of the beach villages remained cheap for as long as they did. A single bus line that ran every 20 minutes made it an undesirable place for some commuters or tourists who wanted convenience. Taxis were easy to use but not during rush hour.
This is one of the pavilions at the top of one mountain. A good place to play guitar and djembe and watch the sea, take a date, or just relax. I had a Yoga lesson here once and went on a first date with a girl who later became a good friend.
A few Hive friends Africa and South America seemed pleased when I showed some of the development on threads. I want to remind you that water, electricity, internet and safety were never an issue while I was there, so development meant things looked 30% nicer and cost 300-3000% more, so they weren’t really welcome by most younger residents, only the landlords appreciated them
It is what it is, I’m happy I got to spend so much time there during its Silver Age, I think the Golden Age was before I arrived when there were twice as many artists and EVERYTHING was cheap and there were strawberry fields and farms everywhere and income was high compared to the cost of living.
When I got there it was a combination of high quality slums and low quality resorts, a Mandarin speaking B-grade Bali, with a dash of Berlin and bit of Portland but with Asian flavors. Try your best to imagine a California beach in China, tattoos and tourists and all, and you might be getting close 😆 very hard to describe.
It felt like a dream.
I still recommend Xiamen as a place to visit, it still has its charm, but those days of magic for me are just a distant memory and a place to draw inspiration from. If you ever go there I can send you to some nice spots.
When the city changed I realized I’d rather move back to Japan than try to force things to work in a city that changed so quickly and rarely for the better, so despite its remaining charm, I left.
The first 1/3 of the footage in my music video for Mirror was taken in Xiamen, I hope that can give you a taste!
As mentioned these pictures are not my own:
https://youtu.be/fxzjCc1bQz0?si=_Q7VijyqlFSSrdlv