Life on a Seaside Island

After the gaokao ended and I confirmed my admission, I gave myself a few days off and took my family to a small island for a trip. It was my first time visiting an island. The island is small; walking around it takes less than half an hour. Yet it holds a few tiny natural villages with over a thousand residents. Most islanders fish or farm marine aquaculture; a few run businesses.

I took to the island at once. I had expected it to differ greatly from the mainland, but walking there felt much like walking through my home village in the countryside. You can hear roosters and dogs, and see vegetables and crops the islanders grow. Life there is truly slow-paced: I saw no cars, not even bicycles. Because the island is tiny, such vehicles are of little use.

The islanders' houses are much like the low courtyard homes I have seen in the north; their yards too hold flowers and fruit trees. Were it not in the middle of the sea, this would be an utterly ordinary northern village. Still, the islanders are plainly more guileless than people off-island. Human relations here are simple; tourists have only begun to visit in the last few years, and otherwise it is long-term residents who live here, so it is not as complex as the outside world. This untouched island much resembles rural China in the 1980s and 1990s.

The moment I stepped onto the island I loved it. I even daydreamed about settling here one day and becoming the village doctor—a job that would suit my temperament. I could clear a few small plots for vegetables and fruit, treat the villagers' little headaches and fevers, and become one with the islanders.

Night falls far faster on an island than on the mainland; the moment the sun sets, the whole island goes pitch black. No lingering sunset glow, no light pollution, no noise, no nightlife. By evening the tourists have all sailed away, leaving only the permanent residents. Like other rural parts of China, the island cannot hold its young; those who remain are mostly the elderly and children.

Before boarding, vendors at the pier told me to bring plenty onto the island, since buying there would be far more expensive. Once actually on the island I found things were much cheaper than at the opposite pier. Seafood was cheapest: scallops and oysters at one yuan each, with no preparation fee. A large grilled fish was five yuan; a small one, ten yuan for a big plate. Some islanders sold sea cucumbers; I did not ask the price as I had no use for them, but they must have been far cheaper than off-island. The small vendors were shy and would not push their wares patter.

The whole island holds only single-story houses, not a single multi-story building. There are a few dilapidated old houses, empty, clearly abandoned by their owners. I very much wanted to buy one, fix it up, and live there. Compared with the tall buildings outside, this place seems backward. But perhaps because I am older, I now love such an environment; I can understand why in old times some people sought out islands like this to live apart from the world. That eccentric Huang Yaoshi in Jin Yong's novels loved being an island lord.

Of course, real island life is not as romantic as in wuxia novels. The islanders are not so different from people in most Chinese villages, and are not completely cut off. It is just that, as Laozi put it, this is a "small state with few people": the residents are few, everyone lives in an acquaintance society, and relations between people are simpler and warmer.

On the way back to Beijing, I saw a mother and son in the sleeper car of a green-skinned train. The mother must have been over eighty; the son around sixty. The mother was paralyzed and very thin, but she was neatly groomed with no odor. To save money, the two had bought only one sleeper ticket; at night the son curled up at his mother's feet, which also let him care for her.

In that moment I envied them. If my mother were still alive, I too could enjoy such family warmth. I so wish I could live with my mother and family on such a small island; with her outgoing, contented nature, she would quickly have gotten on well with the islanders, and the neighbors would surely have loved her.

Leaving, I looked back again and again, standing at the stern for a long time until the small island at last slipped from sight. Though my stay was short, the islanders and I had taken a liking to each other. Mutual attraction between people often comes from something similar in the bone; my temperament resembles the islanders', so we found each other pleasing.

Perhaps I will return in my lifetime; perhaps this will be my only visit. The island's beach has no sand, only pebbles. Before leaving I took a small pebble; if I cannot return to this island, whenever I think of it I can take out this pebble, touch it, look at it, and savor the warm life I lived there.