The Hakka Houses Of Fujian

After one day in Xiamen I took a small sidetrip to see the earthen round-houses (tulou) of the Hakka people in northern Fujian. This group of people have traditionally lived together in these massive semi-fortified buildings that come in all shapes and sizes, from round to elliptical to square, with multiple floors for multiple families and an open courtyard for the animals, for many years. Though they may differ in appearance, they are all essentially made up of a wooden frame enclosed by walls made from a mixture of mud, sticky rice, straw and anything else they could get their hands on that can be up to a metre thick. Very very distinctive, and something I've wanted to see for a long time.

So, after a 5 hour train ride from Xiamen I arrived in Longyan, which apparently was a starting point for trips to see these places. I must have been looking a bit lost, for two Chinese students came up to me and asked if I needed help. I told them where I wanted to go, and despite never having heard of it, they decided to help me out. First thing they did was take me for lunch. All I needed from them was a push int he direction of the bus station and I ended up being treated to dinner and being escorted personally to the bus station where they helped me buy my ticket and sat me on the right bus. That is generosity at it's best. But it didn't end there. On the bus I was approached by another man who correctly guessed that there was only one reason a foreigner would be travelling out here and gave me a card for his son and daughter-in-law's hotel and guide service, pointing out on a map exactly where I should go and what I could see there. What could have potentially been a tough time was made effortless by the kindness of a few strangers. I felt very grateful that day.

The bus ride to Hongkeng, where I was to end up staying was pretty cool. I had no idea that the tulou would be this abundant, but there was at least one in every town we passed and I soon lost count of them all. What I loved was how they were in varying states of preservation. Some were as pristine as a mud-brick house can ever look, while others had been adapted and given concrete extensions. Yet more were completely derelict and falling apart, allowing a look at their insides.

Upon arriving in Hongkeng I was taken straight to the hotel and made arrangements for accomodation and a guide for the next day. I shunned the nice air-condition, en-suite bedroom and instead opted for an authentic experience staying in a room inside one of the local tulou. In hindsight, not really worth the bother. At least I can say I've done it, but that's about all. I had no contact with anyone else living inside the thing and at 8pm the doors are locked so I had to stay in my room and fend off the mosquitoes from an early hour. The toilets are all outside the tulou so it was pissing in a pot for me, but luckily the guys at the hotel let me use their nice bathroom to have a shower beforehand, so I didn't have to carry a bucket of cold water up from the pump in the courtyard. The bed was as hard as a rock and I woke up the next morning at 6.30am feeling less than refreshed and with the additional knowledge that pigs can and do snore quite loudly. My sleeping place for that night is shown in the above three photos.

But there was no time to worry about that. At 7am my tour began. For 180 yuan (let's remember that price for a little comparison later on, eh?) I had 4 and a half hours on the back of a motorbike riding 30km through villages out to what is now a classic tulou set-piece called Tian Lou Keng. This set of one square and four round houses date back to as recently as the 1960s. All are still inhabited and while I felt a bit strange walking round some other people's houses, it was interesting to have a look. This was the furthest point out but our return took us back though many villages where I was able to stop and look in at other tulou and take many, many pictures.

The local scenery was also beautiful and is a big tea-growing area. After a brief stop at one of the oldest Tulou in the area, Yuchang, home of 25 generations of the Liu family, where the wooden interior is now all lop-sided, I was lucky enough to stop in at a few tea factories (if you can call one or two rooms a factory) to see the tea leaves being processed. It was pretty cool to see. I even bought some.
I had a little while to chill back at Hongkeng before returning to Xiamen. The woman at the hotel made a mistake about the bus to Longyan though, so she gave a passing motorbike driver a few yuan and we had a mad dash after it through the streets before finally catching it up. Good fun. The train ride back to Xiamen was less fun. The 5 hours were long and crowded. The train was even an hour late, so I was starting to get worried about getting back to my hotel. One of the problems with staying on an island is that it's not the easiest place in the world to get to. Once the ferries stop that's it. I thought I'd end up on a park bench or something, but the train made up time and I got back to my hotel where I'd left all my luggage just in the nick of time. That was when they told me that they were actually fully booked now. I'd totally forgotten it was Friday night and the place had been flooded with tourists. Another problem with staying on a small island is that there aren't too mnay options available. Luckily one hotel had a room free (for 180 yuan no less, remember that...) which I gratefully took.