There's something very self-contained about the provinces of
Fujian , Guangdong and Hainan Island , which
occupy 1200km or so of China's convoluted southern seaboard. Though
occasionally taking centre stage in the country's history, the
provinces share a sense of being generally isolated from mainstream
events by the mountain ranges which surround Fujian and Guangdong,
physically cutting off the rest of the empire. Forced to look
seawards, the coastal regions have a long history of contact with
the outside world, continually importing - or being forced to
endure - foreign influences and styles. This is where Islam entered
China and porcelain left it; where the mid-nineteenth-century
theatricals of the Opium Wars, colonialism, the Taiping Uprising
and the mass overseas exodus of southern Chinese were played out;
and where today you'll find China's most modern, Westernized
cities. Conversely, the interior mountains enclose some of the
country's wildest, remotest corners, with parts that were literally
in the Stone Age within living memory.
Possibly because their specific attractions are thinly spread
and somewhat out of the way, the region receives scant attention
from visitors. Huge numbers do pass through Guangdong in transit
between the mainland and Hong Kong and Macau, but only because they
have to, and few look beyond the overpowering capital,
Guangzhou . Yet while the other two regional capitals -
Fuzhou in Fujian, and Hainan's Haikou - share
Guangzhou's modern veneer, all three also hide temples and antique
architecture that have somehow escaped developers, while other
cities and towns have managed to preserve their old,
character-laden ambiance intact. The pick of these are the Fujian
port of Xiamen , its streets almost frozen in time since the
turn of the century, and Chaozhou in eastern Guangdong, a
staunchly conservative place consciously preserving its traditions
in the face of the modern world.
Indeed, a sense of local tradition and of being "different" from
the rest of the country pervades the whole region, though, aside
from people being more assertive and open - habits sometimes
regarded by reserved northerners as uncouth - this feeling is
rarely expressed in any tangible way. Language is one
difference you might notice, however; the main dialects here are
Cantonese and Minnan, whose rhythms, even if you can't speak a word
of Chinese, are recognizably removed from Mandarin. And if you can
speak Chinese, you'll find local pronunciation very distinct: "h"
often replaces "f", for instance, and the city name "Shenzhen" is
spoken more like "Shumchun". Less obvious are specific ethnic
groups , though they include the Hakka , a widely spread
Han sub-group whose mountainous Guangdong-Fujian heartland is
dotted with fortress-like mansions; the Muslim Hui , who
form large communities in Guangzhou, coastal Hainan and in
Quanzhou in Fujian; and the Li , Hainan's animistic,
original inhabitants.
While a quick look around much of the coastal areas here leaves
a gloomy impression of uncontrolled development and its attendant
social ills ( beggars are prolific in the cities), most of
this is actually contained within various Special Economic
Zones , specifically created in the mid-1980s as a focus for
heavy investment and industrialization. Beyond their boundaries
lurk some respectably wild - and also nicely tamed - corners where
you can settle back and enjoy the scenery. Over in western
Guangdong, the city of Zhaoqing sits beside some pleasant
lakes and hills, while the Wuyi Shan range in northeastern
Fujian contains the region's lushest, most picturesque mountain
forests. Way down south, the country's best beaches have
encouraged the tourist industry to hype Hainan as "China's Hawaii",
and there's also a limited amount of hiking to try through the
island's interior highlands.
Anyone wanting to stop off and explore will find plentiful
local and long-distance transport from ferries to trains,
though accommodation can be expensive and suffers additional
seasonal price hikes in Guangzhou. The weather is nicest in
spring and autumn, as summer storms from June to August bring daily
doses of heavy humidity, thunder and afternoon downpours on the
coast, while the higher reaches of the Guangdong-Fujian border can
get very cold in winter.