Union Church (Xie He Li Bai Tang协和礼拜堂)
Union Church, Kulangsu’s earliest church, was built in 1863. The church was named as “The International Church”in the beginning and renamed as “Union Church” in 1875. Its construction was funded by believers from three denominations, the American Reformed Church, London Missionary Society, and English Presbyterian Mission. The Union Church was rebuilt again in 1911. Address: Lujiao Road, […]
Christian Cemetery (Fan Zai Mu Yuan 番仔墓园)
There are four separate cemeteries spread out around a single rolling hill in Nei Cuo Ao. All of them are beautiful, lush, mysterious, and overgrown with centuries’ worth of vegetation, and are well worth exploring and photographing. Christians were mainly buried in the graveyard near Anxian Hall, especially Chinese Christians who lived on Kulangsu. The cemetery […]
Shuzhuang Garden (Shu Zhuang Hua Yuan 菽庄花园)
After the Sino-Japanese War, the Qing government ceded Taiwan to the Japanese, and Taiwanese magnate Lin Erjia moved to Kulangsu with his family. In 1913, he built a garden on the slope of Kulangsu’s Caozai Hill and named the Garden after his “courteous name” of “Shuzhuang,” which is pronounced similarly in the Southern Fujian Dialect. […]
Trinity Church (San Yi Tang 三一堂)
As more and more Christians moved to Kulangsu in the 1920s, Xiamen Church, New Street Church and Bamboo Church cooperated to make worship more convenient by building a Kulangsu church in 1934. The name “Trinity Church” alludes to its joint construction by the three churches, as well as the doctrine of the Trinity. (The Chinese […]
Kulangsu Island: a tropical beach paradise beating to the waves of its own drummer
Kulangsu is an island about 600 meters from southwestern coast of Xiamen, Fujian. Slightly long and narrow, the 1.88-square-kilometer Kulangsu Island looks like a sailing ship anchored in the bay. There are seven granite hills as well as numerous ravines and springs scattered on the island. An alternating distribution of white beaches and oddly shaped rocks […]