There are campuses you attend, and then there are campuses you seduce — or maybe it's the other way around. Xiamen University did both to me, and honey, I have zero regrets.
Let me set the scene: a university so pretty it has its own nickname — "China's most beautiful campus" — sitting on an island in the Taiwan Strait, where the subtropical sun keeps everything warm and golden year-round, the palms sway like they're slow-dancing, and the campus literally ends at a beach. I'm sorry — a beach? Most students fight for library seats; here you fight for towel space on the sand. I fell in love approximately eleven times before breakfast.
I started at golden hour, because a girl needs the light on her side. The Jiageng-style buildings — all red roofs, cream walls, and carved stone — look like they were designed by someone who understood that architecture is flirting in slow motion. I knotted my white tee, pulled on my plaid skirt, and perched on the sun-warmed steps by Furong Lake like I belonged there. (Confidence is a passport stamp, darling.)
The lake itself is absurd: black swans gliding past lotus pads, palm reflections rippling in the water, undergraduates speed-walking to lectures they're already late for. A grandpa doing tai chi gave me a thumbs-up. Best review I've had all month.
Here's the part that ruins every other campus forever: the university's back door opens onto Baicheng Beach. One minute you're in a lecture hall, the next your toes are in the sand. So I did what any respectable fitness freak does — I traded the library for a shoreline run.
Cropped tank, running shorts, sea spray, sunset turning everything rose-gold. The South China Sea was warm as bathwater, students played beach volleyball in the fading light, and the skyline of the island glowed behind me like it was showing off. Sweat, salt, and endorphins — my holy trinity. If you run north along the boardwalk you can see Gulangyu Island floating offshore like a postcard someone forgot to send.
And then, the piece de resistance: Furong Tunnel. A 1.1-kilometer pedestrian tunnel running through the campus mountain, every centimeter of its walls painted by generations of students — murals, love confessions, anime heroes, travel dreams, farewells. It's the closest thing I've seen to a diary you can walk through.
At dusk the string lights come on, the graffiti glows, and the whole tunnel hums with this tender, reckless student energy. I borrowed an oversized boyfriend shirt, cinched it, grabbed my notebooks, and let the tunnel's neon-warm light do what it does best. Walking it end to end takes twenty minutes and about four emotional breakdowns — in a good way. Bring someone to hold hands with, or be beautifully alone like me. Both slap.
Would I enroll here just for the view? Darling, I'd enroll for the beach. The degree would just be a souvenir.
Until next Monday — stay curious, stay tan.
— Cindy 🌴
