After the last passenger steps aboard, Old Tsai, with well practiced motions, unties the boat, pulls the gangplank on board and slowly steers away from the dock.

The tour guide gives the tourists an introduction to Singapore in fluent English. Before them, a lion-headed, fish-tailed statue stands amid an assortment of sampans and diesel ships. Large cargo ships and ocean liners of every country can be seen in the outer harbor--Singapore is indeed an international "transfer station."

Easy to make a living in Taiwan? With the cruise going smoothly, Old Tsai pulls down the cigarette from behind his ear and kicks up his feet for a leisurely smoke on deck. His early days as a fisherman not only darkened his skin but also made his hair yellow-brown. The sea's winds left deep and long wrinkles across his face, and the whites of his eyes are cloudy. Who would think he was only 61 years old?

"This job is relatively easy," he says in Fukienese with a heavy Amoy accent. He gets paid 1,000 Singapore dollars a month (around NT$15,000)--enough to pay the rent and buy his booze. His wife has already passed away, and he needs a good drink to get to sleep. His four children are all grown, but kids these days just don't bother themselves about their elderly parents. He raises his sleepy eyes and asks a Taiwanese tourist, "Is it easy to make a living in Taiwan?"

Looking for the promised land: At the beginning wasn't it also to make a living that he left Kinmen for Singapore? He got on a big boat in Amoy, and the voyage took at least 10 days, making stops at Hong Kong and Shantou before going across the South China Sea. When he saw the flashing red lights, he knew that this was the "red light dock" of which he had been told, and he felt safe.

It has been the fate of those from Kinmen to leave the island to make something of themselves.

Off the Fukien coast near Amoy, Kinmen and such neighboring islands as Little Kinmen are only slightly more than 150 square kilometers in area. With strong winds and poor soil, only tough crops that don't need much water, such as sweet potatoes and peanuts, can grow there. It is a far from ideal environment for development.

Sixteen hundred years ago during the Chin Dynasty, when the Huns and the Tungusics occupied central China, refugees fled to the south, including some who hid on this island. Then in the Tang Dynasty, Liu Mien, a high-ranking official in Fukien, designated Kinmen as a district for raising horses. Chen Yuan, the official given charge over raising the horses, brought people of 12 different surnames to the island to open up what was then wasteland and develop agriculture, fishing and the salt industry. Under his supervision Kinmen slowly prospered.

No land is without flowers: The philosopher Chu Hsi came to teach there 800 years ago, and only then did its people commonly receive intellectual training and learn to respect the traditional rites and moral principals. At that time people used the phrases "the kingdom of Tsou and Lu by the sea" and "no land is without flowers" to describe the island. The former is a comparison to the homes of Confucius and Mencius and the latter was to attest to educated men being everywhere--even on the island. It was no longer considered a hinterland, and its people simply became residents of Kinmen.

These happy days did not last long. Starting 700 years ago, a succession of wars and disasters befell the island. It was a target of pirate raids from the Yuan to the Ch'ing dynasties and the base for Korcinga in the late Ming. As a result of all this turmoil, people began to emigrate to Taiwan and Southeast Asia after Chia Ching's rule in the Ming Dynasty. The war between China and Japan and the occupying of the mainland by the communists caused even greater waves of emigration as the Kinmenese made their way to Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, North Borneo, the Philippines, Vietnam, Thailand. . . . Kinmen became a famous place of origin for Chinese overseas.

Relying on water: "When first coming to Singapore, most of these immigrants were unmarried and stayed in 'coolie rooms,'" says Chen Kuo-min, the vice chairman of the Kinmen Club there. While immigrants may have alike been from Kinmen, they could have belonged to any of more than 30 different communities on the island. Most of those who joined the Hufeng Club, for example, have the surname Yang, whereas those from Kuningtou are mostly Lis. Each community had its own "coolie room," providing a bed per man and basic amenities for those just off the boat until they could fend for themselves.

Kinmen stands alone in the sea. Once coming to Singapore, it was natural that Kinmenese would make their living on the water. Fortunately, the water transport trade was booming in Singapore. When sailors came ashore, businessmen carrying their wares would need to hire sampans, and Kinmenese gradually came to skipper most of these. Each community had its own dock. From a day of constant rowing, you could make about five or six Singapore dollars (the equivalent of about 50 today). You could make three dollars a load for transporting fruits and vegetables, but the risk was great as well. In order to send goods to the market sooner than others, the sampans had to go out of the harbor and then move along with the boats while being unloaded onto. If you got careless, the goods could crush or injure you, or you could die at sea if the sampan capsized.

In addition to harbor transport, long-distance shipping was also a field in which Kinmen immigrants made their presence felt. Several famous shipping companies were founded by Kinmenese. "Many experienced long-distance shippers who got to know the sources for goods became ninety-eights." Chen Kuo-min explains that "ninety-eight" refers to the turn-around selling of local goods in Southeast Asia. Because those in this middle-man trade took only 2 percent commission, they become widely known as "ninety-eights." At a time when trading companies were getting 20 or 30 percent, the take by the ninety-eights was extremely small. "Nonetheless, the costs at the time were low--so it was still possible to eke out a living," says Chen.

Everyone's from Kinmen: Resin was imported from Malaysia and coffee, nutmeg and tea leaves from Indonesia. These would be processed in Singapore before being reexported to America and Europe. "When I was little, there would be a string of oxcarts pulling goods all the way from the port to Telok Ayer Street," recalls Chen Kou-min with a smile. From those ships that brought goods from their country of origin to Singapore, to the sampans that brought the goods from ships to the docks and the coolies responsible for transporting the goods from the docks to the ninety-eights, to the ninety-eights themselves--even those who refueled the ships--all were Kinmenese. This kind of vertical domination of an entire industry is rarely seen among other groups of Chinese.

Yet the Kinmenese sense of local loyalty did not extend to those from Little Kinmen. Back on the islands, people from Little Kinmen would be bullied when they went to the big island, and almost none of them could be found working in the harbor in Singapore. As latecomers, people from Little Kinmen moved elsewhere to make a living--to Brunei. At the time, no one thought that Brunei had rich oil deposits, and those who went there, by twist of fate, have since become rich old men.

Pigs' knuckles, taro and meat pies: After the seventies, the Singaporee conomy took off, and the two percent commission for trade of local products was cut back." Because the countries of origin could directly ship out, they no longer relied on Singapore as a transfer center, and sometimes we couldn't even make 0.5 percent," explains Chen Kuo-min. Many of those who originally worked trading local products, began to work in a number of other fields, such as the computer and building materials industries. Hence, Kinmenese were no longer clearly distinguished by their professions, and they mixed in with the general working populationin various industries.

Although their connections through work were gradually weakened, Kinmenese hoped that their sense of identity with their roots wouldn't be. Hence, every Sunday, they would gather in the Kinmen Club and eat sweet potato congee, pork pies, and taro and pig's knuckle with other Kinmenese. They gathered both to maintain their ties and to reminisce about the hard work of the first struggling pioneers.

"It's unfortunate that though the club has been around for 100 years, its purpose hasn't expanded from these two aims," says Chen Jung-chao, a senior lecturer at Singapore National University. Clubs for those who immigrated from other areas of China started to offer various kinds of cultural activities. The Tungan Club, for example, has gathered scholars from Japan, Hong Kong and Taiwan to discuss "The Preservation and Exaltation of Chinese Traditional Culture." The Payi Club for people from Chaochou has published works by local Chinese authors. "Since the club was founded so early immigrants could help each other, it should now raise its sights to serve all of Chinese society," says Chen.

Confucian teachings--roots for life overseas: In fact, the Kinmen Club did hold lectures about the teachings of Confucius, but unfortunately these were praised in the abstract but not well attended. Long ago, the busy striving for thoroughness in business and the hectic pace of life led Chen to turn to Confucian principles as an extremely human and practical set of cultural beliefs. He feels sorry that he cannot get other modern people to accept them as well.

Originally many of the Chinese in Singapore were illiterate and had inferiority complexes, which were aggravated by their living in an international port like Singapore where English was paramount. They broke their backs working so their children could study abroad. Many of the second and third generation can't even read Chinese, let alone understand the Confucian principle of filial piety.

"Now many of the English educated don't care for their elderly parents. They sell their homes and emigrate with the wife and kids, leaving their parents behind for the government to care for," says Chen Kuo-min with great disapproval. "Confucianism is about how to live humanely--one can't sever one's roots!"

No one can say that there is a definite correlation between an English education and not caring for one's parents. But in any case, the current government of Singapore is beginning to exalt the spirit of Confucianism, and there is now a junior high school course on the subject. In days past, Kinmen was called "the Confucian Kingdom by the sea." Why can't its emigrants overseas revive that spirit and earn the name "the Confucian Kingdom overseas?"

[Picture Caption]

Many of the old "coolie rooms" have already been torn down.

Long ago Kinmenese sailed on boats like this to do business all over Southeast Asia.

Kinmenese managing diesel ships are waiting for visits about handling passengers and shipping goods.

(Right) Regardless of the size of the ship, the shipping industry in Singapore has been dominated by Kinmenese.

The Chinese immigrants in Singapore still deeply believe in Matsu.

Working in shipping for years, Kinmenese have added working on tourist boats as a way to earn income.

These children at an English kindergarten, who are descendants of immigrants from Kinmen, might not know what "Kinmen" means.

Long ago Kinmenese sailed on boats like this to do business all over Southeast Asia.

（Right） Regardless of the size of the ship, the shipping industry in Singapore has been dominated by Kinmenese.

Kinmenese managing diesel ships are waiting for visits about handling passengers and shipping goods.

The Chinese immigrants in Singapore still deeply believe in Matsu.

These children at an English kindergarten, who are descendants of immigrants from Kinmen, might not know what "Kinmen" means.

Working in shipping for years, Kinmenese have added working on tourist boats as a way to earn income.