Crisis startles sleepy Haikou

Brig.-Gen. Neal Sealock is part of the U.S. team in Hainan

By staff and wires

HAIKOU, China -- The t-shirts and toiletries may have reached the U.S. plane crew, and American officials are now hoping Chinese officials will pass on snacks and reading material.

As the deadlock involving the 24 plane crew goes on, the waiting game continues for the officials in Hainan's capital, Haikou.

AUDIO CNN's Lisa Rose Weaver says officials are waiting for the word 332 KB/30sec AIFF or WAV sound

Despite the tension, an American official said the Chinese officers were polite and agreed to take a photo of the crew so their families can be assured they are in good health.

On Wednesday, he said, 24 t-shirts and toiletries were delivered to the crew. They had been in the same clothes since Sunday.

Life is very different on Hainan Island since the EP-3 surveillance aircraft made an emergency landing on Sunday after a collision with a Chinese fighter jet.

Until the plane limped into Lingshui airbase, this steamy province off the coast of southern China was known as a free-wheeling backwater of sun-seekers, smugglers and political exiles.

Now the island's beach resorts, jungle-clad hills and sweaty half-built towns form the backdrop for a tense diplomatic drama.

Nobody seems more surprised than the residents of the island that faded into obscurity after the bottom fell out of a property boom etons of unfinished hotels and office blocks.

"We're a long way from Beijing here," said Lu Xuesi, tending a stall of tropical plants under a crumbling highway in Haikou.

"These kind of international problems don't usually affect us. Now everybody's talking about Hainan."

Staff at the Hainan Mandarin hotel where the U.S. officials are waiting for further access to the plane's crew said local police warned them to tighten security after a morning protest by about 50 Hainan University students.

But the university campus was quiet in the afternoon and students said they had not heard of any demonstrations. Local police declined to comment.

"This place has a different culture and mentality from Beijing," said Glenn Peters, an American pilot working for U.S. aircraft maker Fairchild Dornier in Hainan.

Peters, who trains pilots for Hainan Airlines and teaches English on the side, said his students were upset but civil.

"The tone was different," he said. "By the end of the class we were still friends, but it was somewhat moderated." There were real concerns, however, about how the dispute might harm industry based around newly developed beach resorts on the south coast.

"Not many people had heard of Hainan before," said Krista Leavitt, the American manager of the health club at the Hainan Mandarin. "Now, they'll just think of Chinese army bases and U.S. citizens being detained."

Hainan's free-wheeling ways date back to imperial times, when Chinese emperors would banish people to the island.

After the 1989 massacre of pro-democracy protesters around Tiananmen Square in Beijing, several student activists took refuge on the island to escape the arrests that followed.

When Hainan became a special economic zone in 1988, the economy flourished as banks poured money into a booming property market.

But when Beijing introduced austerity measures in the mid-1990s, banks cut off credit lines to property developers, the local economy crumbled, and Hainan slipped back into its sleepy pace of life.

"Hainan is a quiet place," said Lu the flower seller. "Now we just want things to get back to normal."

Reuters contributed to this report.

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