the Devil Cape

Congrats to the new Light Fellows! You are going to have an awesome time :) full of many great adventures. Feel free to contact me with questions at any time

Here are some pictures from last quarter, when Alex took Cat and I on an adventure to Yehliu, a park full of crazy rock formations that look like the surface of the moon or some alien planet.

It's easy to forget, but every once in awhile you will run into a fort or word or food reminding you how varied Taiwan's history is, full of all different kinds of people, from the aboriginals to various settlers/invaders/colonizers/visitors/immigrants or whatever. Most obviously the Chinese and the Japanese, more recently American missionaries and workers from SE Asia, but also since the 1500s Spanish, Dutch, and Portuguese.

"Yehliu" is a phonetic translation from the Spanish word "Diablos" in the phrase Punto Diablos -- the Devil Cape. (I do not think these words sound alike at all. Maybe a linguist could explain.)

The town itself is pretty standard as port towns go, grubby and fishy smelling but has its charms if you're feeling nostalgic. Cat looking pretty at the harbor:


Also the town is entirely about fish. Here were some of the food options we walked by:


Cuttlefish


funny looking 3-eyed crabs (eyes are actually their butt, but could've fooled me)


The park itself is wonderful for exploring, and, fun surprise, as TaiDa students we were let in for free! Free to experience the rocks:



Here is my friend Cat experiencing the rocks (on an emotional level? Or intellectual? i would have to guess spiritual):



Yehliu is a big tourist spot as tourist spots go in Taiwan. Even though we went after school on a Monday, there were still lots of Japanese and Mainland tourists. No comment needed:



Yehliu is mostly of interest to people because the rocks look like things. Here is the main rock, it looks like a queen's head:

Here is the ice-cream rock:


There were some other things but I'll let you see for yourself (don't forget to look for the fairy shoe, the gorilla, ...).

This kind of tourist spot is perfect for Asian tourists, because the main point of going is to take pictures of things. Especially, things that other people have heard of. Or, of you doing funny things in front of the things they have heard of. (So that you can show the people -- who have heard of the things -- that you have been to the places with the things they have heard of!).

This kind of tourist attitude normally annoys me, like in the Vatican when 3 Asian men alternately took each others photographs in front of each painting without even looking at any of the paintings. (Since there were three of them, that was 3 photos per painting - each with a different person rotated in to get a picture of all three possible pairs).

At Yehliu though, I'll admit we got kind of into it:


Popping out among the mushroom rocks.

I can see how in some ways, at least, going to tourist places for the photographs can help you be more alert and observant of what you're supposed to be looking at.

Do you think that Cat looks like a turtle in this picture?


Invented that one myself.

But besides taking creative/repetitive tourist photos you could also just explore! We found a fossil:



And then we just kept walking and walking, leaving the crowds behind to explore spots where only locals came - to fish:


All in all, we walked around for several hours and played amongst the weird rocks and enjoyed the fresh ocean air and scenery until it got dark.



Then we totally lucked-out and caught a bus to Jilong (Keelung) after waiting for only a few minutes. Jilong night market is THE BEST.


The stalls were organized, and it wasn't too crowded but still had sooo many different snacks. And of course, they specialize in seafood! All Taiwan night markets are amazing but this was my best night market experience so far, and perfect after all the exhausting rock experiencing.

All thanks to Alex's planning, and this was on a Monday. Just imagine how awesome the other days of your week could be if you came to Taiwan!

橋 to the future

Michael directed this to my attention the other day and it has now made its way into my beloved Taipei Times.

Essentially, the former governor of Utah, who was appointed as the ambassador to China by Obama in part to neutralize him as a threat for the Presidency, has now stepped down in order to pave the way to seek the Republican nomination.

I know very little about Huntsman's politics and am not the person to tell you about that anyway. Everything that I know about him was from surfing online, and what stuck out to me is that he speaks both Mandarin and Taiwanese, which he learned as a missionary in Taiwan twenty years ago. Also, he has seven children, including two adopted girls, one from China and one from India.

I'm suspending judgment until I get a better idea of who he is, and it's too early to say much anyway. But what I can say is that it's an important moment for language study that someone like Huntsman could be considered seriously as a candidate. A diplomat and student of Chinese and Chinese culture, he is a strong advocate for language study and cultural understanding.

Check out this video. Or here: He believes that language study is important. He can speak Chinese (with a slightly too standard Beijing-y pronunciation, to my ears, and some tone issues. but still). He thinks Confucian thought ought to be studied. He thinks that since Chinese children are learning English from the second they learn to talk, American students should be learning Chinese as well. All of this is important to the future of America and China and American-Chinese relations.

!!

Happy New Year!

Hi friends! Happy Chinese New Year! I have to run off to family things soon, but here's a brief update on 2011 so far.

New Year's was awesome! It was a huge deal this year because it marked the 100th year of the Republic of China (founded 1911), so Taiwan really went all out. Taipei had a huge fireworks display designed by the same guy who did the Beijing Olympics and Shanghai Expo fireworks - though I really don't understand why they felt it necessary to follow in China's footsteps that way - well, anyway, the fireworks were still pretty cool.

Despite the freezing cold, there was a huge turn out at the New Year's Celebration around Taipei 101, I heard over half a million. Scene at the MRT, and this was around 3 p.m.:



They increased public transportation services by a lot - the capacity just one line of the MRT could transport to and from the Xinyi Business district every hour was comparable to the size of my home town.

The celebration around 101 was exciting but super crowded. After getting squashed at the concert, we left with our free stuff to celebrate in a more cozy area:

Thankfully, Alex's grandma's apartment was only about 15 minutes away from 101, so we could avoid the crowds and freezing weather and still watch the fireworks from the roof. View from the balcony:

That is the chaos that we avoided.

The fireworks display was really great! From the roof we could see fireworks from different areas, including 101 and the Flower Expo, and based on what others said the view was a lot more impressive than it was if you were actually in the 101 area.

And at the end of the fireworks show:

This almost speaks for itself. This is what 101 looks like every night now. As my friend's discussed, can you imagine if NYC displayed some kind of slogan containing a pink heart over the whole city? No, that would never happen. It is pretty cute though.

The new year is off to a great start. My classes are amazing! I have one of the best teachers in the entire school and my one-on-one teacher is my news teacher from last year. All of my classmates are heritage learners, meaning no problems with accents or tones. And best of all, my classmates are awesome, really smart and basically the people who I spend time with outside of class. Class feels more like an extended social interaction than actual class.

Also so far in 2011, Dom visited me from Beijing! I went to Xinzhu with Alex and Jason in search of delicious food and we rode the high speed rail back to Taipei. And I travelled to Sun Moon Lake and Taroko Gorge with Cat Drey and co. - the places to go in Taiwan which I had previously never been too. There was an earthquake yesterday which was pretty exciting. Now I get the week off for Chinese New Year, which also means eating infinite amounts of food and yummy snacks!

I have to go eat now! Happy Chinese New Year and actual New Year! more updates soon!