Journey to the East

Ladies or gents?

2011-10-18T12:46:00.000+08:00

Here's a confusing one:

Is this the men's or women's restroom?

The Chinese says "Men, do not enter" (more literally: "Men: halt!") But the English "Men's stop" implies that this is the station or pit-stop for men! Also, foreigners often can't read Chinese, but many will memorize the characters for "man" and "woman" so as to avoid embarrassment at public restrooms. But of you look for 男 (man) here, you'll still get it wrong!

Seoul, South Korea

2011-10-12T16:39:00.000+08:00

Drummers I came across at Insadong, in Seoul, Korea

Shiding-to-Maokong hike

2011-05-01T22:10:00.000+08:00

Just for starters... please check back later.

Old World Forkedfern (Dicranopteris linearis)

Misc. photos from Bangkok

2011-04-29T03:12:00.002+08:00

Now some miscellaneous pix from my recent trip to Bangkok.

Royal Cemetery at Wat Ratchabophit

Little India, with the domes of the Sikh temple
Gurdwara Siri Guru Singh Sabha visible

Video: entering Saphan Han Market

Red Shirt rally

Riverboat approaching. This is a part of Bangkok's
public transportation system.

On the river boat

Water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes), floating down the Chao
Phraya river. It's a problematic invasive species.

Wat Ratcha Orasaram, final resting place of King Rama III

Same temple. Note the Chinese influence.

Oleander (Nerium oleander)

Bangkok Protestant Cemetery

Shell of the Channeled Apple Snail (Pomacea canaliculata),
another invasive species.

Misc. photos from Calcutta

2011-04-27T13:17:00.006+08:00

Motherhouse, the headquarters of Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity

The Maidan, Calcutta's biggest park

The entrance to South Park Street Cemetery, one of the

most amazing cemeteries I've ever visited

A crow (Corvus splendens) in the cemetery

Milk spurge (Euphorbia neriifolia) that has grown into a tree.
It's intermeshed with Bougainvillea.

Video of the cemetery

Calcutta street scene

Video of the street. I held the camera at waist-level and walked fast, to prevent people from looking at the camera!

Another street scene

The curry restaurant I found

Here's something for my friend Sandhya:

St. Paul's Cathedral

The interior of the cathedral

Songkran - Thai New Year

2011-04-13T16:59:00.003+08:00

It just so happens that I'm in Bangkok for the Songkran festival.

This is a time when people traditionally pay respects to elders, give food to monks, pray at temples, wash Buddha images... but the biggest emphasis is splashing water about! Which is nice considering that April is the hottest time of the year.

One of the big hubs of activity and partying is Khao San Road, where I'm staying.

People carry bowls and bottles of water, and increasingly popularly, squirt guns, particularly the "super soaker" type, and they soak passersby. Gangs of water-gun wielding young 'uns often engage in shootouts with each other! Even a quick trip to the corner 7-11 guarantees a soaking!

People also smear a water/chalk mixture on others' faces.

A lot of fun!

Bangkok!

2011-04-07T22:07:00.001+08:00

Now I'm in Bangkok!

I've already visited the Bangkok Protestant Cemetery twice, and I also visited the Royal Cemetery. Besides that, I've been recovering from intestinal... uh... discomfort, but I feel OK now.

I got together with my friend Harry who I got together with in Singapore last August. We talked of many things... of cabbages and kings... had beers and smoked "shisha" (apple and fennel seed flavor). (Yeah, it looks like "hashish" spelled backwards, but trust me, it's not!!)

Here he is.

I'll be here for another week. That includes the Songkran festival.

Tollygunge Cemetery

2011-04-04T14:45:00.004+08:00

This morning I decided to make the trek out to Tollygunge Cemetery, to the south of downtown. Fortunately it doesn't take long to get to: 20 minutes by subway, and a 15 minute walk. But the subway is insanely crowded! Plus the name of Tollygunge Station was renamed, further complicating matters. But it was worth the trip.

Tollygunge Cemetery gate

Later I had a tasty vegetable curry at this wonderful little restaurant I found.

Sacks of hot chili peppers I saw on the street

More Calcutta

2011-04-03T22:08:00.000+08:00

Day two: I saw more than just graves, but I did still see graves.

I saw the Black Hole monument (the Black Hole prison no longer exists). I saw the gigantic building known as the Victoria Memorial.

In no particular order, here are the pics. When I get my own wireless connection I'll fix them.

Calcutta, a graver's paradise

2011-04-02T18:09:00.004+08:00

(Hi, there are pictures now, but they're completely unorganized. Some weird changes have been made to the way they allow them to be edited and placed, and I haven't mastered it yet, so it's a mess.)

Hello from Calcutta! (They call it Kolkata now, but I'm a traditionalist.)

I'm sitting in an internet cafe across the street from the Mother Teresa House.

I chose to come here because of all the historic cemeteries. I visited South Park Street Cemetery, the Scottish Cemetery, Lower Circular Road Cemetery, and Mother Teresa's tomb. There is much more to see.

A rickshaw. This is the product of Japanese engineering from the late 19th century, and its design endures.

I would like to take the opportunity now to sing the praises of South Park Street Cemetery. It's a truly amazing place. Gigantic monuments and pyramids. Thousands of graves. A true shelter from the chaos of the streets outside. It's like the Protestant Cemetery in Penang, but on steroids. If you're a graver, you have to see this place!

The Scottish Cemetery fell into complete disrepair after 50 yeas of neglect. But in 2008, and organizaton started clearing away the dense underbrush and is gradually working on restoring it. It's not in the best condition, but its future is bright.

Lower Circular Road Cemetery is sprawling, and contains many new graves. People are still being buried here.

And Mother Teresa's tomb is quite nondescript, and is wrapped in a tarp right now. Some construction is going on beside it.

Longshan Temple

2011-03-17T18:24:00.000+08:00

The day I went to Herb Alley, I also visited Longshan Temple.

Here, two young ladies perform poah poe (pronounced "bwah bway") in front of the Old Man Under the Moon, a god of love and marriage.

More to come...

Herb Alley

2011-03-09T17:15:00.009+08:00

Just around the corner from Taipei's famed Longshan Temple is a lesser-known attraction: Herb Alley. It's a tiny covered lane with a number of shops selling medicinal herbs. Walk in, and you'll be hit by the aromas of a myriad herbs.

A view into the alley. On the right, there are some large Aloe vera plants hanging. And the brown tangled masses are the roots of Uraria crinita.

Visible in the photo below are prickly pear (Opuntia ficus-indica), also called nopal; milk spurge (Euphorbia neriifolia), which though itself poisonous is said to treat cancer (herbal chemo?); a fruit of the screw pine (Pandanus odoratissimus), which can be brewed into a tea, is hanging from a pink cord.

Left to right: common rue (Ruta graveolens), turmeric (Curcuma longa), and fo-ti (Polygonum multiflorum) roots. Behind the fo-ti roots are Tinospora cordifolia vines, said to be good for the liver.

Outside the alley there are some stalls selling herbal teas. I bought a cup of tea brewed from the chameleon plant (Houttuynia cordata). It's supposed to rid you of toxins and harmful bacteria.

If you go visit Longshan Temple, be sure to stop by Herb Alley and take a look around. You may find the cure for what ails you!

More photos from Nepal

2011-02-17T19:04:00.008+08:00

A Common Myna bird (Acridotheres tristis) eyes some tasty morsels.

Cows crossing a river

Rickshaw-wallahs awaiting fares

A tangle of wires

Bryan Adams concert!

Indian curry flavored snack!

Notice the date in the "Star of David"!

A tasty cup of masala tea!

Miscellaneous Photos from Nepal

2011-02-14T19:59:00.012+08:00

swasthya: it means "health" or "well-being" in Hindi. Derived from Sanskrit svasti, it ultimately analyzes into su- ("good" or "well", akin to Greek heu-, eu-) + asti ("to be", akin to Latin est, German ist, English "is"). The Thai greeting sawatdee (spelled swasdi in their script) is directly derived from this word, as is the word "swastika."

स्वास्थ्य

Flame Vine (Pyrostegia venusta), a popular decorative

Always a welcome sign!

To deal with Nepal's infamous rolling blackouts, many hotels employ the use of generators for power.

Indian Big-Leaf Fig (Ficus auriculata)

And its fruits

Traveling by ox-cart

Turmeric (Curcuma longa) drying in the sun

A baby in a cot at a local orphanage

A cold beer at the end of a long day

Changu Narayan and Bhaktapur

2011-02-14T17:24:00.008+08:00

Today, after leaving Nagarkot, we first hiked to a famous Hindu temple called Changu Narayan.

Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare

Narasimha (4th avatar of Vishnu) kills the demon Hiranyakashyap

A religious ritual

Then we went to Bhaktapur, which is about an hour's drive from Kathmandu. It's a UN World Heritage Site, and is a fascinating historic site and living community with surprises around every corner.

Durbar Square

Nyatapola Temple, the tallest temple in Nepal

Video of this plaza

Big wheels (for a ceremonial chariot)

At the well

This area is filled with traditional Nepali carved windows

And the Peacock Window

We encountered a festival in which boys taunt the goddess Kali, who chases after them and tries to catch them.

Kali chases the children

Woman spinning yarn

We soon passed by a Hindu temple by a river. This temple was filled with Shiva linga, which are stylized representations of male and female genitalia. These are found throughout regions of the world heavily influenced by Hinduism, including Angkor Wat in Cambodia.

Lots o' lingas

Big linga. Size matters.

Potter's Square

A ritual in which young girls are married to a Hindu god. It's just a rite of passage: they will still be allowed to marry a real human man when they grow up.

Proud mother and twin daughters, after the marriage ritual, in Potter's Square

Nagarkot

2011-02-10T18:19:00.007+08:00

Tourists flock to the village of Nagarkot, an hour and a half from Kathmandu, for one reason: spectacular views of the Himalayas. From certain vantage points you can even see Mt. Everest peeking up from behind other mountains.

Nice views into the terraced fields down in the valley below.

Most tourists arrive here in the afternoon, get up early to see the sun rise over the Himalayas, and depart.

A pity... this place offers some decent hiking. We stayed and hiked. Great views on the hike:

Kids going to school (which starts at 10:00 sharp in this country):

Interesting sign we saw on the hike:

We hiked to the top of a hill above a military training ground. There's a viewing tower there.

We climbed up, and could see Mt. Everest, though very far away. My 18x zoom could barely make it out, but it's the white triangular point in the center of this picture:

Lots of eagles in this area.

Steppe eagles (Aquila nipalensis)

Tomorrow, Bhaktapur and then back to Kathmandu.

Then the next day, back to Taiwan. I don't think I'll have the chance to post any more updates until I return to Taiwan.

Chitwan 2

2011-02-09T00:55:00.013+08:00

Today was the day of our elephant trek. On the way to the elephant riding site we saw women harvesting crops (either mustard or rapeseed).

Preparing turmeric

Doing the laundry

Then the elephant trek started. Four passengers per elephant. Not the most comfortable ride, but definitely a unique experience!

We trekked through the jungle and alluvial plains.

We saw Sika Deer, Sambar Deer, and a peacock. No rhinos or tigers. (I did see a butterfly called the Common Tiger... does that count as a tiger sighting?) We also saw the remains of a deer that had been killed by a tiger.

Sambar deer (Rusa unicolor)

The Sambar deer seem to be less afraid of elephants than the Sika deer. We saw a large group (perhaps 15) Sika deer, but they all bolted as we got within photo range.

Peacock (Pavo cristatus)

Here is the elephant I was on:

It is of course an Asian elephant (Elephas maximus), which has smaller ears than the African elephant, and is trainable. The females also have barely visible tusks, whereas all African elephants have prominent tusks.

Afterwards, a delicious Nepali dinner.

Followed by a party in which we drank Everest Beer!

Tomorrow, a 7-hour drive to a Himalayan village.

Chitwan National Park

2011-02-08T00:31:00.008+08:00

More detail later, but... today we were walking alongside a dry creek bed, and saw the rare, endangered One-Horned Rhino (Rhinoceros unicornis)! Yes, unicorns do exist! (Whoever said a unicorn had to be a one-horned horse?)

The next day we went on a wildlife trek, first by dugout canoe and then a trek through the jungle.

We saw Mugger Crocodiles (Crocodylus palustris)...

A Gharial Crocodile (Gavialis gangeticus)

Stork-Billed Kingfisher (Halcyon capensis)

White-Throated Kingfisher (Halcyon smyrnensis)

And Sika Deer (Cervus nippon), among animals.

A termite mound (about 2m or 6 ft tall)

Pokhara Day 2

2011-02-06T20:10:00.011+08:00

Another hiking day. A more strenuous hike.

We hiked to a peak called Sarangkot. It was higher than the one we went up yesterday. Most of the way up was up ridge paved with stone steps. On the left is a view of the lake, and on the right the Himalayas. Unfortunately the air was especially hazy today. Fine particulates blow off the Himalayas, making for a persistent haze that affects the central valley of Nepal. The monsoons clear up the haze: the best views are in October.

There were some shops along the way. Here's a weaving girl.

Datura and Bougainvillea

One thing we saw throughout our hike was paragliders. A very popular activity here. Something I'll have to try sometime. There were some eagles flying among the paragliders.

Again, the trek down was through pleasant countryside.

These haystack-looking structures are common in the countryside. They are shelters for livestock. Mostly goats and pigs.

Hard work

Paragliders!

Fisherwoman

Street in Pokhara

And for dinner: pizza!!

Tomorrow we go to Chitwan National Park. Elephant treks!

Pokhara Day 1

2011-02-05T22:25:00.015+08:00

Pokhara, a city some 200km to the west of Kathmandu.

We arose bright and early, and went on a short trek to the peak of a hill to watch the sunrise light up the Himalayan peaks.

This is what we saw:

That's Annapurna on the left and Fishtail Mountain on the right.

Here's a closeup of the peak of Annapurna:

An interesting succulent Euphorbia plant in the foreground; Annapurna in the background.

We walked through a farm...

And passed some Nepalese graves:

Later we went on another hike. We started at Lake Fewa.

We went in rather rickety canoes to the other side, and started hiking up the path to the World Peace Pagoda, which sits atop a hill overlooking Pokhara. Yes, those trees with the red tufts are poinsettias.

Finally, the World Peace Pagoda!

We took a different route back. We passed through some lovely countryside.

In the evening we walked around the lake.

A beautiful day!

And in the evening, we went to a Punjabi restaurant. Outside, people were playing street music. Forgive the darkness of this video.

Kathmandu: Day 1 PM + Day 2

2011-02-05T00:17:00.009+08:00

In the afternoon we went to Pashupathinath, east of downtown, a Hindu temple complex on the banks of the holy river Bagmati.

Here are funeral ghats. A ghat is a staircase leading down to a body of water. Here, people cremate their dead.

Part of the Hindu temple complex.

A Hindu priest performs a ritual.

Rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta) look on.

A sadhu (holy man) dressed as Hanuman, the monkey god.

Another sadhu

Next, we went to Boudnath, site of a famous Buddhist stupa.

A closeup of the Buddha's all-seeing eyes. Underneath, where the nose would be, is the Indic numeral 1, standing for the unity of all things. Above and between the eyes is a dot (hard to see here), which is the "third eye", standing for the insight of the Buddha.

Pilgrims come here to walk a circuit around the stupa.

Prayer wheel

Day 2

Today I split off from the group (yes, it's a package tour!) to go on a mission of my own, which was to visit the British Cemetery. What an amazing place! An island of peace and beauty in the midst of chaos. I photographed every grave, and met a New Zealander who is also interested in cemeteries and the history of the British presence on the subcontinent, who regaled me with historical facts and urged me to go graving in India.

British Cemetery

To see more about this cemetery, check out my Graving Blog.

Kathmandu: Day 1 AM

2011-02-03T17:29:00.016+08:00

I think I'm going to Katmandu.
That's really, really where I'm going to.
If I ever get out of here,
That's what I'm gonna do. - Bob Seger

Here I am in Kathmandu! This is my first-ever visit to the Indian Subcontinent, and my impression is that of a colorful, chaotic city filled with life and history.

On Day 1 we visited some of Kathmandu's most famous sights.

First, Durbar Square

This is the old religious and royal center of the city. A truly amazing place: it's not very big, but there's a lot packed into this area.

One interesting thing to do is visit the palace of the Kumari. The Kumari is a young girl considered a living goddess. She maintains this goddess status until she bleeds for the first time (whether through menstruation, injury or lost tooth). There are only 10 Kumari in the country, and only one here. When her term is up, she returns to her family and the search for the next one starts.

Every once in a while she appears at the window to look upon the people. We saw her. She looked out the central window on the left (in the photo below) for about 15 seconds, and then ran back to play. She's just a little girl, heavily made up. Taking photos of her is forbidden, but you can Google "kumari" to see what she (or one of her predecessors or peers) looks like. She looks kind of like a five-year-old girl in Queen Amidala getup.

Further on, we found a colorful market there. This woman is selling bowls made from the leaves of the sal tree (Shorea robusta), and are used for religious offerings.

This is a sal tree (taken a week later at Chitwan National Park):

More of the market at Durbar Square

This woman is selling beans. Notice the cell phone she's holding!

Durbar Square is a place of religious devotion. Mostly of the Hindu faith.

This is famous image of Kali. People come here to state the truth; if you say something untrue, Kali will punish you.

Lots of pigeons (Columba livia) here.

Lugging a heavy load

Women singing

A Gurkha soldier stands guard

Then from Durbar Square, we walked back along an interesting shopping street.

An herbalist prepares a mixture.

A passing rickshaw driver

And for lunch:

Momo. A Tibetan dumpling.

On the way

2011-02-01T15:13:00.001+08:00

I'm sitting at the airport, awaiting a flight to Hong Kong. Then on to Kathmandu!

Trip to Nepal

2011-01-28T22:47:00.002+08:00

Chinese New Year is coming up next week. Perfect time for a trip to Nepal: Feb 1-12. More to follow, Internet access permitting.

Intended itinerary:

Kathmandu
Pokhara
Chitwan National Park
Himalayan villages
Kathmandu

It will include a visit to the British Cemetery in Kathmandu. But there will be more than just cemetery visits, of course. After all, it's Nepal!!

Pavilion of Dreams

2011-01-05T00:28:00.007+08:00

The Pavilion of Dreams is far and away the most popular pavilion of the Flora Expo, so much so that there's a rather Kafkaesque system for obtaining tickets. More about that later.

What can I say? Take cutting edge visual/interactive technology, add to it a generous helping of the Japanese "kawaii" aesthetic (you know: Hello Kitty, Sailor Moon, Pokemon, Totoro), stir in a steaming dollop of good ol' Chinese flowery rhetoric (artfully translated into Chinglish), season it with a dash of inadvertent (or perhaps advertent?) sexuality, and then add a powerful dose of shrooms. This is the Pavilion of Dreams.

First, you are led into a chamber to some rows of seats, where you are entertained for a few minutes by a flower-shaped mobile/chandelier thingy hanging from the ceiling, which opens and closes as it changes color.

After that thrilling event is overwith, you line up to be issued a bracelet. In the process, tall people like me have to squat down to read the monitor, which asks you to choose a life goal: career, health, emotion, and two others.... I forget. Why? Not really sure. The bracelet is used for the interactive stuff that comes up.

In the second room, you're presented with dozens of naked-eye 3D screens showing natural scenes. The technology that's used is a refinement of that used in old lenticular 3D postcards from the 70s, and it's actually pretty cool. You then stand in a green circle in front of a screen, and when cued by a light, you wave your hand. Sensors pick up the motion and "fairy dust" appears on the screen, making a flower grow. Kind of silly, but at least the plants you see are images of real ones you see when hiking in Taiwan's wildernesses.

You walk out, and you need to recharge your bracelet with "energy" (probably uploading some data for what comes up in the next room). And what you see in the next room defies belief. The theme of this room is the pollination of a flower. But you, imagining you're a bee, get to do the pollinating yourself. You are first invited to... I kid you not... "stroke the stamen". You approach several pendulous, testicular-looking objects hanging down from the ceiling, and you slap (rather than stroke) one of them. This supposedly releases the digital pollen.

Next you come to a curvy interactive screen where you "gather" "pollen." You wave your arm around, and the screen shows clusters of pollen gathering around your hand. Finally, charged with male DNA, you approach a large spherical ovule, which you plant your hand on and "impregnate," sparking a cascade of light that spreads outward and upward. ... Was it good for you?

Next you enter a hallway, where you place your bracelet in an energy circle to find out what flower you bloomed. Now you walk up the ramp to the second floor. This is where the coolest part of the experience takes place. It's the 360-degree amphitheater. Here you sit on the floor and are taken on a visual journey up into the clouds, and soon you zip through the mountains of Taiwan. This is the highlight of the Pavilion of Dreams. After that, you are brought down into a forest, where you do more interactive stuff. A wave of the hand causes a tree to spring up on screen, and touching a lighted area causes animals to come out.

Next you walk into another room where you're entertained by plastic cylinders that bob up, squat down and change color.

And finally, you walk to a table where you upload the data from your bracelet. The data is displayed on the tabletop screen, and it turns into flower, which joins everyone else's flowers. Woohoo.

You return your bracelet, and are given a souvenir/fortune card. You exit out a walkway lined with plastic bottles.

Drawbacks: Getting tickets is a real pain in the ay, the pavilion isn't everything it's cracked up to be, in my opinion. With the technology they had, they had the potential to do something much more awesome.

Advantages: Some of the technology used is very nice, and the visual flight through the mountains of Taiwan is awesome. And it's just a very bizarre, kitschy experience; an "only in Taiwan" kind of thing.

My rating: 4 stars (out of 5).

---

About getting tickets:

There's a special ticketing area outside the expo grounds. It's by the Xinsheng Park Area, at a gateway that's about 100m east of the main Expo entrance on Minzu East Road.

The gate to the Pavilion of Dreams ticketing area opens at 7:00am. Make sure you have an Expo ticket for the day. Once secured, you walk in, and there's an open flat area (used to be tennis and basketball courts) with plastic dividers allowing for about 20 rows of people to line up in switchback fashion. There are yellow dots on the ground, and each person gets to stand (or sit) on one (this is smart - it makes keeps people from crowding each other out, and makes it easier for the staff to estimate the crowd size).

For the next two hours you sit and chat with your neighbors, read a book, listen to mp3s, whatever.

At 9:00am, they close the gate to the area, and the line starts moving. You file through a special entrance to the park, and they check your Expo ticket. Then they finally hand you the coveted Pavilion of Dreams ticket (no charge, of course)! Your entry time for the pavilion may be several hours later.

Best to show up around 7:00am. Believe me, it was not easy for me. I am not a morning person!

Flora Expo

2011-01-05T00:17:00.003+08:00

If you live in Taiwan and haven't heard of the Taipei International Flora Expo, something is seriously wrong with you. People outside of Taiwan can be forgiven of their ignorance.

The Expo has been going on since November 6, 2010, and will continue through April 25, 2011. In the months leading up to it I translated a number of articles about it, and I was even part of a team doing some signage translations for the Expo itself. (There are also a lot of poorly done signs. Our team is not responsible for those!) Because of this, I feel a kind of affinity to it... a love/hate relationship with it, if you will. And because of this, I bought myself a season pass for the princely sum of NT$2500 (about US$83) so I can attend anytime I wish. (The fact that it's 4 MRT stops from the office is a plus... I can just go before or after work.)

One thing I noticed is that despite the Expo entering it second month, there's an odd lack of reviews of the Expo, in English at least. So I am taking it upon myself to write my own reviews. I will do so pavilion by pavilion.

Journey to the South Part IV

2010-12-18T01:42:00.030+08:00

The next morning I woke up fully rested, having had a very sound sleep in a quiet and comfortable room. We went out and checked out the butterflies flitting about the foliage in front of the cabin and took some photos. There were a lot of Chestnut Tigers.

Chestnut Tiger (Parantica sita niphonica)

After a hearty breakfast that included wild boar bacon, we drove to the Purple Butterfly Valley, an area famous for the massive numbers of Purple Crow butterflies (Euploea tulliolus koxinga) that flock there. I had never seen butterflies in such concentrations before. But the locals said they had seen days with far more.

Look at them all!

Video does it better justice in terms of showing the sheer numbers.

A closeup. Note that one of them has been marked by researchers studying the migration patterns of this species.

Next we drove to a nearby valley, and did a little hiking. See the building in the river valley at the left of the photo? There used to be a village there. It was washed away by Typhoon Morakot in August 2009. If you look closely further upstream, you can see a suspension bridge. We would soon walk across it.

Approaching the suspension bridge

At the bridge

At a quiet picnic area on the other side, Robert taught us a self-hypnosis technique that's useful for relieving stress and relaxing the mind.

Rested, we went back to the car and drove on.

For the gravers in my readership (you know who you are), we passed a small, interesting Aboriginal cemetery. Presumably of the Rukai tribe, mostly.

Notice all the crosses. The Aborigines were heavily Christianized by 19th century missionaries.

Then we drove to the Hakka city of Meinong for lunch. We discovered a fantastic restaurant and chowed down on Hakka food, such as bantiao (a dish of fried flat noodles), meigan kourou (a pork belly and sour cabbage dish), and yelian: a dish made from an aquatic plant called Crested Floating Heart (Nymphoides cristata). I didn't take any photos of the food because I had to recharge my camera batteries.

Interesting thing about the restaurant was that it is also a garden center, with lots of plants. They seemed to be especially fond of Bougainvillea.

Euphorbia lactea var. cristata. Believe it or not, it's closely related to the poinsettia.

The Hakka consider the written word sacred, and historically if they wanted to dispose of written material it had to be done properly, as a burnt offering to a god. This furnace was designed for that particular purpose.

Another historic site in Meinong: this old archway.

And closeby is a sacred tree. In front of it are tablets representing gods. Unlike other Chinese peoples, the Hakka don't carve graven idols of their gods: instead, they are represented by tablets and by natural objects like rocks and trees.

Our next destination for the day was farther to the west, an area the locals call Moon World. It's called that because of the vast expanses of mud hills that the rains and winds have shaped over thousands of years into an eerie lunar landscape.

Moon World

Located in a remote spot within Moon World are a number of mud volcanoes. We visited some. At the first area, we could hear the bloop! bloop! sound of bubbles of gas erupting from one of the volcanoes.

This is the most active on at this site, and is the source of the bloop! sounds. There are two other tall volcanoes that are extinct, but there are also two or three newly forming volcanoes there too.

Some video:

Here's a young volcano. The mud is cool. The gas bubbling out is methane. Robert is testing the depth: his stick is 3 feet long.

Not far from this site is the New Yangnyu Mad Pond (we believe it's supposed to be "mud", not "mad").

Here there are similar volcanoes, but more actively bubbling. A guy there likes to entertain visitors by lighting the gas on fire.

Video:

We left, and arrived at an area called Cockscomb Mountain where we could hike alongside the mud cliffs of Moon World. We saw that there are lots of fossils in the mud!

It was getting dark. After taking a pleasant walk around a new park by a reservoir, we began the long drive home. It was uneventful except for a traffic jam as we approached Taipei caused by potatoes on the road!

A long day with lots packed into it. A very interesting and eventful trip!

Journey to the South Part III

2010-12-16T01:04:00.018+08:00

That night we went on a night safari. The son of the resort's owner, nicknamed "Bighead", showed us a variety of interesting flora and fauna, some of which are better seen at night. Below is jus a sampling of what he showed us.

The first thing we did was visit a frog pond. It became very active with the fall of night, and there were quite a few Latouche's frogs leaping about. Some were relaxing on rocks.

Latouche's frog (Rana latouchii)

Here's an indigenous tree called the Hayata Fig, named after Bunzo Hayata, a Japanese botanist who discovered many species in Taiwan back during the Japanese occupation. Its Chinese name is "rough-leafed fig". As you can see, there are galls on the leaves. They contain larvae of the insect Sympauropsylla triozoptera, and the two species have somewhat of a symbiotic relationship.

Hayata Fig (Ficus irisana)

The owners had set up a fence designed as a place for caterpillars to pupate. Here's the caterpillar of a Golden Birdwing butterfly. Notice the orange organs sticking out by its head: these are defensive, emitting a foul odor to repel predators. And despite the caterpillar's fearsome appearance, the spikes on its body are not poisonous. It's an ugly caterpillar, but it becomes one of the most beautiful swallowtail butterflies!

Golden Birdwing larva (Troides aeacus formosanus)

We were also shown a kind of sumac tree that is used by the Aborigines as a source of tinder, and the seeds can be used as a seasoning for food. The Chinese name is "salt skin tree", and in English it's the Nutgall Tree or Chinese Sumac.

Nutgall Tree (Rhus chinensis)

Closeup of the leaves

The we went to a waterfall area, and in the pool below the waterfall was a freshwater crab.

Candidiopotamon rathbunae

In the same pool were some freshwater shrimp.

And finally, the piece de resistance, Swinhoe's Frog, only found in Taiwan. They like to cling to rocks by waterfalls.

Swinhoe's Frog (Odorrana swinhoana)

Here's a picture I took years ago of the same species, to give you a better idea of what it looks like:

After that we settled in for a long winter's sleep in our cabin room. Very quiet and comfortable, with nice warm blankets. Earlier, the campers who had set up their tents and RVs on the campground had been entertaining themselves with loud karaoke, but they had the consideration to stop it come nighttime.

By the way, here's a view of the camping area:

Pretty nifty, huh?

Journey to the South Part II

2010-12-06T20:28:00.013+08:00

So after a fitful night's sleep, we woke up for the next day of activity.

And it was a fitful night's sleep. In the middle of the night, I happened to wake up, and as I was trying to fall asleep, I started hearing what sounded like a mutant rooster crowing. I believe it was just a rooster, but there was something a little odd about its cry: I thought maybe it was some sort of wake-up alarm coming from someone else's room. I got up to find my earplugs (which I failed to find), and then decided I was going to go outside to find out where the sound was coming from. Just as I was about to go out, the sound finally stopped.

So I crawled back into bed, and that was when the water tanks started filling up. In the distance I heard a pump start up, and then one by one the hotel's water tanks filled with hot springs water. Noise, noise, noise. The kind of noise that you'd be oblivious to if you were asleep, but which keep you awake if you have the misfortune to wake up.

Here is the hotel we stayed at. A venerable, century-old hotel that has a cool old-time atmosphere. Just bring earplugs if you're easily disturbed by sounds at night!

We hit the road. From Guanziling, we drove down the Coffee Highway. Along this winding mountain road are numerous coffee plantations. The climate and geography are also perfect for growing poongans (Citrus reticulata var. poonensis), a kind of green mandarin orange.

Coffee plant

Poongan and coffee

We stopped by a nice little coffee plantation by the side of the road, where they had coffee beans drying in racks, and we enjoyed a cup of freshly brewed coffee that had been grown right there on their plantation.

Black drongo (Dicrurus macrocercus harterti)

We continued driving down the Coffee Highway. Every once in a while we would see wild poinsettias (Euphorbia pulcherrima) along the side of the road.

The red "petals" of the poinsettia aren't petals at all: they're modified leaves called bracts. Like all plants of the genus Euphorbia, the poinsettia has a special kind of flower called a cyathium. Here is a closeup of the cyathia:

At the end of the Coffee Highway we came across a Buddhist temple. Inside the great hall are three principal Buddha statues. Left to right, they are: Amitabha (the Buddha of the Pure Land), Sakyamuni (Siddhartha Gautama, the founder of Buddhism), and Bhaisajyaguru (the Medicine Buddha).

There were a lot of interesting plants in the temple gardens. Here's an Agave:

The next thing we did was stop by a traditional Taiwanese village that's in the midst of being restored. Every resident here has the same surname: Zhu.

Afterwards, we continued our drive along some roads where we saw considerable damage from the typhoon of August 2009. Lots of roads were being repaired after he resulting landslides, and some roads, including the Southern Cross-Island Highway (Hwy 20, part of which we drove along), remain closed.

Here's a typhoon-damaged building

After more driving, we finally arrived at our destination for the evening: a wonderful lodging near the town of Maolin run by an Aboriginal family of the Rukai tribe. It's located in an area called the Purple Butterfly Valley (which is not too far from the Yellow Butterfly Valley).

Here, Kate takes a nap in front of the cabin.

The cabin rooms were spacious tatami rooms with space for five people. Since we were a group of four, there was extra room to stretch out. After settling in, we decided to take a look around.

We saw quite a few butterflies in the area around the cabin.

Here's a Purple Crow (Euploea tulliolus koxinga)

The purples are very hard to take photos of with open wings. Here's the best I could do:

Then we took a hike up a lonely mountain road to observe more of nature.

Golden orb-web spider (Nephila pilipes)

Psyche butterfly (Leptosia nina niobe)

Common Sailor (Neptis hylas lulculenta)

Morning glory (Ipomoea purpurea)

A village across the valley that miraculously survived a major landslide pointed right at it

Later we went on a night safari. I'll save the description for Part III.

Journey to the South

2010-12-06T18:31:00.011+08:00

Road trip!!

It had been a long time since we had had a real, honest-to-god road trip to the south of Taiwan. Why not take a three-day weekend to hit the back roads and explore some of the more off-the-beaten-track sights Taiwan has to offer?

So four of us who were able to take Friday off piled into the Toyota and hit the open highway.

After a relatively uneventful drive down the freeway, we exited to head for our first destination: Guanziling, in the mountains above Changhua. A century ago, Guanziling was developed as a mountain resort area by the hot-springs-loving Japanese. On the way up the winding, switchback mountain road we stopped by a temple just in time to see some monks doing their evening devotionals.

Perched high on a mountainside, the temple ordinarily offers commanding views of the countryside below. But today visibility was poor because of a dust storm blowing in from China.

Then we went further up the road to see a rather bizarre sight: something I'd heard of many years ago but never had the chance to see. It's a small grotto where burning methane bubbles out of the water and hisses out of cracks in the rocks behind it.

Also visible on the grounds of the water-fire cave, are sausage trees, which come from Africa. It has huge, inedible pods.

Sausage tree (Kigelia pinnata)

Crown of Thorns (Euphorbia milii)

Then we checked into a century-old hotel for the night, and had a dinner at a nearby restaurant that included muntjac meat, betel-nut flowers and stir-fried chayote shoots.

Then went to a hot spring that was one of the top five I'd ever been to in Taiwan. Several pools are available, including a few with the muddy spring water this area is famous for, one with herbs (it smelled like fairy grass, Mesona chinensis), and one with essential oil of cypress. There's also a small pool where you can soak your feet. The kicker is that in this pool are doctor fish. These small fish swim up to you, and with rasping mouths they clean the dead skin off your feet!

Refreshed, we returned to the hotel to retire for the night.

End of day one.

Neighborhood sports cars

2010-10-15T00:17:00.005+08:00

I don't know why this is, but recently, just across the street from home, I've been seeing various sports cars. Always in the parking area of a luxury apartment across the alley. And a different car each time.

Last week it was a Ferrari.

And yesterday, it was a Lamborghini.

What is going on??

Caterpillar Float

2010-10-10T18:45:00.003+08:00

One of the highlights of the upcoming Taipei International Flora Expo is this caterpillar float. The expo opens next month, but today they put on a parade to promote it. Parades are planned daily at the expo grounds. Curious, and having done some translation work for them, I do plan to attend the expo.

Atayal Pop Music!

2010-10-04T22:01:00.003+08:00

Wanna hear some pop music sung in the Atayal language?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUpm4pjC5io

Atayal is a language spoken by the Atayal tribe of Aborigines of Taiwan. It's one of the most ancient of the Austronesian languages, distantly related to Malay, Maori and Hawaiian.

The singer's pronunciation is very clear, plus the video has Atayal and Chinese subtitles (but alas no English).

Language mystery solved

2010-09-30T02:08:00.003+08:00

Last month, after going to Singapore, I visited a friend in Bangkok. While there I went to the Royal Cemetery at Wat Ratchabophit, final resting place of many relatives of King Chulalongkorn, grandfather of the current king of Thailand. The current king's parents and sister are also interred in this cemetery.

In the southwestern corner of the cemetery I found this interesting mausoleum:

Curious as to who is buried here, I took a photo of the brass plaques on the doors, in hopes of deciphering the inscription later.

Later, when I was examining the inscription, I noticed something odd. These are Thai letters, all right, but something is a little off.

First, there were too many spaces between the words. The Thais run their words together, using spaces as we would use a comma or period in English.

Next, some of the characters had a dot under them. There is no such symbol in ordinary Thai.

Third, some of the characters had a small circle over them. But in Thai the circle is always paired with a long-A symbol. Most of these circles were not.

I realized that what I was looking at wasn't Thai at all, but Sanskrit or Pali. So to decipher it, I would have to map the Thai letters to their Sanskrit/Pali sounds rather than their modern spoken sounds. In Thai script, all consonants are followed by an inherent vowel sound, and the dot cancels it. Thus, the first close-up word above is dha + m + ma + a, or dhammā. The little circle represents a postvocalic nasal (-m), so the second close-up word above is he + tu + m, or hetum.

And dhamma is a Pali word. It's in Pali!! After that, all I needed to do was map the letters. The result:

Ye dhamma hetuppabhava,
tesam hetum tathagatho aha;
tesam ca yo nirodho.
Evam vadi mahasamano.

Sabbe sankhara aniccati
yada pannaya passati
atha nibbindati dukkhe
esa maggo visuddhiya.

Sabbe sankhara dukkhati
yada pannaya passati
atha nibbindati dukkhe
esa maggo visuddhiya.

Sabbe dhamma anattati
yada pannaya passati
atha nibbindati dukkhe
esa maggo visuddhiya.

And Google was kind enough to point me to websites with the translation. The first stanza is a famous quote by (someone!), and the following three stanzas are verses from the Dhammapada:

Of things that proceed from a cause,
their cause the Tathagata has told;
and also their cessation.
Thus teaches the great ascetic.

All conditioned phenomena are impermanent;
when one sees this with wisdom,
one becomes weary of suffering.
This is the path to purity.

All conditioned phenomena are suffering;
when one sees this with wisdom,
one becomes weary of suffering.
This is the path to purity.

All dharmas are without self;
when one sees this with wisdom,
one becomes weary of suffering.
This is the path to purity.

Mystery solved. But it didn't answer my original question: who is buried here?

I later found from a Thai website that among those interred in this intriguing mausoleum is Bhumi Jensen, the king's Thai-American grandson who tragically died in the great tsunami of 2004 while vacationing in southern Thailand.

Swan Boat at Bitan

2010-09-12T00:28:00.001+08:00

Swan boat at Bitan, Xindian, Taiwan

Flora and Fauna from my trip

2010-08-15T12:47:00.006+08:00

Sorry about the delay. My mouse broke and Internet connection was slow and spotty.

After visiting the Raffles Hotel, I went back to Fort Canning Park to explore it some more. And what should I see, on a public footpath, but a Paradise Flying Snake that had caught a frog! Right there in a city park! Beautiful snake, and not harmful to humans.

Paradise Flying Snake (Chrysopelea paradisi)

Fort Canning Park is filled with great vegetation, some of which has signage. This didn't, but it's known as the Lobster Claw.

Lobster Claw (Heliconia rostrata)

Within the park is the Spice Garden, which features various important herbs and spices of the region. Here's the Laksa Leaf, an ingredient in a local curry noodle dish called Laksa.

Laksa Leaf (Polygonum odoratum)

The Cannonball Tree, an amazing tree originally from South America, but popular and often considered sacred in India and Southeast Asia.

Cannonball Tree (Couroupita guianensis)

The Betel Pepper is a leaf that the nut of the Areca Palm (Areca catechu) is wrapped in to create betel nut, which, with the addition of lime (calcium oxide), people chew for a light buzz.

Betel Pepper (Piper betle)

The Sacred Fig or Bodhi Tree is the tree the Buddha is said to have sat under when he attained enlightenment. Saplings of this tree can often be found growing on walls and roofs because birds eat the fruits and spread them around.

Sacred Fig (Ficus religiosa) growing from a wall

All of the above were from Singapore. The following Common Lime Butterfly is one I saw a couple days later in Bangkok.

Common Lime Butterfly (Papilio demoleus)
on Flame of the Woods (Ixora coccinea)

The Singapore Sling

2010-08-11T14:10:00.008+08:00

On Tuesday I went to visit the Raffles Hotel. This storied hotel is the classic place to stay in Singapore... if you have the money.

It was here, about 100 years ago, that the Singapore Sling is said to have been invented. Today, drinking a Singapore Sling at the Raffles is on the "must do" list for tourists. The place to go for the classic Singapore Sling is the Long Bar.

Inside the Long Bar

And here it is: the Singapore Sling.

The Singapore Sling, as served by the Raffles Hotel, is made according to a recipe painstakingly reconstructed after it had been lost for decades.

Now the bad news: it is expensive. When I first tried it 17 years ago, it cost US$6. Now it costs about US$19! Second, unless specifically arranged for in advance, they are pre-made. They simply fill the glass with a ready made drink. But the drink is made fresh in batches using the authentic ingredients. Third, when I tasted it, it was a little heavy on the grenadine, giving it a slightly cough-syrupy taste that overpowered the other flavors to some degree. I asked what brand they used and they informed me it was Bols Grenadine, which is a very good product. There was just a little too much in it. But grenadine is needed for the classic pink color.

Don't get me wrong, it's still an excellent cocktail, and drinking one in the place it was invented is a sublime experience for a cocktail enthusiast.

On the right: 3 of the 8 ingredients of the Singapore Sling.
On the left: a choice of gins.

Bidadari Cemetery

2010-08-10T18:43:00.009+08:00

Singapore is not known for its cemeteries; if anything, it's more well known for its former cemeteries. In a tiny country like Singapore, land comes at a premium. To adapt with growing populations and need for resources, over the last 200 years there has been constant reallocation and reclamation of land. One victim of this desire for land is cemeteries.

The largest of these former cemeteries is the former Bidadari Cemetery. Exhumation of this beautiful, historic cemetery began around 1999, and was complete by 2005. Many of the bodies were relocated to Kranji and Chao Chu Kang. Others were reclaimed by family and relocated overseas. The rest were cremated and committed to the sea under supervision of clergy. Records were made and are apparently kept in the Singapore National Archives.

Curious, I went to the former site to look around. What I found was an expanse of grassy parkland. The only thing that remains of the original cemetery is the roads within the park. There's not a single grave left, of around 58,000, as far as I could tell.

This is what it looks like now:

Nevertheless, the historic gateway and some of the graves of the most prominent people were preserved. They were located nearby to a place called Bidadari Garden. Within here 21 graves are preserved .

Gateway

The former Bidadari Cemetery was divided into two sections: the Christian section and the Muslim section. Likewise, Bidadari Garden has Christian and Muslim sections.

Two paths: Christian on left, Muslim on right

Next to Bidadari Garden is another cemetery: Mount Vernon Columbarium. It is actually a collection of columbaria, including a prominent pagoda-like lingguta, or "spirit bone tower".

I found this name amusing.

OK, next entry won't have anything to do with graves. I promise!

Kranji War Cemetery

2010-08-09T22:46:00.011+08:00

After leaving the Merlion, I walked a bit along the Singapore River to the MRT station.

Old buildings along Singapore River

Next stop only first full day was Kranji War Cemetery. It's a Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemetery dedicated to those who died defending Singapore against the Japanese in World War II.

Kranji War Cemetery

Cross of Sacrifice

Next to Kranji War Cemetery is the State Cemetery. Only two people are buried here so far; one of them is Dr. Benjamin Henry Sheares, the first president of the Republic of Singapore.

Grave of Benjamin Henry Sheares

Then I returned. Once back in Chinatown I stopped at the Buddha Tooth Temple for a spell.

A wall of Buddhas

I'll have to explore that temple more.

Then I got together with my friend Harry and some of his co-workers and did a little pub crawling. Drank many beers. Some of the bars were pretty wild. That's another story.

Singapore

2010-08-09T10:17:00.002+08:00

I had frequent flyer miles I needed to redeem, so I decided to fly out to Singapore. Then next weekend I'll be returning to Taiwan from Bangkok. Not bad for a free plane ticket, eh?

I arrived at Singapore's Changi Airport, and took the MRT (subway) to Chinatown where the hostel I'm staying at is. When I exited the MRT station, the elevator brought me smack dab into the middle of a Chinatown tourist market. I have a love-hate relationship with it: there are beautifully restored 19th century buildings, but the place is a tourist trap: tacky souvenir shops, overpriced restaurants, and a sanitized, artificial "Chinese" ambiance.

Tourist market

Beautifully restored 19th century buildings

So anyway, onto my first day's activities. The first thing I did was go to Fort Canning Park. This is the location of an old fort that stood ready to defend Singapore for generations. The park also has a lot of interesting vegetation.

Fort Canning cannon

A plant (some species of Heliconia, I believe)

In the northeast part of the park is Fort Canning Green, which was once a cemetery. Now, 12 graves still stand in the northeast corner. The remaining gravestones, around 250 of them, were removed and are now mounted in the walls of the green.

Fern-covered south wall of Fort Canning Green

Remaining standing graves

Twin cupolas

Just outside the southwest corner of the green, but still within Fort Canning Park, is another grave: the Tomb of Iskandar Shah, a 14th century king of Temasek (former name of Singapore).

Next stop on my itinerary was the Armenian Church of St. Gregory the Illuminator. Here, in the lawn behind the church, are the tombstones of members of famous families. One of the tombs is of the woman who discovered the national flower of Singapore, the Vanda Miss Joaquim. The stones had been moved here from elsewhere.

Armenian Church

Tombstones (with Ravenala madagascariensis, the Traveler's Palm)

Next is the Memorial to Lim Bo Seng, down by the Esplanade. He was a hero of the Resistance against the Japanese during WWII. While visiting the memorial, a family was there visiting too. The man told be Lim Bo Seng was his great great uncle. His cute little daughter then said, "He's my great great great uncle!" He told me that his actual grave is up at MacRitchie Reservoir Park.

Lim Bo Seng Memorial

Finally, to the Merlion. Half lion, half fish, it's the symbol of Singapore.

The Merlion

It was only around noon, so I had time to go visit Kranji War Cemetery and the State Cemetery. This will be my next entry.

Pair o' Cats

2010-07-27T00:05:00.001+08:00

Pingxi hike

2010-07-19T00:13:00.006+08:00

Today we did a hike in the Pingxi area. We were a group of six, and I was the only guy. Lucky me!

We started out at the trailhead across from Pingxi Junior High School The trail starts with some steps, but leads up to a level path that was once a railway for coal carts, back in the heyday of the coal mining industry in this valley. It's a very easy trail.

Eventually it comes to an area with a couple stone ruins... old office buildings from the coal days. And crossing the creek to the right, we come to an abandoned coal mine shaft, completely flooded. We call it Gollum's Lair.

Gollum's Lair

One thing we noticed around here, indeed throughout our hike, was a plethora of butterflies.

White Commodore (Parasarpa dudu)

Blue Tiger (Tirumala limnicae)

The trail starts to get a little rougher after this spot. Appropriately, there a tudigong (Earth God) shrine here.

Cluster Fig (Ficus congesta)

Soon we started to climb. Some of the climbs were quite steep. There were ropes.

When we reached a certain altitude, we started seeing Dipteris ferns (Dipteris conjugata).

Dipteris ferns

We reached the top of Zhongyangjian (lit. "central peak"), and then headed down. This required a precarious descent down a steep rocky cliff, but there were some ropes, and we all made it without incident.

Spikemoss (Selaginella doederleinii)

Soon after, we found a nice rest stop and had some snacks.

We trudged on...

And down along the bottom of a cliff face...

And back down to the highway and to the car. There was more nature to be seen, such as the Taiwan Begonia, which grew wild in much of the lower elevation areas of our hike.

Taiwan Begonia (Begonia formosana)

We saw a lot of swallowtails in the woods, including the Formosan Swallowtail (Papilio thaiwanus) and the Great Mormon (Papilio memnon), both of which come in many beautiful forms.

Great Mormon (Papilio memnon agenor)

We followed our hike with dinner at our favorite restaurant in the area, Huanggong, which is in a wonderful old Japanese-built house in Jingtong.

Zombie

2010-06-15T21:47:00.005+08:00

The Zombie is another classic tiki drink. This one was invented by Don the Beachcomber in 1934.

The problem with the Zombie is that there is no set recipe. Donn Beach kept his recipes secret, so much so that he prepared various mixes so that even his bartenders wouldn't know exactly what went in them. To confuse things further, he changed his recipe several times over the decades. On top of this, other bars attempted to reproduce the drink, or else they just created their own versions. Trader Vic's version is quite different from Don the Beachcomber's version, for example.

The common thread connecting all these recipes is the combination of at least three rums with at least three fruit juices, plus some additional flavorings (syrups, bitters and/or liqueurs).

The following recipe is an attempt to reconcile three different recipes known to originate from Don the Beachcomber:

1 oz light rum
1 oz gold rum
1 oz dark rum
3/4 oz. fresh lime juice
1/2 oz. grapefruit juice
1 1/2 oz. unsweetened pineapple juice
1/2 oz. falernum (a syrup with lime, ginger and almond flavors)
1/2 oz. grenadine
2 dashes Angostura bitters
1 oz. 151-proof rum
6 drops Pernod

Shake everything but the last two ingredients, and strain into tall glass filled with crushed ice. Float 151-proof rum and Pernod. Garnish with mint sprig.

No photo this time: too many ingredients I don't have at my disposal!

Mai Tai - again

2010-06-14T11:54:00.002+08:00

While in the US I attempted to go to Trader Vic's to try their Mai Tai. I went to the Emeryville location, which turned out to be closed for renovations.

So I waited until I returned to Taiwan. There's a branch of Trader Vic's that's about a five-minute walk from my apartment. So I went there, sat at the bar, and was served a Mai Tai the way it was meant to be made.

Maita'i roa!

Piña Colada

2010-06-08T15:27:00.006+08:00

The origins of the Piña Colada can be traced back to a refreshing drink sold on the streets of Cuba in the very early 20th century. It was called Piña Fria (cold pineapple), and consisted of the juice of a mashed piña (pineapple) with ice and sugar. The buyer could request that this drink be strained. The Spanish word for "strained" is colada.

It's known that rum was sometimes added to this drink in the 1920s, and someone came up with the idea of adding coconut milk (but no rum) in the 1930s. The first printed reference of a "piña colada" consisting of rum, pineapple juice and coconut milk is from a New York Times article in 1950.

In 1954, something interesting happened. That was the invention of "cream of coconut", a thick, creamy syrup made from coconut milk and sugar. The brand developed is called Coco Lopez.

That same year, so the legend goes, Ramon "Monchito" Marrero, a bartender at the Beachcomber Bar at the Caribe Hilton in San Juan, Puerto Rico, was asked by the hotel management to come up with a signature cocktail for the bar. After some months of experimentation, he perfected a simple yet exotic Piña Colada recipe using Coco Lopez cream of coconut, served as a blended drink. This recipe endures to this day, and Coco Lopez is the industry standard for those who wish to make the best quality Piña Coladas (as opposed to taking the easy way out and using "Piña Colada mix").

The popularity of this drink was given a major boost in 1979 with the release of Rupert Holmes' hit single Escape, also known as the Piña Colada Song.

Basic recipe:

1 part light Puerto Rican or Cuban rum
1 part cream of coconut
2-3 parts unsweetened pineapple juice

Blend in a blender and pour into tall glass; otherwise shake and strain, and pour into tall glass with ice. Garnish with pineapple slice and cherry. Add a straw. A cocktail umbrella would look nice too!

Bartenders have innovated upon this basic recipe by adding chopped pineapple (in blended drinks), Malibu (a coconut flavored rum), lime juice, orange juice, cream, rum floats, and much more. It doesn't hurt to add your own touch!

(I used a golden Jamaican rum here. Tasted very good!)

Singapore Sling

2010-06-04T06:43:00.014+08:00

Most bar books will tell you a Singapore Sling is gin, lemon juice, cherry brandy and club soda. Essentially a Tom Collins with cherry brandy. But the Singapore Sling as served at the place it was invented--the Raffles Hotel in Singapore--has a somewhat different recipe. Fruitier and with more ingredients, and no club soda.

The Singapore Sling is perhaps the original tropical cocktail (if we disregard old colonial potations like Navy Grog or Planter's Punch), predating the tiki era by a good two decades. Legend has it that it was invented about 100 years ago by a bartender named Ngiam Tong Boon (嚴崇文). Now this concoction has pretty much become Singapore's national drink, though even in Singapore, few know how to make it properly. Even at the Raffles, if they're busy, they'll probably serve you a pre-mixed drink squeezed into a dinky glass from a soda gun, and charge you a pretty penny for the honor. Sad.

What to do? As the old saying goes, "If you want it done right, do it yourself."

Here's the authentic recipe:

1 oz. gin (the Raffles uses Gordon's)
1/4 oz. Cointreau
1/2 oz. Cherry Heering
1/4 oz. Benedictine
1/2 oz. lime juice
4 oz. pineapple juice
1/3 oz. grenadine
1 dash Angostura bitters

Shake & strain into tall glass and garnish with cherry and slice of pineapple.

One interesting ingredient is Benedictine, an herbal liqueur developed exactly 500 years ago (in 1510). I couldn't find my Cointreau bottle, so I substituted triple sec. I also suspect it would look redder if I used Rose's Grenadine; instead I used 100% natural grenadine, which gives less intense color but better flavor.

If you want a more alcoholic drink, add more gin.

Looks good in a hurricane glass, does it not?

Mai Tai

2010-06-01T12:27:00.007+08:00

The Mai Tai is one of the great and enduring drinks from the heyday of the tiki culture. The tiki craze started after the lifting of Prohibition. At the time, rum was cheap and plentiful, and two entrepreneurs, first Donn Beach and then Trader Vic (Victor Bergeron) opened bars and restaurants with Polynesian-inspired themes. In these establishments, exotic rum-and-fruit based concoctions were created and enjoyed. The craze was further propelled in the 1940s when soldiers returned from fighting in the Pacific, and in the 1950s when Hawaii gained statehood. By the 1970s, the craze petered out, being seen as tacky and unauthentic. But now tiki culture, just as in the case of classic cocktails, is experiencing a revival.

The Mai Tai is a misunderstood drink. It's often thought of as an exotic red concoction with several fruit juices, such as pineapple and orange juice. But the only fruit juice in a true Mai Tai is lime juice. It's not even garnished with fruit: the proper garnish is a sprig of mint. And it's not red! Please! Trader Vic would spin in his gra... I mean in his columbarium niche at Mountain View Cemetery. A properly made Mai Tai has an amber-yellow color.

The Mai Tai was invented by Trader Vic in his restaurant in Oakland, California, in 1944. He threw together a special rum drink for friends who were visiting from Tahiti, and when one of them tasted it, she said "Maita'i roa a'e!", which means "Very good!" So Vic called it the Mai Tai.

Here's the authentic recipe:

2 oz. aged Jamaican rum
1 oz. fresh lime juice
1/2 oz. DeKuyper orange curacao
1/2 oz. orgeat (an almond syrup)
1/4 oz. sugar syrup

Shake the ingredients, and strain into a double rocks glass filled with crushed ice. Add a half lime shell (it's supposed to look like an island), garnish with a mint sprig or two, and add a straw. Then smile!

Delicious!

On drink recipes

2010-05-31T12:19:00.002+08:00

Here are a few things that bother me when I see them in cocktail recipes, with my solutions on how to deal with them.

1. "Juice of one something-or-other" ("juice of one lime", "juice of one lemon", etc.) This is just asking for inaccuracy and inconsistency. The problem is that lemons and limes vary in size. No recipe should be written this way, in my opinion. If you come across a recipe written like this, here's my solution: an average lime contains about 1 ounce of juice; an average lemon about 1 1/2 ounces. Then be sure to taste the resulting cocktail to check for balance.

2. Sour mix. This artificially sweetened lemon-like concoction is the friend of the lazy bartender, and store-bought brands are usually chock full of artificial flavorings and colorings. Ugh! And many bars have taken to using sour mix in a Margarita, a drink that requires lime, not lemon. In recipes (other than those for Margaritas) that call for sour mix, for every ounce of sour mix, use 1/2 ounce of fresh lemon juice and 1/2 ounce of sugar syrup.

3. Jigger or shot. A jigger or shot can be anywhere between 1 ounce (at many cheapskate bars) to 2 ounces (standard shot at a bar I worked at several years ago). My opinion? One shot or jigger should be 1 1/2 ounces, and nothing else. This is how I learned it back in the 80s and early 90s. The 1 oz shot seems to be an innovation of the late 90s and 2000s. But without exception, unless your boss says otherwise, default to 1 shot = 1 1/2 oz (45 ml). If a recipe calls for a 1 oz. shot, it should just say "1 oz".

4. Wild deviations from norms. Nothing wrong with variations: bars and bartenders come up with their own special touches to drinks, just like restaurants and chefs do with dishes; also, many recipes evolve well over time. Recipes vary from book to book, and that gives the bartender room to experiment with. But some recipes change so drastically over time and from region to region that they bear little resemblance to the original. If so, its time to give the drink a new name. A prime example is the Mai Tai. Originally, the only fruit juice was lime, but many versions nowadays call for pineapple juice, orange juice and grenadine (not in the original recipe), and omit the almond syrup and lime. It may be a tasty drink, but it's not a Mai Tai. I'll give the Mai Tai a treatment in a future post. The only solution to this problem is to do research. Look at different books, check the Internet.

Irish Coffee

2010-05-31T08:42:00.007+08:00

In the 1950s, a sweetened coffee drink, spiked with Irish whiskey and topped with cream, was served in a lounge at Shannon Airport, Ireland. Impressed by this drink during a visit to Ireland, San Francisco Chronicle writer Stanton Delaplane worked with the owners of the Buena Vista Cafe in SF to reproduce and perfect the technique of making this drink. This was accomplished in 1952. The fame of this beverage spread, and the cafe is now renowned for it. It's called the Irish Coffee.

We visited the Buena Vista Cafe yesterday, and I ordered one. Absolutely wonderful! You don't stir it; you just drink it through the cream, and there's a great feeling of contrast between the heat of the coffee and the cold of the cream.

Recipe:

Fill hot Irish Coffee mug 3/4 full with coffee.
Add 2 sugar cubes and stir until they are dissolved.
Add 1 1/2 oz. Irish whiskey (Buena Vista Cafe uses Tullamore Dew).
Top with lightly whipped whipping cream, poured gently over a spoon.

A cable car passes in front of the Buena Vista Cafe

Sazerac

2010-05-27T07:32:00.005+08:00

I'm in the US right now, so instead of writing about my experiences in Asia, I've decided to do a series on cocktails. Here's my third installment.

The Sazerac. This classic cocktail is 160 years old this year. It was invented in New Orleans in 1850. At first, brandy was the chief ingredient, but when France's grape crops were wiped out by phylloxera, American whiskey became the spirit of choice. The cocktail has endured as a whiskey drink ever since, with few changes.

One change is that until the early 20th century, absinthe was one of the ingredients. After absinthe was banned in the US in 1912, the de rigueur substitute for a proper Sazerac was a pastis called Herbsaint. Now that absinthe has been re-legalized in the US (as of 2007), it's no longer necessary to use Herbsaint.

Another defining feature of the Sazerac is the use of Peychaud's bitters. Along with the Seelbach Cocktail, it's one of a handful of drinks to use this ingredient.

Another feature is that, along with the Old Fashioned, it's one of a handful of drinks that fit the original definition of "cocktail": spirit, bitters, sugar, and a splash of water to dissolve the sugar.

Here's how to make it:

2 oz. American whiskey (rye or bourbon)
1 cube sugar
A few dashes of Peychaud's bitters
A splash of bottled water
Absinthe or Herbsaint
A twist of lemon peel

First, place a sugar cube in a rocks glass, and add enough Peychaud's bitters to saturate it. Then add a splash of bottled water. Muddle these ingredients until it forms a rich syrup. Then fill the glass with ice and add the whiskey (I prefer rye whiskey), and stir. Next, coat the sides of a second rocks glass with absinthe, and discard the excess. Strain the mixture from the first glass into the second glass. Then twist a piece of lemon peel over the drink to release the oils onto the surface, and hang the twist over the rim. Voila!

Martinez

2010-05-26T12:57:00.006+08:00

The Martinez, which, according to one legend, was invented in Martinez, California, in 1876, is reputed to be the forerunner of the Martini. The original recipe, published by Jerry Thomas in the 19th century, is as follows:

4 oz. Italian sweet vermouth
1 oz. Old Tom gin
2 dashes maraschino liqueur
1 dash Boker's bitters

Shake with two lumps of ice and strain into cocktail glass. Put a quarter slice of lemon in the glass.

Two of the ingredients--Old Tom gin and Boker's bitters--were until recently impossible to find. With the recent resurgence of interest in classic cocktails, they have been revived. Old Tom can be found at the better liquor stores; a recreation of Boker's bitters, unavailable since 1906, can be ordered online.

Baby Kitty

2010-05-25T17:42:00.002+08:00

Baby Kitty: a simple yet exotic cocktail; a pousse-cafe.

1 part anisette
1 part creme de violette
1 part whipping cream

layered in a liqueur glass.

It's a very gentle drink, going down smooth. And quite tasty.

Shield bug

2010-04-30T14:22:00.003+08:00

You know I'm busier 'n sheeit when I go long periods without a post, and my entry turns out to be just a picture of a bug, bird or flower.

I came across this interesting bug last month while hiking in the mountains outside Taipei.

Megarrhamphus truncatus, on the leaf of a mountain screwpine (Freycinetia formosana).

Chinese hydrangea

2010-04-07T13:12:00.003+08:00

Chinese hydrangea (Hydrangea sinensis)

I saw it on a hike along the Bijiashan ridge a couple weeks ago. It's not a decorative like the common hydrangea; it's a wild plant with large flowers.

2010-04-05T17:16:00.004+08:00

Muller's Barbet (Megalaima oorti)

The Chinese call it the Five-Color Bird. It's very common in the lower-altitude wooded areas in Taiwan. I've rarely actually seen them, but I commonly hear when hiking. They have a distinctive call.

I was walking around the Liuzhangli cemeteries when I found this one. A beautiful bird.

You can hear the bird's call here:

Chinese bulbul

2010-04-05T12:38:00.004+08:00

Chinese bulbul, or Light-Vented Bulbul (Pycnonotus sinensis)

We saw this bird near the town of Linnei, on a recent, less-than-successful attempt to see the Purple Butterfly migration.

Tree Cotton

2010-03-14T18:04:00.005+08:00

It's that time of year... the tree cotton (Bombax ceiba) is beginning to flower, bringing some color to the city. And yes, it's quite closely related to the cotton plant: both belong to the mallow family.

Find the bird in the photo.

Flowers up close

So... Why cemeteries and graves?

2010-03-09T17:49:00.003+08:00

People have asked me why I engage in this unusual hobby, which the good folks at FindAGrave.com refer to as "graving."

If I could boil it down to one word, it would be this: "information."

Years ago I became interested in genealogy: tracing my family tree. There are many sources of information out there--vital records, Social Security indices, obituaries, library records and so forth--many of which can be searched online or ordered through the mail. But there's another source of genealogical information that most often requires personal visits, frequently involving long-distance travel at considerable expense, followed by exhaustive searches in-person searches. This would be cemeteries.

If only there were a convenient online source in which genealogists and historians could look up people's burial information.

Well, FindAGrave.com has become such a source. It's completely dependent on the work of volunteers: there are thousands of people walking cemeteries around the world (mostly the US, Canada and the UK) and inputting information onto the site.

My goals in graving are two-fold: first, to pinpoint the locations of cemeteries of which online descriptions are poor or non-existant; and second, to photograph and record gravestones in order to create online transcriptions of the data.

Sometimes I visit a cemetery and just walk around taking photos of gravestones that catch my eye; this is the case especially with large cemeteries. With a few select cemeteries, however, my goal is to record every single legible gravestone (and even decipher illegible ones if possible).

Living in Asia, I have had the opportunity to contribute data from cemeteries in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, Thailand, Brunei and Malaysia. I hope to visit Singapore one of these days, and also India and Indonesia.

What do I get out of it? Well, apart from the thrill of the detective work and travel involved, I have also received a number of emails from people thanking me for finding long-lost relatives and friends. These emails make it all worthwhile.

Snake Temple and Kuala Lumpur

2010-03-03T18:47:00.003+08:00

High on the list of Penang's long-promoted tourist attractions is the Snake Temple. That name alone conjures up exotic mental images of a temple slithering with deadly vipers, cobras and pythons, where you have to be careful where you tread lest one sneak up on you from some nook or cranny. Think Snakes on a Plane, but in a temple.

Unfortunately, the name of the place is a set-up for disappointment if you go there with high expectations. It's only worth going as a curiosity, and only as a quick stop-over on the way to or from the airport, where it's close to. Don't make a special trip out here unless you have absolutely nothing better to do. It's free, at the very least.

The reality is that it's little more than a run-of-the-mill Chinese temple. Snakes? Yes, there are snakes, but only a few.

Snake Temple

I walked into the main sanctuary, and saw nothing unusual: a table in the middle with offerings of fruit and incense, three niches in the back dedicated to different Taoist gods, and a desk where a monk sat quietly. One young worshipper was there; she was performing the usual "bai bai" ritual that the Chinese often do.

There was one major difference from other temples: on the altar in front of the central niche, dedicated to Qingshui Zushi (the same deity that Sanxia's Zushi Temple is dedicated to), were two wicker frames, looking somewhat like trees. Coiled on each of these frames were two or three Wagler's pit vipers (Tropidolaemus wagleri). No other snakes were to be seen in the room.

The snakes are just sitting there... it's claimed that they're doped up on the smoke of the incense. Still, this species is one to sit quietly for long periods of time, striking fast when prey happens to pass by. It's also said that these particular snakes have been de-venomed, but they still have their fangs. Visitors are warned not to disturb them.

Closer!

Closer still!

In an adjacent chamber there are two snake handlers who will try to convince you to have a photo taken with one of three Burmese pythons, charging you nine bucks US for the honor. No thanks...

Behind the temple is a pretty garden, and another sanctuary, this one dedicated to Guanyin. But that's about all there is. Nothing spectacular. I am glad that I visited, though. Curiosity satisfied.

So to the bus stop, and on to the airport. Once I arrived at the airport, they asked me if I wanted to get on an earlier flight. Sure, that would make things easier for me. More daylight time to spend in Kuala Lumpur, searching for the Cheras Road Christian Cemetery.

Long story short, I arrived at KL, took 3 different commuter trains, walked a mile, and arrived at the cemetery. It's huge, and has a special section maintained by the CWGC.

There's also a section dedicated to Henry L. G. Gurney, a former governor of Malaysia who was killed by the Japanese.

Getting there was quite a trip... hot, sweaty, taxing. Now I'm in the air-conditioned comfort of the airport, awaiting a morning flight to Taipei.

That's it! My trip to Malaysia.

Kuala Kangsar

2010-03-02T23:32:00.013+08:00

Today I decided to go to the pleasant little town of Kuala Kangsar in search of another elusive cemetery. I've found several sources telling me the location of it, but all of them have problems of some kind. One says it's in the western end of town (it's not), another says it's on Bukit Chandan Road (it's not), and another says it's near the "Government Resthouse" (such a place doesn't exist). To pinpoint the location once and for all, I had one option: to go there myself.

It's not difficult to get to Kuala Kangsar from Penang if you're familiar with the buses in Taiping. I am, so though it took 3 buses to get there (including the Taiping rattletrap Red Omnibus #8)...

... it was quick and easy. And the drive took me through some pretty countryside. Upon arrival I checked the ticket counters and saw there was a bus going directly back to Penang at 4:15 pm. Perfect! Three hours to explore, and a comfortable, convenient return!

Kuala Kangsar is a very small town, and easy to get around on foot. I went to where I thought the cemetery might be, and soon found it: Bukit Chandan Cemetery. It's located behind the Kuala Kangsar Rest House (not the "Government Resthouse"). It's a small cemetery, and I photographed all the legible graves there.

Then I continued along the road to take a look at Masjid Ubudiah, a famous mosque in the city.

Fishing in the Perak River

Ti plant (Cordyline fruticosa)

A Kuala Kangsar claim to fame: Malaysia's oldest rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis), planted in 1877.

A game of cricket

Then I went back to Penang. Here's the bus terminal at Butterworth.

"May the Official of Heaven bestow good fortune upon us!"

Quiet Penang street scene

Lok Lok ("happy happy"): Pieces of food on skewers, which you boil in broth and then eat with sauces. The sticks are color-coded according to price, and when you're done, the stall owner takes the sticks and tallies up the total.

Tomorrow: the Snake Temple, then a flight to Kuala Lumpur to visit the Cheras Road Christian Cemetery!

Hanging around

2010-03-01T19:06:00.008+08:00

Today I hung around town, taking it relatively easy. I upgraded to an air-con room at the hotel, because it's been getting pretty insufferably hot.

I lunched at Krishna Restaurant in Little India, where I had huge helpings of rice, dal and condiments for about US$1.30.

Then I walked around, never straying too far from the hotel, so I could relax in air conditioned comfort between exploration breaks.

I also revisited the Protestant Cemetery, and took a brief video. This starts at the grave of Capt. Francis Light, founder of Penang, and ends at the grave of Thomas Leonowens, husband of Anna. If you listen carefully, you can hear the call of the Asian Koel (Eudynamys scolopaceus) at the beginning of the video.

Just click play:

While at the cemetery I came across this little critter:

For dinner I had a stir fried noodle dish called Hokkien Char. Very good.

The stall where they prepared it:

Gecko on the wall.

Trip to Taiping

2010-02-28T23:40:00.002+08:00

Today was a trip to Taiping to visit two places I missed during last year's visit. The first was the elusive Kamunting Road Christian Cemetery. The reasons I had such trouble finding it were erroneous directions given by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website, the fact that the cemetery is not located on Kamunting Road, and the fact that the cemetery's official name has been changed to Christian Cemetery Taiping. I needed to actually visit the place to confirm that it was indeed the right cemetery, and it is. I've found in my cemetery research, directions and descriptions of locations of cemeteries are so poor and spotty that I often have to go there in person to get the location nailed down.

I discovered it quite by accident last year... I simply noticed it as the bus I was riding in happened to pass by it. Now part of the cemetery is being worked on by the CWGC.

My next stop was All Saints Church, which happens to be Malaysia's oldest Anglican church. I heard in the news not long ago that an attempt to firebomb the church was made by angry Islamic fundamentalists after the Malaysian Supreme Court ruled that non-Muslims had the right to use the word "Allah" to refer to their god. Thankfully the plot was foiled, but it made it even more urgent for me to visit the place lest any damage be done before I see it.

I photographed as many of the legible gravestones as I could, and then had a quiet little picnic on the cool, shaded steps at the church doorway. It was Sunday, but nary a soul was around.

Then I took the local bus back to the bus station. As I was waiting for the bus to leave, an Indian woman who was quite overweight struggled to board the bus. The two Malay teen boys in front of me (the very first row) started laughing at her, and she launched into a tirade at them. I gave up my seat to her, with the double benefit of giving her an easy plce to sit, plus she ended up sitting right behind the kids for the entire busride, berating them! The kids deserved it! I ended up sitting next to a man who sat with a wide stance and who would start laughing unprovoked (he had no headphones on, so he wasn't listening to comedy). Then when the bus came to the terminus, he stayed on board. Methinks he was a little bonkers.

After that short but hellish local busride, I boarded the intercity bus back to Penang.

Then at night, there was a Lantern Festival parade. It was 14 days after Chinese New Year, which is when the most festive CNY events usually take place. In the parade, the gods from different temples around the island were being paraded around. The gods Fude (the god of the earth) and Matsu (goddess of the sea) were highly represented. Tigers were a major theme too, it being the Year of the Tiger.

At one point, it became Night of the Dueling Gods. During the parade, the Muslim call to prayer rang out from the mosques around the city. The goddess Matsu with her blinking lights and banging drums was passing right in front of the mosque next door as that happened! I gotta say: diversity makes things interesting!

Here you can see a winged tiger, behind which, sitting on a small throne under an ornate roof, is Fude.

And what better way to celebrate the Year of the Tiger than a Tiger Beer?

A laid back day

2010-02-27T22:33:00.011+08:00

Today I slept in quite late, blissfully unaware of the morning call to prayer broadcasted from the nearby mosque, thanks to my earplugs (which I consider, next to my passport, money, backpack, camera and clothing, my most essential travel gear).

I've recorded the call to prayer, and will put it up here as soon as I figure out how.

I went for a late breakfast at the dim sum place. On the way there, I walked along this walkway.

After breakfast, I went over to the Protestant Cemetery again, looking for more overlooked names. I found perhaps a dozen. I even spent several minutes trying to read a well-worn gravestone, finally figuring out it wasn't in English at all; it was in Armenian!

While there, I encountered an Australian guy, and he was interested in what I was doing. I told him I was an amateur researcher transcribing the cemetery and putting the data online. He told me, "You know, there's a website where you can add your own burial records... 'Find A Grave', or something like that."

After that, I decided to go to the Sheikh Omar Basheer Mausoleum. It's quite small and off the beaten path.

Next to it is a small Muslim cemetery.

A closeup of an Islamic gravestone

Then I went back downtown.

Chulia Street, the main drag of the old part of town.

As I walked from the bus stop, I saw this: one of the most poisonous plants on the face of the earth!

Oleander (Nerium oleander)

Street food: one of many things Penang is renowned for

A fruitful day

2010-02-26T22:57:00.011+08:00

Today I took a trip outside of Penang, into the center of Perak State. I went in search of two cemeteries I missed last year...not enough time. Problem is that because of the somewhat screwy bus system here, it required a lot of effort to get to my main destination: the small town of Batu Gajah. To get there, you first have to go to Ipoh, the state capital, and change buses. Fair enough. But oddly enough, to get to Ipoh, a major city, you first have to go to Gopeng, further to the south by about 13km, then change buses and go back north.

So the ride from Penang (well, actually, Butterworth, on the mainland) went smoothly and surprisingly quickly. Changed buses at Gopeng, but I had to ask several people before I found the right place to catch the bus. Anyway, so far so good.. arrived at the Ipoh City Terminal.

Fortunately, the Ipoh Christian Cemetery is an easy ten-minute walk from the bus station. This was one of my intended destinations, and it made an easy stop.

Back at the bus station, I found the bus to Batu Gajah. The driver was playing music that sounded like Bollywood's Greatest Hits. It was comfortable, air conditioned. Finally, at Batu Gajah, the bus pulled over, and the conductor said, "Here we are," and left me at the side of the road with no idea where I was. I couldn't find the location on the map I had printed out. (Turns out the big highway intersection where I was dropped off at is so new that Google Maps doesn't have it mapped yet!)

I crossed the street, and randomly approached a Chinese-run lumberyard. The woman there was exceedingly friendly and helpful, and arranged to have one of her truck drivers drive me, free of charge, to my destination: God's Little Acre.

Turns out that God's Little Acre this is one of the loveliest little cemeteries I'd ever visited. The trees there overwhelmed the place with color and scents: white, pink and deep-red plumeria (frangipani), bougainvillea, hibiscus, euphorbias, stately palms and cypress. Even a papaya tree with ripe fruit I was tempted to take and make a meal out of.

Red plumeria

Bougainvillea

Now the sky was threatening... I could see massive cumulus clouds by the mountains and hear thunder roaring in the distance. Time to go.

I know... I could try taking the train back. I walked past the old prison (still in use... a guard in the tower watched as I walked by), past a historic hospital, by some splendid parks, into the city, and to the spot where the train station was listed on my map.

But it was closed!

Asking around, I learned that there was a new one, several kilometers down the road. I decided to cab it. The cabbie whisked me there, all the way past the Chinese lumberyard, and to the station. Once there, I learned that the next train wouldn't come for an hour and a half, and the trip would take 4 hours! I could get there much faster by retracing my steps: bus, bus then bus. So that's what I did. I walked back to the Chinese lumberyard (to save me about 20 minutes, I climbed an embankment up to the highway overpass instead of following the road around), and chatted with the people there, thanking them once again. They showed me where to wait for the bus to Ipoh, and told which bus to take. (Very gracious, helpful people!)

Soon the bus came, and just in time too, because the skies opened up with heavy rains and thunder. On the way back, we passed the old train station, and I noticed there was a bus stop just opposite it, where I could have waited if only I had known... So, back to Ipoh, then Gopeng, and then Butterworth... with very little waiting between buses. Pretty much arrived at the station, and hopped on. The bus got me back to Penang an hour and a half earlier than the train would have.

Now I'm cooling down in my guesthouse bedroom... I filled a towel with ice and an using it like a cold compress. Works like a charm!

Revisiting old haunts

2010-02-25T21:29:00.013+08:00

I started my day with a dim sum breakfast at Tai Tong Restoran (45 Cintra Street), a place I discovered last year. Cheap and delicious! Highly recommended!

I walked past the place I stayed at during my visit last year. It's closed for renovations.

For those who don't know, one of my reasons for coming here is to research historic cemeteries. I'm a volunteer for FindAGrave.com, a website whose goal is to become a comprehensive listing of cemeteries and interments. It's an odd hobby, to be sure, but I love the history, the detective work and the travel involved.

So I went to the Protestant Cemetery. On the way, I passed by this place, with an interesting name.

At the Protestant Cemetery, I found dozens of graves I missed during my transcription effort last year.

The yellow flame trees (Peltophorum pterocarpum) were in bloom at the cemetery. Fallen flowers coated some tombs.

I also transcribed about 10 more graves from the adjacent Catholic Cemetery. But I was soon chased out by some huge ants!

The plumeria was in bloom too.

Then I went to the Jewish Cemetery.

At the Jewish Cemetery, I found some graves I missed last year. The caretaker showed me one corner that I hadn't seen before, and he gave me some stones to place on the graves.

Then I went for some dinner... I had some kuay teow (a tasty stir-fried noodle dish) at a coffee shop I visited last year... one that claims to be "runned by a small modal". I looked around, but didn't see any small modals.

Tomorrow, I will either go to Batu Gajah or Taiping, depending on what time I get up.

All Settled In

2010-02-24T20:19:00.008+08:00

Landed at 5:00, on the bus by 5:30, in town by 6:30. Plenty of sunlight left!

Went to the hostel I stayed at last year, 100 Cintra, but they're closed for renovations. My second choice, the popular Blue Diamond, was full. So I went to my third choice, the Oasis Hotel, which was once the popular backpacker hangout Swiss Hotel until the owner sold the place to another local hotel operator. It's a little worse for the wear from what I remember, but they're the same price as the place I stayed last year, and they have free wireless Internet!!

I still had an hour of daylight left, so I went exploring.

St. George's Church, closed for badly needed renovations.

Chinese lanterns and Kapitan Keling Mosque

Devotions inside Sri Mariamman Temple

A Hindu shrine

Some lanterns at a Chinese temple

The amazing thing is that all these places of worship, of so many different religions, are within a couple blocks of each other.

Now for some well-deserved sleep!

Flight delay

2010-02-24T08:47:00.003+08:00

Well, my flight is delayed, and as thing are going I will miss my connecting flight. I have no idea what time I'll be getting into Penang. I hope I can get into the hostel I stayed in last year. Wait and see, I guess.... (sigh)

Update: I'm now at Kuala Lumpur International Airport. Free wireless! The flight was delayed in Taiwan for 2 1/2 hours due to fog, and missed my original connecting flight. Now I'm waiting for a flight that leaves at 4:10. Then another hour or so of flying, plus immigration, plus bus ride, plus walk... looks like I might be arriving at the hostel around sunset... I had hoped to arrive during the daytime. Oh well...

Trip to Malaysia

2010-02-23T17:32:00.000+08:00

It's about time for my annual spring trip. I'm going to Penang again. This time I'll spend a little more time in Malaysia, and make some more distant trips.

I leave on Malaysia Airlines bright and early tomorrow (Wednesday) morning.

Spanish Needle

2010-02-10T23:56:00.002+08:00

A very common weed in Taiwan:

Spanish Needle (Bidens pilosa)

Creeping Inch Plant

2010-02-09T22:57:00.004+08:00

Another plant in my neighborhood. This creeper is commonly seen growing out of rain gutters.

Creeping Inch Plant (Callisia repens)

Crown of Thorns

2010-01-26T00:28:00.002+08:00

A plant in my neighborhood. It's related to poinsettia and other spurges.

Crown of Thorns (Euphorbia milii)

Finally: Caoling Trail

2010-01-21T21:39:00.015+08:00

Forgive the tardiness of this report... the last couple months have been completely occupied by moving to a new apartment right during the peak season of work. It has been a non-stop parade of work, moving and organizing, working till 10:00pm every night with little chance to work on my pet projects, much less my blog.

Anyway, back in early November, we went on a hike to Caoling Historic Trail, on the northeast coast of Taiwan. It had been about three years since I had been there. The weather was beautiful. Robert drove us there, and Sunny came along.

On the way we stopped by a newly restored sanheyuan, a kind of traditional country estate. (Is that a Hawaiian ti plant, Cordyline fruticosa, that I see peeking out at the bottom right?)

The owners of this house have spent fortunes fixing up this place, restoring it to its former glory. Houses like this, once common throughout Taiwan, are falling apart and fast disappearing because the materials and skills to maintain them are no longer readily available, and as such they're are very expensive to maintain. A real pity because of their historic value. Thankfully some, like this, are being preserved.

A closeup of the front door. Oh, look: bird's nest ferns (Asplenium nidus):

We drove to the trailhead only to find that half of Taiwan had the same idea of coming here to hike. I'd never seen so many people at Caoling Trail, and the first stretch, the jungly part, was like a traffic jam of people. But finally we arrived at the first pavilions, where we commenced onto the grassy part of the hike.

There are some spectacular views from atop the bluffs. You can see Turtle Island and the Dali harbor.

One famous feature of Caoling trail is the water buffalo (Bubalus bubalis) that live here. They are the descendants of domestic buffalo, but now live in the wild. Far away in the background you can see the yellow sands of Fulong Beach.

Kate and Sunny

The vegetation here is mostly grasses and canes, with the occasional flower.

Rose of Sharon (Hibiscus syriacus)

Passing through a stile.

Up, up, up!

But then it started getting late. Instead of walking all the way to the end and going down to Daxi, we took a shortcut at Taoyuan Valley in order to avoid making our way down in the dark.

When we got to Daxi, Trailhacker showed us the back entrance to the Daxi Fish Market, where from amid a wide selection of groupers, tilefish, parrotfish, conger eels, bigeyes and many others, we selected, with Trailhacker's expert help, a fresh 3-kilogram Indo-Pacific King Mackerel (Scomberomorus guttatus).

We took it to the local seafood restaurant where it became our dinner.

In fact, the mackerel sushi was perhaps the best sushi I'd ever eaten. (If only there were hand-ground wasabi, then it would have been perfect!) The fish was so good that Sunny, who up to that point had an aversion to seafood, actually enjoyed it.

A successful hike and a memorable day!

An interesting beetle: Eusilpha bicolor. I don't know the English name, but the Chinese name translates to "red-breasted carrion beetle."

Temple Opening Ceremony

2009-11-24T18:33:00.016+08:00

It's a rare opportunity indeed to witness the opening ceremony of a major temple: the ceremony in which the temple god is officially moved in.

Robert and I did just that yesterday (November 23). We had been waiting two years for this event.

The temple is Hai Qing Gong, a huge, splendid, brand new temple built (mostly) using centuries-old traditional methods and materials. The temple is dedicated to Bao Qing Tian, a legendary Song Dynasty judge who, like other historic figures who have reached mythical status, has been deified.

We drove down to the town of Santiaolun, which is on the west coast, not too far from Chiayi. As we were driving along the No. 61 expressway, we saw bright lights in the distance, with searchlights. We got to our turnoff, where a two long strings of red lanterns lined the road, guiding the way to the temple. We got to the temple amid a flurry of noise and color, with throngs of worshipers and onlookers crowding the temple plaza, though it was nowhere near as crowded as at the Boat Burning Festival. As far as we could tell, we two were the only foreigners in attendance, and man people seemed surprised to see us there, some asking us how we know about it.

First we explored the temple grounds. Two tents filled with god statues from temples all around Taiwan were set up on either side of the temple plaza, and around the temple was a huge string of firecrackers. In the middle of the temple square, facing the main door, was a tent containing the statue of Bao Qing Tian, which had once taken the place of honor in the old temple in this area.

Firecrackers surround the temple.

A tentful of gods.

We made our way into the crowd in the temple square, where we could watch the activities. The temple doors were sealed, each with two yellow strips of paper forming an X. A ceremony was taking place in front of the doors. We watched as a priest unveiled the plaque bearing the temple name, above the central door. Then five figures ascended the temple steps: they seemed to be Chinese lions, or perhaps a mythical beast called a qilin. To me, their faces looked like cat demons. Their heads would tilt back and forth as a driving 4/4 rhythm of drums and gongs played.

Is it a lion? A qilin? I call it a "cat demon."

Soon the central beast started dancing more wildly. And then the main priest started going into a trance, dancing, whirling, and drawing characters in the air. The cadence of the drums grew faster, reaching a crescendo. More worshippers kept pouring into the area, some carrying large sticks of incense. Then at the appointed moment, the priest started bashing at the door, which after a few forceful thrusts opened wide. The other temple doors opened at the same time, and inside the doors firecrackers started going off, filling the area with sulfurous smoke. With a fanfare of trumpets, the temple god was now being carried on a litter toward the central door, and the smoke rendered his figure an imposing silhouette as he was brought across the threshold. Fireworks were shooting off above us. It was a powerful scene.

The temple doors are flung open!

The god is moved into the temple.

Fireworks shoot overhead.

I searched on YouTube, and someone submitted a video of it! The cameraman was standing about 15 feet in front of where Robert and I were. Click here to see the raw video. The doors are opened at minute 5:19. The god is moved into view at about 5:59. Unfortunately he moves the camera away when the god actually enters, but you can see the crowds and the smoke.

This video shows the part of the ceremony before the above. At about 5:00, you can see a good view of the lions with the twitching heads.

As we explored the area in the aftermath, people were lining up in the temple square to be blessed. There were more lion dances and a city god dance going on around the temple; people were still banging on drums and gongs. A raojing (procession) soon left the area on the way to other temples, and the crowds started to dissipate. A fireworks display was going on around the temple: in my estimation, the display went on non stop for an hour and a half. And these weren't dinky fireworks; they were of professional scale, the kind of big ones one would see at a 4th of July celebration. It must have cost the temple committee a fortune.

Fireworks

We came across some guys who gave us betel nuts to chew, tea to drink and tangyuan to eat, and we chatted a bit, though it was hard with all the noise. Robert had his photo taken with a god.

Finally, after hanging around for a bit longer, we left. As we drove away, we could see the fireworks still going off behind us. We followed the red lantern trail out to the expressway, and drove home, arriving in Taipei around 4 in the morning.

More of Bangkok

2009-11-24T18:31:00.000+08:00

This is a filler; watch this space.

The marvels of Ayutthaya

2009-10-31T23:37:00.005+08:00

Ayutthaya was the capital of the Kingdom of Siam from 1351 to 1767, when it was besieged and razed by the Burmese. In the ashes of the old kingdom came the new: the current Chakri Dynasty was founded soon thereafter, Ayutthaya being abandoned and the new capital established safely downriver in Bangkok.

Ayutthaya makes for a great day trip. A two-hour train ride, and you can see wondrous ruins of an old city.

A famous Buddha head, entwined by the roots of a bodhi tree (Ficus religiosa).

In Bangkok!

2009-10-28T21:56:00.005+08:00

Today we went to Wat Benchamabophit, known as the Marble Temple. Absolutely beautiful.

On the grounds of the temple was this amazing tree. It's called a cannonball tree (Couroupita guianensis). It has snake-like stalks that grow off the lower part of the trunk, at the end of which are these pink flowers. The fruits look like brown coconuts.

I made a side trip to the Bangkok Protestant Cemetery, only to find it was flooded from recent rains! Next time I should be sure to come here in the dry season!

However, despite the flooding, they had done some fantastic sprucing up of the cemetery, clearing out thick underbrush and planting new plants, including a bunch of young frangipani trees. After all, what's a Southeast Asian cemetery without frangipani?

Wat Arun at sunset.

Wang Yeh Boat Burning Festival Part II

2009-10-26T16:17:00.029+08:00

Friday, October 16, was the final full day of the festival. Though the festival technically centers around the Wang Yeh, to onlookers it may as well center around the boat.

Here's the boat in its "garage." I took this photo back in August.

The boat is painstakingly built by a master boat builder, exquisitely painted, and decorated with carved figures of sailors from around the world. Too bad this fine work of art is destined to become ash.

Detail of three of the sailors.

So anyway, we met at Xindian Station and piled into Robert's car. But just before we left, we saw some people looking with amazement at the ground. It was a Common Bluebottle (Graphium sarpedon). Unfortunately the poor critter was injured. A spectacular specimen.

So we drove down south. First we stopped at B&Q to pick up some folding chairs. I also bought a portable step stool. A worthwhile investment, especially when trying to take photos in a crowd!

We decided to take a more scenic route this time, along the coast, which added some time to our trip, but it was worth it. We got to Kaohsiung in plenty of time to meet up with Katannya, who took the High Speed Train because she couldn't get off work earlier. We had a dinner at a dumpling house near this local landmark:

We arrived at Donggang at about 10:30 pm, and got to the temple square just as the pace of events was starting to heat up. The boat was in the square, having finished its tour of the area to collect disease and bad luck.

Here, a man is placing lanterns on the boat.

Between the boat and the golden arch, a group of Taoist priests chant prayers.

A Taoist priest burns a piece of paper. He did this at five different stations.

We returned to the temple to witness the Feasting of the Wang Yeh ritual. A total of 108 dishes are offered to the gods, who are represented by colored plaques. People not directly involved with the ritual couldn't enter the sanctuary, but we could look in. There was a good-sized crowd outside the doorway peering in, trying to get that perfect shot. Robert managed to do just that, and I've borrowed his photo here:

Here's a closeup of plaques that represent the gods.

A view of what was going on in the front area of the temple:

Colorful sedan chairs, illuminated with flashing LED lights and playing music, are lined up in front of the temple, ready to carry the Wang Yeh to the beach to board the boat. Each one is powered by a generator, which is wheeled along behind it.

At that time, Sunny and two of her friends arrived. She's a family friend who is studying in Taiwan, and they decided to come down and witness this rare cultural event. I'm glad she came down: it's a great glimpse into local culture!

A select group of men clad in yellow and wearing tasseled hats prepare for the big event: pulling the boat to the beach. Only men are afforded this honor.

Finally, at 2:00 am, it happens! We moved to the archway, which is the best place to watch the boat pass, and what occurs next is one of life's magical, sublime moments. It's a surreal feeling watching this huge boat, accompanied by the sound of drums, gongs and horns, and lit up by the flashes of fireworks, float by.

I took a great photo of it, but I felt that Robert's photo does more to capture the grandeur of this moment.

Here's one I took right as it passed by us:

The march down the street to the beach is lively with firecrackers and festivity. That's Sunny in the foreground.

As we approached the beach, the tide of people got congested. There's no choice but to go left or right. We went left, and found a spot on the beach near this sedan chair.

Next comes the wait. Slowly, the gods are invited onto the boat. The boat is surrounded by joss paper. Then one by one the masts and sails are raised: three in all. A bamboo stalk, complete with leaves, is hoisted up to serve as a windsock.

The entire process takes two to four hours. This time it took about two and a half hours. Here I again use Robert's photo, since he was up close and he has a fantastic camera.

Finally, all the gods are aboard. The anchors are placed on the boat. And at about 5:15 am, the boat is finally set alight. Firecrackers are used to ignite the joss paper kindling.

This guy looks like he walked into the depths of hell to take a photo:

Burn! Burn!

Soon the sky gets lighter as dawn approaches.

The little sailor figurines are engulfed in flame!

As the sun came up, the crowd started drifting away. We watched the boat burn for a bit; then, tired and covered with ash, we walked back to the temple. We were greeted by the rising sun lighting up the gold-leaf-covered archway, with a blue sky backdrop. Nice!

Then we went to the other Golden Arches to wash up in the bathroom and enjoy Egg McMuffins for breakfast in air-conditioned comfort.

Then we drove back to Taipei, taking turns at the wheel.

Wang Yeh Boat Burning Festival Part I

2009-10-11T14:05:00.020+08:00

Yesterday, Saturday Oct. 10, was the first day of the 2009 Wang Yeh Boat Burning Festival in Donggang, in southern Taiwan. It's one of Taiwan's prime festivals, and it takes place once every three years. We went to the final day of the 2006 festival, and this time around we decided to go to the first day of this week-long event. (Next week we'll go once again to the last day, which we just learned is Friday the 16th. The boat will be set alight on what will technically be Saturday morning.)

Robert wrote two interesting articles on this festival:

1. Taiwan Today
2. Wall Street Journal

We drove down south and overnighted in the city of Pingdong. The next morning we drove to Donggang, where the festival takes place.

Wang Yeh (wang ye, Royal Lords) are an aspect of Chinese folk religion. They are the spirits of what were once real, historical people, who centuries after their deaths have been elevated to divine status. Representatives from Wang Yeh temples all over Taiwan converge on Donggang for the festival, carrying their local gods in sedan chairs.

The festivities focus on Donglong Temple, with much of the activities happening in the temple square. On the first day, Wen Hong, the god of Donglong Temple, is carried outside and the doors to the inner sanctuary are ceremonially sealed during his absence.

Here's a scene from the ceremony in which the god is brought out. You can see, on the right, under the twin paper lanterns, the sanctuary door is open in the background.

The characters on the two lanterns above the doorway read "Inspection tour on behalf of Heaven," which is what is about to happen during the week: the gods go around on an inspection tour of the area, and will report their findings to Heaven.

A palanquin bearer, wearing the characteristic hat, inspects the sedan chair in which the temple god will be carried.

Music fills the air. Inside the temple, a group of young musicians play the suona, a double-reeded horn which sounds somewhat like a bagpipe.

Next, the gods are carried in their palanquins across the temple square, past the Wang Yeh boat still waiting in its "garage," through the golden arch on the far end of the square, and into the city streets.

The temple square is jam-packed with palanquin bearers, devotees and tourists. During this festival, Donglong Temple has been designated daitianfu: "Temple in Lieu of Heaven."

Make way for the King! Temple god Wen Hong is carried in his sedan chair.

Along the way, there are drums, gongs, fireworks along the pilgrimage to the beach. Finally, we approach the seaside.

A palanquin bearer cools down with a refreshing Taiwan Beer.

Dozens of palanquins are lined up on the sandy shore.

Lots of colorful characters can be seen here.

One of the gods arrives by sea.

Just beyond the lined up sedan chairs is a stretch of open sand in front of a stage, where another ceremony takes place. At this ceremony, the presiding Wang Yeh is chosen.

We had been told that the name is chosen by spirit mediums who write characters in the sand. We saw them carrying sticks presumably for that purpose, but either there were too many people or we were looking in the wrong place because we didn't see the sand-writing taking place. In any case, the name was chosen: with fanfare, firecrackers, cheers and a release of balloons, it was announced that the presiding Wang Yeh was named Luo.

Afterwards, the procession started in earnest, with all the sedan chairs being carried to another temple in the city, the first in a tour of many temples in the area.

We decided to go have dinner while we waited for the next major act of the day: the firewalk. On their return to the temple, the sedan-chair bearers walk barefoot through coals to purify themselves.

At around 7:00pm, the coals were burning with fierce heat.

The coals are smoothed out, and rice is tossed onto the coals as an offering. It bursts into a blaze with plumes of smoke rising into the night sky.

Next, salt is tossed on the coals, which lowers the temperature "so they don't get barbecued," the announcer said.

And across they go.

After crossing the coals, they left the temple grounds, went onto the street, and came back, forming a continuous loop of people streaming across the coals. I don;t know how many times they had to make the circuit.

Even SpongeBob was there to witness the festivities.

At night, the palanquins are lit up with colorful lights.

Festive fireworks enliven an already intense evening.

And this is only the first day!

On Friday the 16th, we go back down to Donglong Temple for the culmination of the festival: the Boat Burning!!

To get an idea of what it's like, check out the video I made for the last festival. Just click on the following YouTube link:

2006 Wang Yeh Boat Burning Festival

Jiajiuliao Hike

2009-10-09T12:36:00.003+08:00

Last Saturday we did one of our favorite trails, the Jiajiuliao Trail, near Wulai. It was threatening rain, and this trail, clear, wide, level and not muddy, is a good trail for rainy days. We went here last February, so I blogged in more detail at that time. But this time we had some new people along, including Sunny, the daughter of long-time family friends.

Here we are in the hut.

Paradise Lost and Regained: Daxi River

2009-09-07T17:40:00.034+08:00

This is the tale of our adventures on Daxi River, one of our favorite destinations near Taipei.

It all started in late spring of 2006, when we trekked along a previously unexplored (by us) trail starting from a farmhouse on Highway 007, and headed downhill along the Daxi River, which flows out at the fishing town of Daxi on the east coast, north of Yilan. I still remember the farmer's words of warning to us as we began the trek: "You won't make it by nightfall." Turned out he was right: we spent the last hour hiking through the woods on a leechy, overgrown trail in pitch dark, with just a couple of tiny flashlights to light our way. (But oooh, the fireflies!) Our hopes were finally buoyed when we saw, on the opposite hillside, a house with the lights on. We knew a road had to be nearby, and that we were coming to civilization.

That hike was a mixed bag: a mixture of tribulations and amazing discoveries. The biggest discovery of all was a fantastic-looking waterfall we observed from far up on the hillside trail. Unfortunately I didn't bring my camera that day.

On the way, we crossed the river a number of times, noticing that it seemed easily walkable. We were determined to come back someday and walk up the river to the waterfall.

The day came a couple months later.

We organized a group of perhaps 6 or 7 people, and "river traced" up the Daxi River.

Along the way, we scrambled over boulders and stopped to cool off in refreshing pools.

The surrounding mountains and jungle were gorgeous, and we noticed as we hiked up that there were no traces of human presence: not a scrap of litter or any artificial structures. The water was crystal clear, teeming with fish, including Taiwan shoveljaw carp (Varicorhinus barbatulus), which flash their silvery bodies in the sun.

As we hiked up, the trail got rockier. On our first hike, we stopped by a pool and had lunch, wondering how much farther it would be until we got to the elusive waterfall.

One member of our group went on to explore as we waited, and found our destination just 10 minutes beyond:

The waterfall!

Since that day, we've made this an annual hike, ideal for summer because of the cool water and the beauty of the place. And after each hike, we'd go and have a seafood dinner in Daxi, often buying fish at the harbor fish market and having a local restaurant cook it up for us.

Daxi Fish Market

The following year, we went there again. Here, Robert and Christian discovered a trail that brought them around to the top of the waterfall:

On this watery trail there are other interesting diversions, like the Massage Waterfall:

And the Power Waterfall

Robert taking in the power

Paradise Lost

After several memorable visits in 2006 and 2007, we decided to go again in 2008. This time wasn't so enjoyable. First, the air was filled with smoke from several brush fires that were burning along the river. We decided to quicken our pace by hiking along the trail that was up on the hillside. But when we were getting close to the waterfall area, we encountered some illegal hunters who didn't want us there scaring the game away. (They were presumably hunting barking deer and/or wild boar.) We took a trail down to the river, where we encountered yet another person, who seemed concerned that we were there. (It turned out he was the guy who lives at the house on the hillside, the same house that had given us hope a couple years before.) Dejected, we went back with the feeling that our secret paradise had been spoiled.

Paradise Regained

We went back on September 6, 2009. The weather looked promising and, according to Trailhacker, who owns a house near the trailhead, the local mulberry trees were bearing ripe fruit.

So we went. The weather was perfect, and the mulberries were delicious! And the area was teeming with butterflies. And the water and air were clear. We hiked up the river, as usual, and encountered no one. (Only bad point: we did find a few piles of garbage farther upstream, evidence of illegal fishing activities, since this is a closed stream. We cleaned up all the garbage we found.)

I had forgotten my camera, so I started using my cell phone as a backup. But early into the hike, my cell phone fell into the river. I managed to grab it after it was submerged for a second, and took it apart and let it dry for 24-hours. Surprisingly, it works fine now!! So anyway, all the photos below from Sunday's hike were taken by Robert.

An extraordinary specimen of Blue Pansy (Junonia orithya)

Four species
Common Jay (Graphium doson postianum)
Common Bluebottle (Graphium sarpedon connectens)
Chocolate Albatross (Appias lyncida formosana)
Common Mapwing (Cyrestis thyodamas formosana)

Mulberries!

And of course, this time we made it all the way to the waterfall, where we had a nice swim!

And discovered that those funny little fish behind the waterfall are juvenile Monk Goby: they climb up the wet rock walls eating algae, using their front pair of fins like arms. Later they swim downriver out to sea to mate, returning to the river to spawn. More than one hiker has mistaken them for leeches.

Monk Goby (Sicyopterus japonicus)

It was a truly enjoyable day, which, as usual, we topped off with a meal at the seafood restaurant. The meal included Yellowtail Barracuda! (A little bony, but very tasty!)

Dinner: Yellowtail Barracuda (Sphyraena flavicauda)

And this is the view of Turtle Island as we round a corner on the road from the trailhead, driving toward the coast (photo taken by me in 2006):

A relic from Japanese times

2009-08-27T13:33:00.011+08:00

This place seems to have no single official English name (and believe me, for a translator, situations like this are a perpetual source of headaches). But I've seen it called Lin Tien Coopery and Lin Tian Bucket Shop. Since the name could well be of Japanese origin, it could presumably also be Hayashida Barrel Shop.

I admire the owners of the shop because they have resisted the trend of modernization. Far too many traditional businesses in Taiwan have upgraded their appearance to look slick and modern. But this place retains its old-time charm, having made few changes from the time of their founding during the Japanese occupation.

Instead, they focus their energies on their products: hand-crafted buckets, barrels, tubs and dippers made of cedar. And with the high quality and fine craftsmanship, you'll get what you pay for: a standard sized bucket fetches about US$100.

The address is 108 Zhongshan N. Rd. Sec. 1, Taipei. It's kitty corner from MetrOasis and just up the street from the Happy Family Hostel.

It's located in the same Japanese-style brick building in which the shop was founded way back in 1928.

If you want to experience a touch of old Taipei, and are in the area, why not stop by?

A little more nature in Taiwan

2009-08-27T01:45:00.003+08:00

Swinhoe's longhorn beetle (Paraglenea swinhoei)

Swinhoe's japalura (Japalura swinhonis)

A couple more Taiwan nature photos

2009-08-25T02:33:00.007+08:00

A slug feasting on the deadly mushroom Amanita virgineoides, a close relative of the Death Cap. (Photo by Katannya)

A spectacular swallowtail. (Photo by Robert)

As for the typhoon-predicting grass, a week after we saw it, a major typhoon hit Taiwan: Typhoon Morakot. We hope it's correct in predicting that this will be the only one this year.

Though we were relatively unharmed in the north, the south saw massive flooding and landslides. Some mountain communities were wiped off the map, and many people lost their lives or went missing. And the government's poor handling of this emergency has led to charges that this is President Ma Ying-jeou's Hurricane Katrina. Michael Turton gives this issue extensive treatment in his blog The View from Taiwan.