Haňule z Kyjova

On Saturday morning I started a journey with Elaine. She wnated to show me the water reservoir near Taoyuan. It is a beautiful place, around is forest and in the trees there are trails up to the hills. Many people come here every weekend to have a picnic or barbecue and let the children enjoy themselves. The air here was very pleasant, full of water and sweet fragrance form the trees. First we took a small path to the hill to take some pictures of the green trees, but my camerea is not good to capture the beauty of that…

Than we rode to the upper part of the dam to take a boat here. The water level wasn’t at its highest position so we could see the stone shore. We just arrived at the small wharf and a boat with other 18 people was waiting for us (as the 19th and 20th persons needed for departure). Other passengers were very kind and friendly, two of them, older man with his nephew and old father, started talking with Elaine and also  wanted to take photo with me :))

Than we went to meet Rosemary and Peter in Taoyuan city and drove towards Taipei. We parked our car under the Memorial Hall Square (or also Liberty or Freedom Square). At the square there are 3 important buildings – Chiang Kai-shek’s memorial hall, National Theatre and Natioanl concert hall. The memorial hall looks stunning, all white whith blue octagonal roof and standing at the east side of the square. ON the north and south sides there are the other building, which look exactly the same. Altough they were built in 1987 they copy the style of traditional chinese palaces. The whole square (which has around 240000 square metres) is closed by the magnificent white and blue gate. The place was full of tourists, but in past it was also the assemblence place of many revolts and protest.

Also the telephone booth here is made “traditional”

Peter wanted to show me around a little so we took MRT to the centre of the city. First we stopped at a place called the Red House. It is a plce for young people and students, with many shops, coffee shops, artist and places to perform f.e. music.

Then awe continued to the Long Shan temple. It is a budhist temple, from the beggining of 18th century, but many times damaged by earthquakes and also during wars. The present Lungshan Temple consists of three halls: the fore hall, the main hall and the rear hall. The fore hall is used as the entrance and the space for the people to worship. The main hall is in the center of the whole complex with a statue of Kuan-in as the main god of the temple. There were a lot of people singing a song from diaries they could buy. Many of them bought some presents for their gods. In the whole place there are many statues of gods, every is for a different purpose – f.e. you can ask a god for health, for luck in your bussines activities, if you want to give birth to a baby, or find a boy/girl friend, and many more – you can just pray in fornt of the god with burning smelly sticks and give him some fruit, food or flowers.

I like that place, it has a unique atmosphere, and aslo it shows how the chinese are tollerant to other religions, because they do not mind a foreginer to come to the temple and pray with them. Te architecture is very traditional, with many statues and wooden and stone carvings. Every piece of it has its own meaning, a story hidden. I really loved the dragons and phoenix birds on the roofs nad the colourfullnes of those peices in comparison with black wood and stone.

Long shan temple form the square in front of it

offerings to gods and the central hall

central hall with praying people

Kuan-in the main god of the temple

the god for finding a boyfriend or girlfriend

the roof with dragon and phoenix

Oh and in translation long=dragon and shan=mountain. The dragon is very positive animal in chinese mythology, it brings luck and happines. Mountain is something strong, with good roots and can last forever. So this temple is something very traditional for chinese…

After that Peter wanted me to try a traditional tea, very special one, very bitter. I wanted to be brave so I took a big cup but that was really a mistake. After the first sip my face  wrinkled, my throat went very tight. I had to finish the whole cup! But it is very healthy!! so NEVER AGAIN!:D

photo taken before I tried that = still smiling

In markets there is always one resturant selling snake’s meat and soup! I was told I have to try that, but maybe next time!

We also stopped at a part of town – the QUidong street, with traditional japanese style buildings. They were build during the occupation of Taiwan by japanese during 1920s to 1940s. Those houses served for japanese officers and now you can go inside of them and see how they lived in that time.

back garden of the houses

painitngs on the walls

After all this we were really tired, so we took the MRT back to the memorial hall to meet up with Elaine and Rosemary. One interesting thing – it is not allowed to eat or drink in the MRT, I do underestand that, it’s the same in CZK, but it is also prohibited to eat at the stations. Not knowing that I put a lump of sweet candy to my mouth, and Peter horrified that I have eaten something told me not to chew, that there are cmares and a policeman could stop me and I’ll have to pay a fine. I told him not to worry, I’m a foreigner and they won¨t stop me, and it was aslo the troth, but this shows how conservative and also orderly lives they have!

For dinner we went to a hotel resturant, where they serve cantonees style food. Because Rosemary wants to do it big always we had maybe 7 or 8 different courses! All of them very delicious! Many of them contained shrimps, some rice, some made of rice dough and so on. It was also a special occasion, because on Tuesday Rosemary is going to have an important operation… good luck Rose…

On Sunday i could rest a little. But for lunch my homepa was invited for a wedding lunch and they took me with them. The weddings here are a lot different. They invite many guests for dinner or lunch only. During the lunch there were some formalities, but none as our wedding ceremony. The birde wore first very big white dress, but during the lunch she dressed to different one, golden, and when we were leaving, she had a blue one. There were 12 courses, so I was really full after that. Some rice, some noodles, crab, lobster, pork ribs, dumplings, baked douggh with filling, soup, vegetable, fish… many and many and many. We ate maybe for 2 hours continuously!

I have to ask the teachers more about the wedding ceremony, because homepa could not underestnad some of my questions….

And now, at 8pm, full of food again (very tasty rolls with beef meat and spring onions) I’m going to watch a film and relax for the coming week!