It's been a good while since I've updated this blog, and since then, summer has settled upon the island. The weather has turned even more humid, and rainy days are a common sight. Up here on the mountain, though, life is flourishing - birds and butterflies of all sorts are constantly arcing through the air, and all the ivy and vegetation looks like a green winter. School has been out for me for about a week and a half, and I've been taking some time to write, relax, and, of course, explore the island.
A great note - this summer, we're taking a vacation to the Mediterranean, travelling around in Spain and Morocco. We're also going on a cruise for about a week, and the spots include Tunisia (a country in northern Africa) Turkey, and Italy. It's going to be amazing. I'm not taking my laptop, and internet spots will be few and far between, but I'll be taking lots of photos, which I'll post as soon as I return home.
Yesterday was a national Taiwanese holiday: The Dragon Boat Festival, also known as duanwu. It's supposed to stem from the celebration of a man named Qu Yuan, who was an ancient Chinese scholar, and to remember his death, but these days it's more about the dragon boat racing, which is both fun to watch and fun to do. I didn't have a chance to head down to Danshui, where the races took place, but we did go somewhere: the Bishan Suspension Bridge. It was one of the few sunny days this summer.
By the time we got there (about four o'clock) it was pretty crowded, full of other locals that had just the same thought as us. It didn't take away from the natural beauty of the land, though. The bridge was supposedly built to look like a "wriggling dragon bone." I didn't really see that image, but maybe I just wasn't looking at it the right way.
The bridge itself was pretty packed, but it must have been built pretty well, because it barely wobbled as we trekked across it. It's not that long - maybe a few hundred feet at the most, but it looked quite impressive.
At the other end of the bridge was a trail, which led onwards to a kind of "tourist" spot...actually, I'm not quite sure what it was. But there were fields of strawberries, lemongrass, and ponds full of koi and lillypads wherever we went. Flowers were everywhere - a kind of preperation for the 2010 Flower Expo, which is coming up soon.
Anyways, we walked along the trail for awhile, watching the birds and smelling the strawberries, until we found the best part of the entire walk: the temple.
Okay, I just have to say that I absolutely love the temples in Taiwan. They're beautifully built, with amazing carvings and colors everywhere. But this temple is by far the most magnificent one I've ever seen.
It's called Bishan temple, which I *think* translates to "Jade Mountain" temple - it makes sense, seeing as it's so green here. I could be wrong, but that sounds pretty logical to me. One great thing about Taiwan is that the people are much more relaxed about having tourists like me poke around their temples; in China, you were barely allowed to look inside, let alone take photos. Maybe it's the island "chill" vibes, but it was really awesome. One of the temple guards told me in plain English, "Go look inside, look around." Thanks, temple guard.
I suppose I could go on about the temple, but pictures are worth a thousand words:
I'll be posting more pictures on my DeviantART account - there are a lot of really good ones. When I do, I'll post a link on here. Until then, zaijian.
-Ari
(Note that this post is relatively image-heavy and might take awhile to load if you have a slow internet connection. My apologies! You should know that you can click on all the pictures to see a larger version of them.)
Hey guys. The weather here in Taiwan has been vacillating between crappy and less crappy as of late. Today it's crappy, but yesterday it was quite nice. So what did I do? Took my dogs down the mountain and decided to visit a temple that's on my bus route. Now, Taiwan is one of the most dog-friendly countries in the world, so it wasn't a problem to bring them along. You see them everywhere: in shops, restraunts, stores...and not just the little ones, either. It's great to be in a country of dog-loving people.Anyways, we went on down, and found Hui Chi Temple, which, translated, literally means "Good Fortune Temple." It's really beautiful, as you can see, very ornate but not tacky. The picture you see to the left is only the gateway to it.
As we walked onwards, my dogs and I saw the temple's two guardians. They're Chinese lions, and they're pretty common around temple areas, and even houses or bridges. There's usually a male and a female, and in Chinese they're known as shizi. (Side note: the two dogs I own, Daisy and Happy, are known as Shih-Tzu dogs, which is basically the American way of pronouncing the Chinese word for lion. Yes, my two furballs were actually bred to look like miniature lions...which they kind of don't, but the statue above doesn't exactly look like a lion, either. I'm not sure if the ancient Chinese actually ever saw a live lion.)
We went through the gates, and saw that the temple had only just begun: as you can see, there are steps that lead up and up, towards the real temple. It's not much of a hike, since the steps are relatively low and very wide, but it was fun to look around. The pictures here don't do the place justice; with all the lanterns and the surrounding greenery, it looked truly magnificent.
As my dogs and I traveled upwards (meeting many other dogs on the way, most of them Shih-Tzu as well) it began to grow darker, and our only light was that of the lanterns, as you can see to the left. They're really gorgeous in real life, and are probably one of my favorite parts about Asian arcitecture.
Here's a closer look at the statues that line the stairway (look to the right.) I'm not exactly sure what they're supposed to be (lion? dragon?) but they're a cross between adorable and hideous. A face only a Chinese mother could love, I suppose.
The stairways continued going upwards, and began to twist and turn. To the right there was a beatiful garden area, filled with statues of what I'm guessing to be Buddhist deities. Buddhist deities that ride tigers for fun. That. Is. Awesome. Though the tiger doesn't look too happy, from the look of his face. There are other ones as well, including a pedophile-looking old man riding a deer (not as awesome as a tiger, but it probably takes skill) and another guy on top of a mini elephant. The tiger still wins in my book, though.
By now my dogs and I were about a third of the way up, and continued. It got continually more tropical as we did so, and the stairway rails started showing carved panels on them, most of which had a) dragons b) people riding dragons c) dragons fighting each other d) or tigers. If you're reading this blog and know you're not going to remember anything I'm writing, at least remember this: China and Taiwan like their dragons. And I can see why - they're awesome. Forget those nasty Western dragons, man. I want an Oriental dragon.
By now we're finally at the top, and we've passed a koi pond, another garden, several trails, and a couple of locals who were giving me some strange looks (I'm not sure if it was the dogs or the camera, or the fact that I'm white. Probably a combination.) By the time we got the the top, my poor dogs were panting (they're lazy) while I was doing just fine. And, let's just say, the views got even better at the top. (The picture to the right is one of the carved dragons on one of the incense burners. If you haven't noticed yet, I'm a big fan of dragons.)
Because, at the top, we saw the temple. The actual temple. Yeah, all the preceeding stuff was just a precursor to the big show up on top of the mountain. Needless to say, I was kind of impressed. The cool thing about living in Asia so long is that I've been able to see how temple styles differ in various countries. In Korea, they're very bright and have a lot of woodwork; in Thailand, there's a lot of gold used; in China, the style is darker in color but much more ornate. Taiwan is like a mix of all three, and the resulting buildings are beautiful. Very colorful, very ornate, with some beautiful stone and wood carvings. It also smells great.
After wandering around the courtyard area for awhile (see the link below to see all the photos in the album, since too may on here will overload the post) I tied my dogs outside and decided to take a look inside. Since this is one of the more "touristy" temples, I didn't have to take off my shoes or anything, and even though taking pictures wasn't exactly condoned, nobody yelled at me for doing it. I just tried to look nice and innocent while taking a look around.
The inside, obviously, was quite lovely. Besides smelling strongly of sandalwood incense, it was really quite beautiful. I don't know...it had this kind of aura around it, I guess. Even though I'm a pretty devout Christian, I couldn't help by be impressed by all of this. Within, there's a large statue of Buddha; around there are more minor gods. There's a place where people can kneel and pray and burn incense and give offerings. I kept walking forward, and found another koi pond, as well as a pretty cool dragon engraving. It kind of amazes me, how much effort that people put into this temple, which is kind of out of the way to see.
Hello there, my amazing nonexistent readers. How are you today? Well? I hope so. Moving on.
You know what Taiwan loves? No, not manga or anime, though they like it. Not cute stuffed animals. Not food, even though they realy like that as well. Nope. What Taiwan loves is paperwork. Or, to be precise, what Taiwanese government officials love is paperwork. Superfluous, redundant paperwork. Seriously, it get to the point where you should carry your passport and visa everywhere, because odds are somebody's going to want to see it. Just last week I wanted to take a look at the Taipei Public Libary, just to see if they had anything in English, but to simply get it you have to be older than nineteen and have some form of ID. Not even to get a library card. Just to look.
Moving on again. A key difference (one of them) between Taiwan and China is that Taiwan's been rabies free for a good couple of generations. China is not. Actually, rabies still runs rampant in China, even in Shanghai, where I used to live. I should know, since I got bit by a monkey at a zoo there and had to get a series of rabies shots, and, later, my thumbnail removed. The thumb's perfectly fine, but my pride will be forever wounded. Long story short, China has rabies, and since Taiwan's the equivalent of China's whiny college student who wants to get out of his mother's house, they love making trouble for anyone coming out of China. Not that I blame them, but sometimes I feel like I'm stuck in a fight between two petty children. China won't realize that Taiwan's never going to become part of it, and Taiwan just won't get over the fact that China has a large store of missiles...pointed right at them....and they're not far away....right, someone tell me what I was talking about, again? The sudden fear that China's going to nuke Taiwan into nothing has paralyzed my mind.
Which has meant that my poor dogs, Daisy and Happy, have been in the USA for sixth months so we could get them here. (The dog to the left is Happy.)
For the last two weeks they've been back, but in quarantine, just to make sure they don't have rabies. Even though we've gotten them rabies vaccinations since they were born and numerous blood tests show they're clean, they can't come home for another eleven days. Thankfully we got to visit them in the quarantine area in a city called Taichung (has a nice diner) today.
The poor guys have been stuck in a cage for the last two weeks, in this dirty hellhole they call a facility. Let's just say that Asia's standards of cleanliness differ greatly from that of the West. The sad thing was that I wasn't even surprised. I shouldn't judge, because it's not like they have the money to make it much better, and the employees were great (mathematically speaking, about 98% of the Taiwanese are extremely friendly. They have the highest percentage of friendliness in the world) but my dogs have already been through a lot. I'm surprised they don't hate us for dragging them through all the airports and planes, but they were happier than ever to see us. I love dogs.
Right. Enough semi-ranting for now. I'm tired, and the hour is late. Tomorrow I'm going sightseeing. We'll see how that turns out, yeah?
Story Word Count: 116,000 words and going strong. Seems that the closer exams get, the more I'd rather write.
Thanks for reading,
-Ari
Hello there again, nonexistent readers of my unknown blog. How lovely to see you all again.
This weekend I haven't done much, thanks to getting about a pint of blood drawn for testing and resulting in me becoming extremely giddy (dui, for some strange reason I get into a drunken-like state after losing blood) and then having to lie down for awhile. But I did manage to get some sightseeing in, and am I amazed. The hospital I went to is near the area where a lot of old government buildings, and all of a sudden my and my mom stumbled upon the Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall.
And wow, is it amazing.
For those of you who don't know, Chiang Kai Shek was one of the men who helped build Taiwan and made it independent from China. (Note: Never assume that Taiwan is part of China. It's not, and the Taiwanese would like to be very clear about that.) There's mixed feelings about him on the island, but they still built a huge memorial for the guy, and it's 
beautiful.
The gateway actually reminds me of a place from my story. The picture to the left is the actual memorial (thanks, Wikipedia!) and even though it doesn't quite capture how big and grand the building is, it's a good shot. Within is a big statue of Kai Shek sitting on a chair - yes, similar to the Lincoln Memorial, except this has Asian style. :)
So I saw that, and also some other beautiful buildings in the area. Personally, I think it's the best looking part of Taiwan, save Yangmingshan, of
course.
On other notes, the weather here is definitely taking a turn for the...different. Apparently Taiwanese winters are foggy. Really foggy. And rainy. Basically, very damp. I'm not sure if it will snow or not, but since I live on a mountain, I'll probably be the first to know. Today we celebrated Thanksgiving at my church, and we get two days off from school this week.
Writing-wise, my story's going pretty well. I'm writing the end, and it's 
quite exciting. It's not an action-packed ending, but it's really emotional, and definitely bittersweet. I don't like happy-happy endings. For me (and in my writing) everything comes with a price, and this time the price is big. NaNoWriMo's starting to wind down, so my heart goes out to all the novelists scrambling to get in their 50k quota.
Also, time for some book recommendations! The library at my new school is much better than the one at my old school, so I've been checking out books like a mad woman. Right now I'm in the middle of Cybele's Secret, a book by Juliet Mariller. It's the second in the Wildwood series, but it's not so much a sequel as a a loosely-related book in the same universe, through a different character's eyes. If you like historical fantasy and rich Ottoman Empire-inspired cities, then this is for you. Of course, I recommend reading the first book, Wildwood Dancing, first. It's vaguely based off the fairytale of the Twelve Dancing Princesses, and it has the same magical feeling in it. The cover art is just as beautiful.
I think that's all for now. I'm really having fun with this blog, and I'm going to keep adding on more to it. Enjoy.
Sarn Progress: 111,000 words and going strong.
Cheers,Ari
So we had a four-day weekend this week, which was really nice. Unfortunately I spent most of my time studying - I've been in Asia way too long, man - but I did have some time to go out and explore Taiwan some more. I went to the Taipei Zoo, and a market known as Ximending, and they are both very well-known places, especially for tourists. I usually prefer to take the road less traveled and all that, but this was pretty cool, I have to admit.
Right. I'm not trying to give Asia a bad name, but I have to say that zoos here are usually...held up to a lesser standard than in Western society. Sometimes it can't be helped - on the whole, Asia doesn't have as good a quality standard of living as America and co. does, so they don't have as much money to make the zoos all awesome. But the Taipei Zoo is very, very cool. It's kind of far out - we had to take the MRT for almost an hour - but it's worth it. There's an aviary - my favorite part - a section about the animals endemic to Taiwan, a nocturnal house, an African section a Rainforest section...I could go on and on. I took a lot of pictures; they're not posted on here, but you can go to my DeviantART gallery to see some (I love photography.) We spent the whole day there, walking around in the humid Taipei heat, having a ball. The crowning jewels, of course, were the pandas, recently imported from China. There was a parade in their honor; yeah, people are that excited about them. But seeing how Taiwan and China are constantly on edge, it makes sense.
The day after, my sister and I went to Ximending, a sort of market, but not the kind I'm used to. No idea what the word means in Mandarin, but I'm guessing it's something like "the anime/manga lover's paradise." Because that's what it is.
And let me say that I really dislike anime and manga. My sister loves it, so she was totally enthralled by the market, and I was mildly amused and somehow horrified at the same time.
First off: the people. I have never seen people like this before. Little girls with hair dyed so much it was kind of orange, with one-inch nails adorned with lots of glitter, waaaay too much makeup, mini-skirts and high heels? And then me: no makeup, jeans and a t-shirt, no jewelry. I almost died laughing - after I managed to rip my eyes away. And the guys were just as bad, if not worse. Skinny jeans and hair that looked better than mine, and so many piercings I wasn't sure where to begin counting. They're living anime characters, or so they want to be.
Second: The stores. Oh, the stores. I have never seen so many cosplay costume stores in my life. Maid outfits, schoolgirl outfits, whatever - it was there. Then there were these cafes where the waitresses were dressed up in lolita (some kind of anime style) dresses and spoke in whispery little voices. Yeah, to me. I've had nightmares like this. I wish I had taken pictures, but I forgot my camera at home.
Taiwan is definitely different from Shanghai.
Tune in next time to see where I go next, hmm?
-Ari
So today after school I decided to go exploring around my neighborhood a bit. Like I said before, I live on a mountain known as Yang Ming Shan, so the roads aren't really very flat. More like steep hills and winding little pathways everywhere. No two houses are at exactly the same height. And it's really quite interesting, because everywhere the jungle is trying to creep back into where we've cut into the face of the mountain. No wall doesn't have budding vines and ferns creeping on it, and all the trees become tiny little worlds all their own. Even with all the tiled houses (some of which are more like palaces) it's obvious that this is a wild place.
And it's actually kind of sad. See, all the houses here are completely walled in, so that everyone is protected - or trapped - from the world outside. Not like in America at all. I don't even see our neighbors. And that raises a question. Why are we even living on this gorgeous mountain if we're trying so hard to keep it away?
Just something to ponder. Let's see what else I can find out.
A great note - this summer, we're taking a vacation to the Mediterranean, travelling around in Spain and Morocco. We're also going on a cruise for about a week, and the spots include Tunisia (a country in northern Africa) Turkey, and Italy. It's going to be amazing. I'm not taking my laptop, and internet spots will be few and far between, but I'll be taking lots of photos, which I'll post as soon as I return home. 
At the other end of the bridge was a trail, which led onwards to a kind of "tourist" spot...actually, I'm not quite sure what it was. But there were fields of strawberries, lemongrass, and ponds full of koi and lillypads wherever we went. Flowers were everywhere - a kind of preperation for the 2010 Flower Expo, which is coming up soon. 
