The Moon Festival

We're in the midst of a three-day weekend, thanks to the lunar Moon Festival holiday 中秋節 falling on a Monday this year, and the Kaminoge family returned home several hours ago from an overnight trip up north. We left early in the afternoon on Saturday, and eventually made our way to Nanliao 南寮. With the exception of Kaohsiung 高雄, all the major and minor cities on Taiwan's west coast are well inland, away from the ocean. The city of Hsinchu 新竹 is no exception. Though a part of the city, Nanliao seems like a distant world from the hustle and bustle of downtown Hsinchu. The city's tourism officials have only recently woken up to the possibilities lying along the shore just a short drive from the city center, with a 17-kilometer (10.6 miles) long cycling course having been laid out along the coast. Our first stop was at a beach not far from the Nanliao port:

Things were a little bit windy...

...but the water was warm:

After looking for shells and harassing crabs, we drove to Nanliao port, where many kites were being flown in the late afternoon sky:

Amber commandeered the camera, and took several pictures...

...including some self-portraits:

My daughter is turning into quite the confident photog. You can see several more of her pictures on her photo blog.

Being at a fishing port, dinner was inevitably seafood. Here is Amber pointing to some future dishes inside the market building:

By the time we were finished with dinner, the sun had gone down, and darkness had descended upon the area. Our plan was to stay the night nearby, though we didn't have any reservations with any hotels. Not a problem, however, as we drove into the center of Hsinchu. It wasn't too long before my wife started following a sign for the Wego Motel, located just off of Chungcheng Road 中正路. Pulling up to the office, we were taken aback to discover that the cost for a night there was NT4000 ($140/¥10,650). The Wego is what is known as a "boutique motel". These are basically upmarket versions of the Japanese love hotel ラブホテル, and have taken off in popularity in recent years. Pamela has always wanted to stay in one, and seeing her chance, decided to damn the torpedoes price-wise, and go full speed ahead. I've been to love hotels in Japan and motels in Taiwan (high five!), but the Wego was the first multi-story kind for me - eight floors in total. Like a parking garage, we drove in ascending circles to our room on the third floor, where we parked the car in the garage there, and checked out our room and bath:

Admittedly, it wasn't exactly the kind of family motel I was used to back in the States, but Amber was thankfully too young to feel anything but excitement at the springy bed and large bath. And she must have been excited, because in the early morning hours she kicked me in her sleep and pushed out of the bed and onto the floor.

In the morning, we took the elevator to the top floor, and had breakfast with the fornicators, plus a family of four. Afterward, seeing as we didn't have to checkout until 11am, Pamela decided she wanted to get her NT4000-worth, so she and Amber took a bubble bath together. I used to opportunity to go for a walk in central Hsinchu. It didn't take long to find Peimen Street 北門街, one of Hsinchu's first commercial streets, lined with buildings dating from the Japanese period 台灣日治時期. Most of the shops were still closed, or just getting ready to open, as I walked down the street. Among the ones that I stopped to check out were this puppet shop...

and this establishment dealing in traditional Chinese medicine 中藥:

Near the end of the road was Ch'anghe Temple 長和宮, dating from 1742:

I went inside, and checked out the main hall...

...and a side shrine called Shuihsien Temple 水仙宮:

Back on Beimen Street, I followed the road to almost the end of the street, where several old homes were still standing, though some just barely. This house is called the Cheng Family Shrine 鄭氏家廟:

Returning the way I came on Beimen Street, I paid a brief call on Hsinchu's most famous temple, Ch'enghuang Temple 城隍廟, barely visible behind a ring of food stalls:

Another temple, another main hall:

Eventually, I made it back to the Wego Motel, where Amber and Pamela had finished their morning bubble bath. After checking out, we drove out of Hsinchu and traveled southeast, eventually reaching the "old town" of Peip'u 北埔. Taiwan is full of such historic places. Unfortunately, much of the history has been squeezed out in the name of tourism, leaving behind only an outer shell of restaurants and souvenir stores. Beimen Street in Hsinchu is still a living, breathing commercial road. Beipu, unfortunately, has been reconfigured to fit the needs of the tourist hordes. Still, when in Taiwan, do as the Taiwanese, so we took a stroll through the older section of the town:

Lunch was at a restaurant serving Hakka cuisine 客家菜 such as pant'iao fried noodles. This place wasn't my first choice - that had been reserved for the establishment next door which, according to my Bradt Taiwan guidebook, served "local beer". I took this to mean some kind of microbrew/craft beer, but to my disappointment, "local" meant Taiwan Beer 台灣啤酒. Taiwan's equivalent of Budweiser or Miller isn't worth waiting in line for, which is why we headed to this place:

Somewhat artificial it may be, there are still some interesting buildings in Beipu that were worth checking out, such as Tz'ut'ien Temple 慈天宮, a Hakka house of worship that was established in 1830:

The main hall of the temple:

In the streets surrounding the temple, there were old buildings that had been turned into teahouses:

This building is an old meeting hall built around the same time as Citian Temple, called Chinkuangfu  金廣福:

Beipu''s most impressive structure is, ironically, a Japanese-style Western-influenced building. Here is Amber posing with her newly-purchased dolphin balloon in front of the 1940's A-Hsin Chiang Residence 姜阿新宅:

A typical weekend scene in one of Taiwan's "atmospheric" streets of yore:

We soon bade the hordes of architectural enthusiasts farewell, and began the long, leisurely drive Highway 3 台3線 to home. We made one stop along the way, at Emei Lake 峨眉湖. The lake itself is nothing special to look at, but overlooking the water was this statue of the Maitreya Buddha 彌勒大佛:

At 72 meters (236 feet), this statue, along with the colossal Maitreya Monastery 聖地建築, were impossible to miss, despite being closed off to public access.

Tomorrow being a public holiday, I have one more day to sleep in (Daddy says "please", Amber) before returning to work on Tuesday. I haven't decided what to do yet, but whatever it turns out to be, I hope it will be relaxing.

We're going to the zoo

It's less than a week until Christmas, and the shopping isn't finished, so in order to give my wife time to hit the stores today, Amber and I took up my friend Thoth's offer to visit him in Hsinchu 新竹. It took about an hour and a quarter on the local train from Fengyuan 豐原 to Hsinchu Station 新竹車站, where we were met by Thoth:

From the station, Thoth took us to Hsinchu Park, where Amber checked out an old cannon battery...

...before heading over to what was undoubtedly the highlight of my daughter's day, the Zoological Gardens 新竹動物公園. Though I had been warned that the zoo wasn't much of an attraction, it turned out to be far more interesting than I'd thought, and the admission fee was a bargain at only NT10 (33¢/¥28). Amber enjoyed seeing monkeys, tigers, and, bless her heart, reptiles (especially the swimming python). Getting to feed a baby Sika Deer was especially enjoyable:

Leaving the zoo, we walked back towards the train station in search of a place to have lunch. Following a leisurely meal at a cafe just a stone's throw from the train tracks, Thoth took us to one of the best-preserved Japanese-era 台灣日治時期 houses I've seen so far in Taiwan. Officially called "The Residence of Hsin Chih-Ping", and dating from 1922, the building has been carefully preserved in its original condition, and walking around inside, it's easy to forget its location near the center of a bustling Taiwanese city. Unfortunately, interior photography was forbidden, but some nice photographs of the tatami mat 畳 rooms could be seen on the free pamphlets available inside. The English captions describing the various rooms were also well done. In addition to the house, an equally well-maintained wooden lecture hall could be visited just behind the residence:

If you're wondering just who Hsin Chih-ping was, he was an educator from China who came to Taiwan after the Second World War to become the principal of the Japanese-built Hsinchu High School. Apparently, Hsin didn't let any resentment he may have felt from fighting the Japanese (he served in the Nationalist Chinese military during the war) stop him from appreciating the aesthetic beauty of a well-designed traditional Japanese wooden home.

By now, it was getting late in the afternoon, so we returned to the train station, thanked Thoth for taking the time to show us around and caught an express train back to Fengyuan. Amber couldn't wait to show her mother the gifts we had picked up for her in Hsinchu, namely the packages of Hairei Meatballs and Hsinchu Rice Noodles. Yes, when in Rome...:

On the Taiwanese Range

Taiwan isn't the first place that comes to mind when thinking of wide-open spaces. This is one of the most-densely populated places on the planet (668 people per km²/1730 per square mile), especially when taking into the account the fact that 90% of the population is crammed onto the west coast, as a result of the Central Mountain Range 中央山脈. Therefore it's always something of a surprise when coming across a relatively vast expanse of land. Thanks to my friend Thoth, Amber and I visited one such place this afternoon, the literally named 19 Hectares Grassland (19 hectares = 47 acres), in the city of Hsinchu 新竹.

Due to the uncertain weather (there was one bolt of lightning that struck uncomfortably close to where we were resting, with a corresponding loud-as-a-cannon peal of thunder) and my little girl's four year-old legs, we were only able to cover a small portion of the grasslands. But there aren't too many places in Taiwan where open land is just that, open and (refreshingly) uncluttered, and Amber was especially excited when a goat-herder and his flock came along to feast on the grass:

In addition to goats, there were bugs to check out, but Amber's enthusiasm evaporated a bit after she took a fall and skinned both of her knees and one elbow (not too seriously, fortunately), so we took a drive into downtown Chunan 竹南. There we met up with Thoth's partner Sharon, and trouped off to a small Vietnamese restaurant for something to drink before getting back into the car for the drive home. All in all, it was a pretty pleasant afternoon, and I wouldn't mind going back to see more the grasslands sometime.

Spending the day in Shinchiku

台北の南西７０ｋｍにある新竹は、「新竹風」といわれるように風が強く、「風の城」という異名がある。東門城を中心に放射状に道が延びるごぢんまりとした町だが、郊外にある新竹サイエンスパークは、ハイテクアイランド台湾を牽引するシリコンバレーとして世界的に有名。

（地球の歩き方台湾）

I took the train up north this morning to Hsinchu 新竹 (the train station of which dates back to 1908)...

...to meet up with my friend Thoth. Thoth moved to Hsinchu three months ago, and he clearly enjoys living there, as you can tell from looking at his blog, The Montreal Writers' Storm Sewer. After being ridden around and shown some of the sights, I can understand why he likes it there. Outside of T'aipei 台北, Hsinchu is probably the most foreigner-friendly city in Taiwan, due to the presence of the Hsinchu Science Park 新竹科學工業園區. Here are a few images from today's guided tour of the Windy City, courtesy to Thoth:

First up is a video I made from the back of Thoth's scooter, riding through the streets and into the foothills of Hsinchu. Filming stopped when my hand became too tired from holding up the camera.

Here is Thoth outside his comfortable three-bedroom home. It's located in a quiet area in the hills above the city, with several inviting-looking dirt roads behind his street just begging to be explored:

Going back into town, we had lunch at a small cafe located across the street from National Tsing Hua University 國立清華大學. The menu was in English, and the dishes were American, ranging from grilled cheese sandwiches to Philly Cheesesteaks. I tucked into the first Tuna melt sandwich I'd had in god knows how long. There sure aren't any places like this where I live:

After lunch, Thoth showed me around the campus, which looks very much like any large American or Canadian university. Here I am looking appropriately philosophical outside the Casa de Socrates cafe on campus:

Next stop on the tour was the Hsinchu Science Park. With its Western-style apartments and large lakefront park, one could easily forget that they are in Taiwan (which was probably the designers' intention). The artificial lake had to be the first one I've seen in Taiwan not to include food vendors and Taoist temples. If only I were a highly-skilled professional living in Taiwan on an expat package...:

It was at this point the rain started coming down, so we eventually made our back to the train station area so I could catch my train back to Fengyuan 豐原, but not before doing a little walking around. Here is the East Gate, Hsinchu's landmark, dating from 1829 (though restored in 1999). It's all the remains of the old city walls:

As someone is who tired of the hassles of having to live in a small provincial Taiwanese city, I can see why Thoth likes being in Hsinchu. My wife has a cousin and a friend who both work in the Science Park. Hmmm, I wonder...