Tourin'

Japan Today has an article today on the challenges and opportunities facing the Japanese tourism industry ("Asian tourists mean cash"):

"Earlier this year, the Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO) 国際観光振興機構 announced that the number of foreign tourists traveling to Japan plummeted 18.7% from 2008 to just 6.79 million people in 2009. This was the largest decrease in tourists since 1986 when the yen suddenly appreciated by almost 100%. Needless to say, the tourists stayed away at that time simply because everything became so darned expensive. This time around, the tourists are staying away because of the global financial meltdown and it wasn’t just Japan that was affected. Pretty much every tourist destination saw similar double-digit drops. However, whatever the reason, the fact is that the government is extremely unlikely to hit its 10 million visitors by 2010 target this year, and indeed a bad economy is not the only reason. There needs to be an awakening both at government level and commercially that tourism is a potentially massive industry for Japan and that investment is needed to help things along."

I'm going to do my part at the end of next month, when I'll be in Japan for a week, visiting Kumamoto 熊本, Aso 阿蘇, Takachiho 高千穂, Usuki 臼杵 and Beppu 別府. But the article ignores my past (and future) contributions, and instead focuses on the importance of Asian visitors to Japan's tourism industry, especially that of individual free-spending travelers from Hong Kong. Seeing as this is a Taiwan-based blog, however, here are the sections of the article referring to Taiwanese travelers. After pointing out that visitors from Taiwan make up the third major grouping of tourists to Japan (at 1.02 million), the story notes that:

"...the most prevalent repeat travelers are from Hong Kong and Taiwan...The number of repeat visitors from Taiwan was 72.1% and 73.6% of them were tourists."

Not much, but it does give an idea of the numbers of Taiwanese who choose to spend their vacations in Japan, and who do so more than once. Even around ten years ago, when I was living in Ikebukuro 池袋, there was a significant Taiwanese presence in the area. I can only imagine what it must be like now.

Doggone it

The skies were overcast, with occasional drizzles, and I was still suffering from a cold that had started last Thursday, to the point that I was still wearing a face mask during my Tuesday morning classes. So of course conditions were ripe for a walk this afternoon in the mountains of Tak'eng 大坑. Despite the less-than-ideal conditions, trails 9 and 10 were busier than I'd imagined, even though the warm temperatures today left me a sticky, sweaty mess at the end of my nearly two-hour trek around the hills. While out and about, I came across...

...this butterfly must have been feeling sluggish in the muggy conditions as well, because it allowed me to get up close and take several shots before finally flitting off. And...

...this grave, post-Tomb Sweeping Day 清明節. It's certainly been cleaned up (all the overgrowth has been removed), but with lots of ghost money left behind to (hopefully, but doubtfully) biodegrade. What you can't see in this photo are all the rubber bands that the ghost money had been wrapped in lying scattered around on the ground (most definitely not biodegradable) , along with the ashes of all the plant life that had been burned in the tomb clearing process. Traditional Chinese culture and environmental awareness - two trains of thought that often collide head-on, with the environment usually on the losing end. And...

...on the walk down Trail #9 going back to my scooter, a middle-aged woman and her pet Husky. At least I assumed it was her dog, by the way it was running circles around her as she was walking. It soon became apparent, though, that the woman was scared. I asked her in my awful Mandarin if the Husky was hers, and just as she was answering it wasn't, the dog started to growl at her. Yelling in my huskiest (pun intended), cold-induced voice, I charged the beast and drove it off. The woman made a hasty getaway, stopping only to pick up a stick for defense, and continually looking over her shoulder and back up the trail for any sign of the Husky. Taiwan has a problem with free-roaming dogs, stray and otherwise, and many Taiwanese are scared of canines, most probably due to past traumatic experiences with man's not always best friends. I've had more encounters than I'd like with aggressive loose dogs while hiking, though these almost always end up being a case of the proverbial "all bark and no bite". Sticks, stones and words, in concert or acting individually, are effective anti-dog deterrents, I've found. The hairiest (another pun intended) experience for me had to be the time I was surrounded by a pack of seven mutts. Armed with a large stick, and having identified which one was the alpha male, I was preparing to charge the leader and make a break for it, when an old woman appeared out of a shack along the trail up ahead and called the dogs off. By Taiwanese standards, that made her a responsible K9 owner!

A grave oversight 清明節

By a coincidence in the calendar, Easter and Tom Sweeping Day fell on a Sunday and a Monday, respectively, this year, resulting in a three-day weekend. For those not in the know, Tomb Sweeping Day is the occasion on which Taiwanese descend on cemeteries en masse in order to tidy up the graves of their ancestors. Seeing as many people are genuinely scared of going to graveyards, for most folks this is the only time of the year to visit the dear departed. As you might imagine, there is a lot of cleaning up to do, with 365 days' worth of weeds to be pulled up and burned, and the fires sometimes getting out of control. Getting down and dirty isn't my idea of spending a restful holiday, but fortunately for me, Tomb Sweeping Day is one local custom I've been exempted from. My father-in-law's ancestors are all buried in China, and having gotten married, my wife is now out of her family, and therefore not obliged to tend to her mother's deceased relatives.

Being out of the family doesn't mean Pamela is ostracized, and so we decided to spend the holiday by visiting her relatives in her hometown of Hsiluo 西螺. Leaving our home on Sunday morning and picking up my mother-in-law en route, we eschewed the presumably crowded freeways and made for Hsiluo by way of highways and county roads. It took a little longer to get there, of course, but driving on the back roads not only avoided the traffic jams, but really made me appreciate just how breathtakingly ugly the smaller cities and towns on Taiwan's west coast truly are!

In contrast to the architectural eyesores we passed on the way there (and back again the following day), upon arrival in Hsiluo, we paid a visit to my wife's junior high school. Without a doubt, Tungnan Junior High 東南國中 has to be the most attractive school of secondary education I've ever laid eyes upon. Hilton D. Bell Junior High School in Garden Grove, CA, certainly wasn't landscaped with carp-filled ponds and flower gardens:

Following that pleasant surprise, we drove into downtown Hsiluo to visit the "sights". First up was Fuhsing Temple 福興宮, dating from 1717 and one of the stops on the annual gangster-controlled Tachia Matsu Pilgrimage:

(The weather was continually overcast and hazy this weekend, which might explain the lousy colors of the pictures I've posted here)

Next up was Yanp'ing Old Street 延平路. There are those poor souls who, having resided in Taiwan for far too long, insist that Hsiluo is a Hidden Gem because of the old buildings here, and even my Japanese-language guidebook lists it as a tourist sight...

美しいレリーフを施した洋館などが現在も商店などとして使われている。特に、非対称な曲線美を残す延平路７２～７６号の「鐘楼」と、レリーフが美しい建興路２４６号の「佳聲唱片行」は見ものである。

（地球の歩き方台湾’０５～’０６）

...but unless you're a serious student of architecture, or need to stop in Hsiluo for the night while on the way to somewhere else and have some time to kill, there is no reason to go out of your way to pay a visit. There are only a handful of structures, none of which are particularly beautiful or outstanding (despite what the Japanese guide says), but at least they still function as real businesses and homes, and not as souvenir shops or tea houses catering to the tourist trade, as has been the case in too many of Taiwan's other Old Streets. Things could change, however - in an ominous sign, work was being done to the sidewalk on one stretch of the street. The Liong Choan building pictured below dates from 1935:

For Pamela, the real reason to visit the downtown area was to buy some Chienpao 煎包 - "cabbage cake" is how my significant other describes it. The blue truck that makes and sells them is always swarming with customers, and it takes a while for your order to get filled. Amber took this photo of me killing time with a green tea while Pamela stood around and patiently waited for her number to be called:

What does one do on a Sunday night in an urban township like Hsiluo? Go to the night market, of course, which is what we did after dinner, guided by one of my sisters-in-law. The market was far larger than any of the ones here in Fengyuan 豐原, and Amber enjoyed the rides and games. After a while, though, I got a little tired of the constant collisions of elbows, and it was with some relief that we made our way back to Pamela's sister's house, where we spent the night.

We had a somewhat fitful night, due to Amber's coughing (she has a slight cold), constant shifting of positions (at one point her feet found their way onto my throat) and habit of gnashing her teeth while sleeping. None of this was the fault of the house, of course, the interior of which is one of the nicest I've ever seen in Taiwan. Spacious rooms, wood flooring, even a tastefully done rock garden - my sister-in-law's house certainly puts our all-too-typical Taiwanese apartment of white tile floors and dirty white walls to shame.

After eating out for breakfast, we paid a couple of social calls to some of Pamela's relatives. We first visited a couple of her cousins, who live in an old, traditional house:

Then it was off to an uncle's home, where we had lunch, and Amber had a lot of fun taking the family's hyperactive poodle Pudding for a walk past the rice fields:

And that was how we spent our Tomb Sweeping Day weekend. Pamela's relatives are, without exception, extremely nice people who went out of their way to make us feel welcome. I'm proud to be related to them.

Happy Easter!

For the second year in a row, we were able to have an Easter egg hunt in our small apartment, thanks to the Ferrero company and its Kinder Surprise chocolate eggs (the ones with the small toys inside, banned in the USA). This year, we were even able to dye several eggs - the local Family Mart was giving away free stencil and dying kits with purchases of Kinder Surprises. Being a cross-cultural kid is getting easier in this day and age of globalization!

Some things never change

I make no secret of my being a Japanophile 親日, but I nonetheless try not to put on the blinders or rose-tinted glasses when it comes to looking at what goes on in the country. Take Japan's attitude toward the conservation of marine resources - please! It's bad enough the Japanese continue to hunt whales under the flimsy "scientific research" premise, buttressed by dubious claims of "culture" (not to mention hilariously ridiculous comparisons to cattle ranching), all to satisfy a small but vocal nationalist clique. Now it's the turn of the Atlantic bluefin tuna to be put at risk. Despite the ever-increasing prices for the fish at sushi restaurants in Japan, despite the dramatically declining stocks in the Atlantic (by up to 80%), despite the irony in having buy fish from the other side of the world in order to maintain the "traditional food culture" line, the so-called "reformist" Hatoyama administration 鳩山由紀夫 worked overtime to defeat the proposal to have Atlantic bluefin tuna fishing and trading banned under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). If and when the day comes that tuna is no longer on the menu at sushi and sashimi restaurants, the Japanese won't have to look far to find out who was responsible. The nearest mirror will suffice quite nicely.

Some things are not endangered. I took this photo of a betel nut seller talking to a customer. The picture clarity would've been better had I not been such a coward:

Welcome to the Plaza

A short drive from our apartment building, there is a large concrete plaza and underground parking lot. From what I understand, it was built to house an odoriferous traditional market located at the intersection of Yuanhuan and Chungcheng Roads in Fengyuan 豐原. For reasons unknown to me, the market vendors decided against relocation, and the plaza has been sitting unused for several years now. Until today that is. I don't know why it took so long for me to realize it, but this concrete oasis makes an ideal spot for a little girl to ride her tricycle around in, and to play hide-and-seek with her daddy. Not to worry, Fengyuan city fathers - your taxpayer-funded white elephant has finally been put to good use!

Most Taiwanese prefer Japan over China, survey finds

The kind of story that would get under the skin of a Greater China 大中華地區 nationalist, and result in a back-channel tongue lashing given to the KMT 中国国民党, appeared in both the Japan Times ジャパンタイムズ () and the China Post this morning. Here is the JT's Kyōdō News 共同通信社 version:

"Taiwan may be in the midst of a thaw in relations with China, but a survey released by Japan's de facto mission in T'aipei 台北 on Tuesday says Taiwanese are more positive about their Japanese neighbors. The annual survey measures Taiwanese attitudes toward Japan. The survey is of more interest this year given attempts by Beijing and Taipei to integrate cross-strait trade and financial services through a free-trade deal and after a number of quarrels between Taipei and Tōkyō 東京. Asked which country Taiwan should be closer to, respondents maintained the pattern reported in 2008, roughly split between China at 33 percent and Japan at 31 percent, with 16 percent preferring the United States. When asked if they had feelings of attachment to Japan, however, 62 percent agreed or strongly agreed. The starkest statistic accompanied the question, 'Other than Taiwan, which is your favorite country?' Fifty-two percent answered Japan, up dramatically from 38 percent last year, while China floundered with 5 percent. The United States managed barely more at 8 percent. Before 1945, Taiwan was Japanese territory for half a century under colonial rule. Consequently, most Taiwanese in their 70s or older speak Japanese. Japan remains a critical trade partner and a leading source of tourism revenue for Taiwan, as reflected in the survey, which confirmed Japan as the No. 1 preferred destination, ahead of Europe. The survey, commissioned by the Interchange Association, Japan, was conducted by Nielsen Taiwan between Dec. 12 and Jan. 11. More than half of the 1,018 respondents were 40 or older."

The China Post (or, more precisely, the Central News Agency), unsurprisingly, chose to include paragraphs referring to territorial and fishing disputes, and noted that:

"...while most Taiwanese still view Taiwan's relationship with Japan as close, the percentage of those listing Japan as their favorite country has dropped from last year, and the appeal of Japanese food was slightly down."

Strangely, there is no link to this story on the Post's homepage, even though all the other Taiwan-related articles from Wednesday's edition can be found there. Still, the message is clear: Taiwan and China may share a common cultural background, but when it comes to Japan, the distinctions and divisions between the two couldn't be more starker.