Jaoixi, Taizhong, Chinese New Year is coming

Jiaoxi

This past weekend we had a Lee family gathering in Ilan, the ancestral home of the Lee family. Florence and I stayed in an apartment in Jiaoxi, a town to the North of Ilan.  Jiaoxi is famous for the natural hot springs and lots of tourist come for the both waters and the seafood. There is even a stream of hot springs water that runs through a park in the middle of the town.

 The gather was a big success, partly because we have Guanyin, the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy in our neighborhood.

 I recently heard a description of Chinese religious beliefs:
"When things are going good one is a Confucian (authoritarian), when things are going bad one is a Taoist (fatalist), when old and close to death, one is a Buddhist.

But maybe Guanyin's mercy was countered with the girl in this betel nut advertisement. ( I doubt that she has ever used betel nuy in her life, her teeth are too white.)

but never discount the power of religion, it is everywhere in Taiwan. Like this temple(Taoist) on the downtown street in Jiaoxi.

 Or this Camelite Catholic Church up in the mountains around Jaioxi where we went hiking.

 
TaiZhong - National Museum of Natural History

We recently took a day trip to the National Museum of Natural History in TaiZhong which is in central Taiwan.

This skeleton was actually found in Taiwan. During the last ice age there was so much water tied up in ice that the sea level dropped to a point so that there was a land bridge between Taiwan and present day China. The same there was a land bridge between Siberia and Alaska 10,000 years ago.

 There was an entire wing in the Museum of animated dinosaur models with sounds and movement to scare the pants off anyone.
Taiwan only emerged from the oceans 10 to 20 million years ago and all the dinosaurs died 65 to 70 million years ago, so no dinosaur bones will be found here.

While at the Museum we saw an IMAX movie about the translation of Mayan gylphs. They didn't really saw the world was going to end, and it didn't and it probably will not.
 
Chinese New Year

Chinese new Year is on February 10th. The stores have started displaying the decorations. Guess what the big color is.

My Eyes are slowly getting better.