My favorite pet, urban chickens, a trusting mother

I saw my favorite pet to day of the streets of Taipei. It was an elephant! I think every child could have this elephant as a pet. Even though it was an elephant, I think it would be easy to feed and easy to clean up after.

I can say with certainty that this pet goes exactly where you lead it.

Right now the child is going where the her mother leads her, but I can guarantee that in the future this little girl might not follow her mother so willingly.

Lest you think I am against all animals, I want you to know that some animals visit us regularly. When we sleep too late in the morning we are woken by these guys.

Their cooing sounds much better than a rooster crowing and pigeons general wait for a more reasonable hour.

Many times, when some ask what a strange meat(snake, grasshoppers, frogs, ... )
tastes like the answer is: "It tastes like chicken." I recently heard that the name for a frog is mainland China is "tiánjī" 田雞. Which translates into English as:
Field Frog. So frog meat really is like chicken.

Here is a picture of the most trusting mother in Taiwan, she has let her baby girl hold what will be irreplaceable if lost.

LEDs

Taiwan is the number one(#1) producer of LED(Light Emitting Diodes) in the world. That's a pretty impressive distinction for such a small country. I had thought the LED displays around Christmas and Western New Years was impressive but they  got even more elaborate for Chinese New Years. Most of the time the LEDs come in strings light Christmas tree lights but being smaller and more uniform they can be shaped around large objects, like trees!

And the "rain lights" can be added to give the display movement.

Sometimes the strings can be combines to produce mixed colors.

And being on strings they can be shaped into writing and symbols.

And there are always lots of people with cameras who are willing to help you compose a picture.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Construction Signs

Taipei is a city on the move, there is construction everywhere. New buildings, new subway lines, new parks, ... One of the reasons for the building construction is that land prices in Taipei are going up for centrally located plots. With land prices going up it makes sense(economic sense) to tear down that 2 story apartment building and replace it with a 20 story office building.

Some of the pressure on land prices comes from Taiwanese moving from the countryside and southern Taiwan to the "big city" Taipei. Some of the pressure comes from mainland Chinese finding a new place to spent their money, like they did in Hong Kong.

There is a peculiar genre of construction signs at the construction sites. It catches my eyes because the signs are in both Chinese and English.

The characters in the signs always look like cartoon characters.

Sometimes they look like Laurel and Hardy.

Sometimes the message is very clear, whether in Chinese or English.

But there always seems to be a self-deprecating, humorous message that counters the inconvenience with some humour.

 

Chinese New Years - continued

The Chinese New Year(CNY) marks the beginning of the lunar calendar. Because is starts on a full moon, it can happen any day within 28 days compared to the Western calendar. February 10th(this year's CNY) seems particularly late.

School children get maybe 2 weeks off and businesses a full week. Most people use this time to connect with relatives. Taiwan is a small island and because everyone is traveling in the same vacation period there are plenty of traffic jams and long waits for buses, trains, ... I hear that in mainland China, the traveling is even worse as the distances are longer and many young people have moved to the city but then for CNY must travel to the countryside.

For Florence's family, the Lee family, most relatives are in either Taipei or the ancestral home of Ilan on the eastern coast of Taiwan. Two of Florence's uncles still live in Taipei and two of Florence's nephews have had girls. So gatherings in Taipei have four generations of relatives. Here are the 2 newest Lee family members.

The CNY gatherings combine the best of Taiwanese culture: eating and talking. Taking a cue from the Harley Davidson Crew, the questions is: "Live to eat or eat to live?. The first day of CNY is spent with your family and the second day is spent with your in-laws. Either way, the food will be impressive. I know of some well-prepared attendees who start dieting 2 weeks before the feasts so that they will have no reason to hold back.

When I go to these gatherings, I expect an army to arrive soon to help us eat all this food. To counter these dinners there are outings planned to get some exercise. There are plenty of beautiful places within Taipei city limits to visit.

The cherry trees are blossoming early in Taiwan this year.

For the Taipei Lees going out to Ilan is a special treat, all of us have good memories about Ilan and the Ilan relatives always treat us well. Going to Ilan is like taking a step back in time compared to Taipei, the people are friendlier and time moves slower. 

Nowadays with the XueShan Tunnel travel to Ilan is much easier than before. Coming out of the 8 mile tunnel is always exciting and this year the weather was particularly sunny and we could see GuiShan Island(Turtle Mountain) in the

distance, it is an island off the coast of Ilan.

Everything seems to grow well in Ilan and some things are different from Taipei.

We had a big discussion whether this was a begonia or not, anyway it was pretty.

We made it out to Ilan on Wednesday, already 4 days into the CNY, for these gatherings, the dinners are usually at restaurants and reservations have to be negotiated a good week before. We went to a restaurant with a old Taiwan motif with interesting nostalgic displays like this collection of old cigarette packs.

I was a little surprised by this "vintage bicycle" from 60 years ago,  because I know in Taipei(and probably Ilan) many of them are still in service.

This time, rather than going hiking with the old people, I rode a scooter with the young people to a shrimp fishing pavilion. These are big farm fishing pools with a picnic atmosphere because you are going to eat what you catch.

I caught more than I ate, but I was definitely not the best fisherman(shrimperman). There were two ponds, in one you loaded the hook and tempted the shrimp to stay attached long enough to land them. In the other pool, you used a very small hook with a bit of bait and tried to get the shrimp to actually swallow the hook. The second pool produced the bigger shrimp.

And here are the results:

When you see the shrimp flopping on the barbie, you know it doesn't get any fresher than this.

CNY always a good time.

Signs and Ideas

Here are some unrelated pictures and ideas from this trip to Taiwan.

Here is the diagram I have been looking for. In English we might say: "your eyes are the windows to your soul", but in the Chinese massage field: "your soles are the windows into your body". So each area of the sole is connected to an internal body part and massaging that part of the sole effects that internal body part. This picture clears up the asymmetry of the body as the liver is connected to the left foot and the heart is connected to the right foot. I had felt the left and right soles had perfect mirror symmetry.

I was shocked by this billboard as Taiwan is somewhat of a prudish country but on the other hand children are number one. Breastfeeding is correct but, I don't know that a billboard convinces anyone.

 While in TaiZhong, we stayed in a hotel that had no 4th floor, this is a Chinese superstition that the sound of the word for "death" sounds like the word for "four". I've heard that some buildings in the US do not have a 13th floor. Our building in Taipei does have a 13th floor and a 4th floor but maybe those residents get a discount. Count me in on the discount.

On the bus, I saw this translation about a low ceiling, I thought may be they were worried about a bad drug experience.

 From personal experience, I an testify that this restroom can handle more that one.

 I'd like to save the planet too!, but I don't think I'll become a vegetarian.

 At a hotel in TaiZhong this looked like a good idea. Separating the faucet from the tub. Most places in Taiwan have only a shower, a tub is a luxury.

Many of the ocean going ships/boats in Taiwan don't actually have a hull. They are more rafts built of PVC tubes. If Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer saw these boats they would be green with envy.

Some of these "rafts" are big enough to fish the oceans around Taiwan and make the commute to China.

 Using transparent material to use sunlight to project a message is kind of cool. Here in Puzi the tourist center used sunlight for notifications, tourist don't come when it is raining.

Long Shan Temple, Math models, kawasaki B1 125

Long Shan Temple

One of the big activities of the Chinese New Year is to go to the temple. This is a chance to get the Gods on your side for the coming new year. One of the most popular temples in Taipei is the Long Shan Temple in the WanHua district. One of the subway stops is just a block away from the temple so it is convenient to pay your respects during this busy season. Here is the outer gate of the temple.

Inside the gate the temple is in a courtyard with the temple in the center. Here the offerings are made to the Gods, incense is burned and the Gods entreated to bless the coming new year.

 The temple complex covers about an entire city block. Because it is popular, it has the money to be beautifully decorated. With a waterfalls,

 hanging lanterns,

 and a pond of the biggest koi that I have ever seen.

 It is the donations to the temple that provide the money for such a large complex. There are offices inside the temple complex to phone in your offering, the Gods accept money transfers, checks and all major credit cards.

Math Model
 
 Now that my eyes are good enough to read books and newspapers. I have been going to National Taiwan University(NTU) library. I can't take out books there but I can read them in the library. The math library is particularly good, bigger than both the University of Washington and the University of Minnesota math libraries. The
NTU Math building recently had a model displaying omnitruncated didecaplex made with zometools. It was impressive.

Yuen Foong B1 125

When I saw this motorcycle on the streets of Taipei, I thought Kawasaki had released a retrobike from 50 years ago. But I was wrong it is a reburbished motorcycle from 50 years ago. The Kawasaki B1 125 or as sold in Taiwan the Yuen Foong B1 125.
They were in production from 1966 to 197? )It was a pretty bike.

Chinese New Year

This is a busy time in Taiwan, Sunday January 10th is the Chinese New Year(CNY). It is a time when children have no school for almost 2 weeks and most workers have the entire week after CNY off. Lots of family gatherings, dinners, parties, ... it's like Christmas, New Years, Thanksgiving and the 4th of July all wrapped up in one week. But mostly, I think, it's about strengthening the ties between family members, old to young. So there are gifts given to the younger generation from the older. And the customs of Chinese culture are handed down from the older generations to the younger.

Usually the gifts are the famous "red envelopes" that contain money. (As far as gifts go, money is always the correct color!) But there are other gift giving, this is a Banyan tree near the GuangHua Electronics Shopping District. LED strings are shaped in the form of possible electronic gifts.

Chinese New Year is actually the beginning of Spring by the reckoning of the Chinese Lunar calendar. This year in Taiwan has been unusually warm. The cherries, magnolias and azaleas are in bloom.

 Another tradition of CNY is to put up Chun Lian as I have written about before:

http://mikeess-trip.blogspot.tw/2011/02/chun-lian-spring-couplets.html

But this year I went down to the old WanHua neighborhood of Taipei to have a professional write my Chun Lian. I had to struggle with this old guy because my couplets for ChunLian were not "beautiful". That's true, I told him, my couplets were political and because I was paying for it he had to do it my way.

My couplets are as I explained in the previous blog entry, but now they were written by an artist.

While in the WanHua district I heard an amazing performance, someone playing a saw under tension with a violin bow. Wow, she was great, it sounded like a theremin.

While at ZhongShan Hall, they also had a collection of the traditional Chinese instruments.

 Ruan - the Chinese Guitar, 4 strings

 Guzheng - a zither, 16-25 strings with movable frets

Guqin - a zither, 7 strings