Second trip to Taitung (台東)

The second trip to Taitung was only for two days but we got to see a lot of interesting cultural activites. From the 17th to the 20th of February is a local holiday in Taitung know as "The Bombing of Master Han Dan" or in Chinese "寒單爺". This holiday honors the local god "Han Dan" by throwing firecrackers at a person being carried on a ceremonial chair and wearing only red shorts and a mask and carrying a branch for protection. There are two stories surrounding the tradition. The first is that there was a gangster in Taitung who one day decided to turn his life around and allowed the people in the town to throw firecrackers at him for repentance. The other story is that the local god Han Dan is cold during the spring so they throw firecrackers at him to keep him warm and bring wealth. In any case, the person who has firecrackers thrown at him is still ceremonially representing the god Han Dan, who is said to protect the person from harm. However after the event is over the person is covered in welts and burns, and is sometimes even bleeding. The other picture is of aboriginal dancers in Taitung. Taitung is actually home to seven of the 14 aboriginal tribes in Taiwan, so they have a very rich traditional culture. These dancers were also participating in the Han Dan ceremonies, but they were not getting firecrackers thrown at them. In Taitung we also got to meet the mayor, go to feed the fish at the beach, and go to the hot springs. It was a lot of really fun activites for only two days!

Taitung (台東)

Here are a couple of pictures that I took around Taitung on my first visit there. The first picture is of a fishing boat off of the coast. Fish is one of the major exports of Taitung. My host dad was telling me that most of the fish in Taiwan actually comes from Taitung. There are many facilities for processing fish in Taitung. The second is of part of the coastline of Taitung. A lot of the coastline is beach, but some is actually just rocks. This picture is from a natural area in Taitung.

Kending (墾丁)

The day after I went to visit grandparents in the mountains we went to the very southern part of Taiwan called Kending (墾丁). The picture is of my host sister and brother from Taitung and I standing on a cliff overlooking the beautiful beach and ocean of southern Taiwan. Even though it was February, it was still incredibly hot and sunny there. After the day trip to there we went to visit relatives up in Kaosiung and in Tainan (which are cities on the western side of Taiwan) and then returned to Taitung.

The first day that I got to Taitung (台東) I went with my host family to visit the grandparents who live alone on a mountain. It was a really cool experience seeing the mountains and the way that people live in the country. The house was really old and the grandparents raised chickens and grew vegetables themselves. Unfortunately I couldn't really talk to them because they were only able to speak Taiwanese and the grandfather could speak Japanese because of the Japanese occupation in the 40's. The third picture is of fruit trees that grow a fruit called "peepah" (which is actually the Taiwanese name for the fruit, I have no idea what the Chinese name is). I probably haven't touched on the subject in my blog yet, so I will do it right now. There are two or three main languages spoken in Taiwan and 14 aboriginal languages. The two most popular languages are Chinese and Taiwanese. Everyone learns Chinese in school, but about half of the population learns Taiwanese as their first language. The two languages are both from China, so oftentimes people can speak both fluently due to their similarity. However, the exchange students for the most part only learn Chinese, so when people speak Taiwanese I cannot understand anything that they say. But almost everyone in Taiwan can speak Chinese, so there is usually not a communication problem. It was really neat to get to go up into the mountains and escape from the hustle and bustle of the city for awhile.

Before Chinese New Year

A few days before the Chinese New Year, which started on Feb. 2nd, the Rotary had an activity where we went to the most famous street that sells Chinese New Year goods in Taiwan. We went during the afternoon on a weekday a full week before the New Year and it was still absolutely packed with people! On this street there were a ton of things to buy. The most popular item on the street was candy and snack foods. This is because it is considered good luck to offer guests these items during the Chinese New Year. There was also a lot of colorful trinkets for hanging in the home to bring prosperity and wealth. The most amusing part was that everyone selling items was wearing rabbit ears being that this year is the year of the rabbit in the Chinese calendar.

Holidays!

Hello Everyone!

Sorry that I haven't updated my blog in so long. I have been on holidays since essentially the first week of January and am going back to school this coming Tuesday. It's been a lot of fun time to hang out with friends, but the highlight was definitely two trips to a town in southern Taiwan called Taitung (台東) in a three week time span, both with the Rotary. So in the next following few posts I'm gong to try to talk about those trips and put up a lot of pictures. I hope you enjoy!