Sunday, 05 August 2007

• 你們好﹗

  Hey all, sorry it's taken me so long, but here's a quick update of what's been going on in Taiwan.

   

  After a 20-odd hour flight, I arrived in Kaohsiung in all it's hot and sticky glory.  I stayed for a week at my grandparents' house, where I adjusted to the time change and explored the city a little bit.  By my grandparents' house, there's an elementary school – they just got out of school, poor kids (or at least they just had at the beginning of july when i first wrote this) – a Carrefour – a Target-ish kind of store and a great place when you’re looking for some AC – and Love River, which runs right through Kaohsiung all the way to the harbor and the big blue sea.  Across Love River are, conveniently, some bridges, and on one of these bridges, I found some of these:

  

  Cool, no?  Behind the birds, as you can see, is the Carrefour and yes, a McDonalds (pronounced mai-dang-lao).  A close up, for your viewing pleasure:

  

   

  One of the first places I visited was my mom's hometown, Tainan.  As one of the oldest cities in Taiwan, Tainan is known for having lots of historical places (and really good food), but alas, English translations were sparse so you all must settle for some pictures and what I gathered from my dad and good ol' wikipedia.  First off, there's Fort Anping (安平古堡)., which was first built by a Dutch company in the early 1600s.

   

  A view of some of the grounds from the white tower pictured above:

    

  In 1662, Ming General Koxinga defeated the Dutch at Fort Anping and the handover of the fort marked the end of Dutch rule on Taiwan.  I think the statue in the picture is supposed to be of him.  Tainan also has the most Buddhist and Taoist temples in Taiwan, one of which you can see in the background.

   

  

   

  The other major place we went to in Anping was the Eternal Golden Castle (二鯤鯓砲台 or 億載金城) which was built in 1824 by Qing official Shen Baozhen, who supposedly built a whole bunch of other places in Taiwan too.  This place was a key military post in Taiwan until the Russo-Japanese War, when Japan sold some of the cannons in Eternal Golden Castle to pay for war expenses.  Some pictures:

   

  

   

  My dad, next to a really big cannon:

   

  

   

  Finally, we ended the day with some fantastic dumplings and free refills of 豆漿 at Wan Ke Lou. Yummmm :)

   

  

   

  So that was Tainan.  If you learned something, or if you didn't, or if you just want to say hi, leave a comment!  I'd love to hear from you :)

   

  *for more pics, visit here. :)

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