Red Envelope Shows

Hongbaochang (Red Envelope Shows) only exist in Taipei. Since the KMT as well as the Chinese refugees retreated to Taiwan during the 50's, this type of shows has been the place providing people with the atmosphere of nostalgia. Singers sang old Chinese songs, which made the audience feel like going back to their hometowns in the Mainland. They rewarded the singers with red envolopes, which was originally the money of gift given during the New Year, wedding or childbirth in China. Red Envelope shows were popular but has been declining recently. The Chinese migrants have been aging: some of them have passed away, and some of them have chosen to go back to China after Taiwan and Chna opened the door to each other during the 80's. I visited one of the Red Envelope Shows last week. The singers went to the stages in turns, and each of them presented 3 songs. Most of the songs are still old Chinese songs, but from time to time I can hear local Taiwanese songs and new pop songs. There were not many people in the audience, maximum 20. I was the youngest among them, and a lot of singers came to me and chatted. I gave off a couple of red envolopes while listening to the music. To me, Red Envelope Shows demonstrate the political changes in Taiwan. People might be sad about what they have lost, but at the same time are trying to create something new for the future.

More Amazing Buildings in Taichung

I posted some photos of the amazing designs of restaurants, tea houses and boutiques in Taichung when I was in Taiwan last year. Last week I visited my families in Taichung, and found more interesting buildings. To be honest, compared to Taipei the infrastructure and superstructure of Taichung is far "backward." However, it's always a lot of fun to get together with my grandmom, other families, and my old friends. These buildings seem to remind me of the "personality" of Taichung which I cannot find in other cities.

The exterior of a restaurant.

The balcony of the restaurant

A hot pot place

Want to learn the Chinese calligraphy traced back to the Oracle period?
This is a restaurant which serves healthy "nourishing" food.

Super Hot Pot

The first day I arrived in Taipei, Andy took me to a hot pot place for lunch. The style of this hot pot place is just like Little Fat Sheep in Montreal, which means you can pick as much meat, seafood, vegetable, beverages and dessert as you want. Meanwhile, the pot is divided into two parts: hot and spicy (for people like Andy), and regular stock (for people like me).

Andy told me this hot pot place is famous for its wine-marinated chicken, and it's really good! We kept eating and talking, and had a lot of free Häagen-Dazs ice cream after the meal. I looked at people around us, men and women all dressed-up and talking about makeup, money and trips to China and Japan, which are typical scenes we can see in Taipei. This was my first day in Taiwan, and the lunch was a fun welcome party!

A Nice Lunch

Last week Amanda invited me and another friend of her for a lunch in the SOGO Department Store. The French-style restaurant is located among a lot of boutiques on the third floor. It's quiet, spacious, and has a lot of light.

I had pasta and creamy latte, and it was a nice lunch hour!

The Deaflympics in Taiwan

The Deaflympics games are taking place in Taipei (Sep 5-15), and I can see a lot of international visitors, including athletes and journalists, in the streets. In the neighbourhood where I stay a lot of people communicate with each other in sign language. It seems that tourists suddenly show up, and Taipei looks different.

People in Taiwan are quite excited about the games, too. This is a great opportunity for people to know about the special feelings and needs of others, and at the same time to organize an international-scale event for them. TV news talk about the results of the games, and in addition, how restaurants and stores prepare for entertaining these guests from other countries.

I hope these international visitors can know Taiwan better, too. A couple days ago I went to observe a Taoist ritual, which took place in the area close to the Deaflympics stadium. While the priests were dancing and chanting, a tall journalist with the ID hung on his neck passed by, and he kept gazing at the ritual. That’s part of the culture of Taiwan, and I wish he will mention it in his report.

The sign and art installation of the Deaflympics with its mascot, the Taipei tree frog, in front of the SOGO Department Store.

The fireworks on the top of Taipei 101 tower celebrating the opening ceremony of the Games.

Haha, I’m Back!

For another stage of my fieldwork I’ve been back to Taiwan since the beginning of September. Taipei is hot, humid but at the same time full of interesting events (and food). As usual, I’ll try to take as many as photos to share with you!

Show girls promoting new Sony digital cameras in front of the New York New York department store. Compared to my generation, these active show girls represent the new generation of girl power in Taiwan!

Two Young Girls And One Old Woman

Most Taiwanese women at my age grew up in a “de-sexualized” environment. I still remember when I was still a teenager university is a place for “competition of being ugly.” Girls went out without any makeup and dress-up, and nobody has ever taught us how to take care of the appearance or express ourselves while being interested in a guy. But it doesn’t mean that there aren’t beautiful girls on campus. A lot of Taiwanese guys like thin girls with long hair and big eyes; furthermore, they got mean mouths. When guys saw an ugly girl trying to wear some makeup and a mini skirt, they laughed and exchanged strange sight with each other. Once a guy even told me: “you got fat legs and how dare you wear miniskirt?” Sometimes I wonder if girls in Taiwan are too nice to stop this kind of comments.

However, when coming to Taiwan this time I was surprised to find that girls have changed a lot. One of the informants I interviewed with for my fieldwork, who is a feminist activist, told me that women’s rights have been paid a lot of attention during the past decades, and she proudly said: "the congressmen and congresswomen are glad to cooperate with us.” I can tell women are active and brave, and it shows by their appearance: girls in miniskirts are everywhere regardless the size of their body. In addition, a lot of TV shows and magazines are teaching girls how to dress nicely, and of course, how to be confident when either being in a relationship or single. Looking at these changes, I’m so happy for girls in Taiwan. When visiting the Fengjia market in Taichung I saw two girls in anime style of makeup, and I asked them: “can I take a photo with you?” They were kind of shy, but immediately went to me and smiled in front of the camera.

The divorce rate is increasing rapidly in Taiwan now. One girlfriend of mine- Amanda- told me that she got divorced after being married for 10 years. I was kind of shocked, but after one-day chatting I totally understand her choice. Divorce is not a great thing; on the contrary, it could hurt a lot and stop a man/woman from believing in a relationship anymore. But compared to the past which a lot of Taiwanese women got married simply because of the pressure of the family or the society, it’s encouraging to see that women nowadays make every decision by themselves.

The "West Gate Town" (Ximending) where young girls go shopping and to the movies in Taipei.

Shopping in Taiwan: Department Stores

Department stores are somewhere we go either when we have a lot of money or when there is a big sale. It’s a lot of fun to go to the department stores, not only because of the high quality of goods they got, but also the nice decoration of the buildings. I went to some department stores at the end of August since summer sale was going on everywhere. I like Sogo’s new plaza on Zhongxiao Fuxing, the Shin Kong Mitsukoshi across from the Taipei Main Station, and another Sogo in Taichung. I bought some cute dresses and shoes. There were wool coats and pelerines left since last year and were sold at great price, and of course I got some for winter in Montreal!

Best sellers in Taiwan: how to eat healthy?

The Japanese garden on the top floor of Sogo

The cosmetics counters in Sogo

Roots in Taiwan

Inside the Taipei 101 Mall

People lined up to get free Minute Maid juice

Shopping in Taiwan: The Fengjia Market

The other place I shopped my fieldwork uniforms is the Fengjia Market in Taichung. The market is named after the university where it’s beside. Honestly it’s not a good place to live- too crowded and noisy-, but it’s a great place to shop since it’s a students’ neighbourhood and there are a lot of cute clothes with good price.

Shopping in Taiwan: The Wholesale Market of Wufenpu

I didn’t bring a lot of clothes with me coming back to Taiwan. First, I don’t want to carry a big and heavy luggage; second, Taiwan is a great place for shopping and I can always get beautiful and inexpensive clothes here. During the first two months I went to cheap places to shop the clothes for fieldwork. I need something easy to wear and easy to wash. In Taipei, the wholesale market of Wufenpu is a great choice.

Wufenpu was originally the market for retailers to purchase their goods. However, it has been getting more and more famous and popular among common people during the past decade. Now when I go to Wufenpu I can see a lot of individual consumers like me. I’m like located in the mountains of clothes and people and don’t know where to start (so sometimes got kind of angry). One friend of mine- Chengyi- who was working as a shop attendant in the department store told me as an individual consumer never try to bargain in Wufenpu, because those shop owners need to offer retailers with a better price. I got a lot of clothes in Wufenpu, and they are called “fieldwork uniform” by me.

A Small Town Close To Taipei: Shiding

I visited the “Guniang Miao (temple of the girls)” two weeks ago. In traditional Chinese thoughts an unmarried woman can’t be worshipped with other ancestors of the lineage after their deaths, and their tablets can’t be placed in the household, and hence the temple of the girls provides the family with a space to commemorate her. This temple originally worshipped the Lady Wei Bian, who died early but has been acting as a virtuous girl of the family. The introduction of the temple warns people that Ms. Wei is kind and affectionate to worshippers, but at the same time very serious. So visitors shouldn’t make jokes in the temple in order to avoid offending her. The statue of Lady Wei Bian wears a gown and jewleries, and the shop of the temple sells paper money which has images of girls' dresses and jewleries on it.

After visiting the temple, I took a walk in the small town Shiding. It used to be prosperous because the coal mines, but it’s so quiet now that only some households can be seen in the mountains and the bus only comes every 30 min..

The temple of the girls

Lady Wei Bian

The town Shiding

The Korean Street

I heard there is a “Korean street” in the suburb Yonghe of Taipei long time ago. The street gathers a lot of importers selling Korean food, clothes and accessories. It’s been flourishing for at least 2 decades, especially Korean goods are getting popular in Taiwan.

I visited the street after an interview with two informants. The Korean street is not a fancy new neighbourhood, but quite lively. I saw posters of Korean stars on the wall, and smelled ginseng and kimchi. Inside the lanes there is a traditional Taiwanese market selling fresh food. I guess this street has been this energetic since Taiwan and Korea launched the trade. It tells a lot about how the two countries have been working hard as new economic bodies in Asia.

A shop selling Korean herbal medicine and snack

The street

The market

A promotion vendor by the Korean Tourist Board in the Xingyi commercial area of Taipei

My Hometown Taichung

I was born in Puli, a beautiful small town in central Taiwan, but moved to Taichung when I was 10 years old. For me Taichung has been the representation of a big city.

There are a lot of beautiful architectures in Taichung and those nice resaturants and tea shops amaze me. However, Taichung is famous of being “undisciplined” in Taiwan, which means people here don’t behave very well. They drive fast, and the pavements are full of scooters and parked cars and I have no choice but to walk on the roads. In addition, there are a lot of robbers here. Actually robbery happened to me once when I was still living here; fortunately because of my scary screaming, I didn’t lose my purse. And then I called the police right away, but to my surprise, he didn’t care at all. I gradually realized that the police didn’t care because there were just so many robberies in Taichung.

Although I don’t like Taichung that much anymore, I still enjoy staying with my grandma, auntie and old friends in the city. After all, this is the place where I grew up and has been part of my life.

A clothing boutique

Starbucks

A tea shop

Inside the Eslite Bookstore

A Karaoke place

The Baseball Fever

The Olympic games were over. Due to political reasons, Taiwan has been given a strange name "Chinese Taipei" while attending international sports games, but people in Taiwan are still enthusiastic. During the first week of the games I was overwhelmed by the baseball fever in Taiwan. The baseball is called “guo qiu (the national ball game)” of Taiwan, and everyone wants the Taiwanese team to win a medal. So during the games between the 8 teams I can see people sitting in front of TV cheering, but too bad the Taiwanese team didn’t play well this time. It was defeated by Cuba, Korea, Japan and China. I saw fans in Beijing crying “I’m so disappointed! But I’ll still be here to support our team!”

When the Taiwanese team lost the game against the U.S, it is not qualified to attend the semi-finals any more. Interestingly it looks like all the team members can finally get relaxed and then play a good game against Canada. I was eating dinner at a small restaurant while the game began, and everyone there was watching the TV screen. Of course the hosts both cheered for Taiwan (however, I felt like one part of mine fighting against the other, and honestly when Taiwan was gradually winning the game I totally became Canadian!) The result was 6 (Taiwan): 5 (Canada), and the two are both ranked top 5.

People watching the baseball game in front of the SOGO Department Store.

Going East: Yilan

Upon my friend Petty’s invitation, I visited Yilan last week. Yilan is located in eastern Taiwan, and originally the domain of indigenous people. Petty told me her father is from the Fujian side, her mother Hakka, and her grandmother is partly indigenous. Her family is a good demographic representation of Yilan.

This is the first time I’ve been to Yilan since coming to Taiwan. Yilan is a peaceful county, and people are nice and generous. In addition, the food is so good that I ate the most on the table. Petty guided us through mountains, sea, rivers and towns. I enjoyed the beautiful scene and believe firmly that Taiwan is an island full of geographic characters.

The Turtle Mountain Island outside Yilan

The dolphins in the Pacific Ocean

The Taiwanese hamburgers we had for dinner. The bread is green because it's made with tea.

The Lanyang River

On the top of the 2,000-meter Taiping Mountain