Asking for help to my fathers football team

My father is a very passionate soccer fan. Last year when I was in Taiwan, I spoke to him over the phone, and mentioned that we were on our way to yet another temple. As his team were in a bad shape with several looses in recent games, he asked me to pray for them, to turn their bad luck into good luck. I was very surprised by this request, as my father in a non religious person - I guess it demonstartes just how passionate he is with soccer?

Kaoshung

When I am in Taiwan we always visit my wife's little sidster, who lives with her family in Kaoshung in the southern Taiwan. Kaoshung is a new upcoming and very successfull city of Taiwan. Above is a photo from their famous train station Formosa Boulevard Station decorated in glass by Narcissus Quagliata.

Fo Guang Shan Monastery

A few year back I visited the Fo Guang Shan Monastery ( http://www.fgs.org.tw/english/index.html )with my chinese family. As always the experience was fantastic and I think the picyures speaks for themselves. The temple is huge and reside on a mountain outside Kaoshung in the southern Taiwan.

Chinese new year

Last year I finally had a chance to participate in a real chinese new year. Living outside Asia, all we ever hear about chinese new year is the transportation chaos when millions of people try to get home for new year. It is not quite like that in Taiwan, but it is still chaotic and much different than the rest of the year.

Taroko

My single best experience as a tourist in Taiwan was visiting Taroko. Taroko is a nature park located on the east coast of Taiwan near to Hualin. We went there by train from Taipei and this is a perfect way to go there, as the train trip is very beautiful. The east coast of Taiwan is fantastic with the sea on one side and the high mountain on the other side.

Taiwan temples

I love Taiwanese temples and for many good reasons. They are beatably and very colourful. Plenty of red and gold, green and blue. No boring brown or  beige.Plenty of people come and go, children are running around, shouting and a huge noise level. No misunderstood piousness and yet they take the religious element very serious. They pray, the give presents to god, they talk directly with good and expect and answer. There is a scent of incense and burned paper money. it is ALIVE!

Lin Mei

My trip to Ling Mai came as a bonus. After a long trip along the east coast of Taiwan, it was sadly but surely time to go back to Taipei. On the way we drove through the area of Ling Mai and agreed that one more nature walk was what we needed. For sure Ling Mai cannot compete with Taroko, very few things in this world can, but this trip was very nice and surely very recommendable. The trek was along the water, and every now and then you can enjoy big and small waterfall.

Street Kitchen

The best food experiences for me is from visiting the street kitchens. Here you eat very authentic and local food, and this always act like a third spice for me which beat everything else. This is where the Taiwanese eat their food every day. This is where you pay less than 3$ for an unbeatable experience. I cannot recommend it enough.

Water lilies

Taiwanese are crazy about water lilies and who can blame them. They are incredible beautiful and you can find them in various colour and shapes. Several places in Taiwan, I have been to small parks, that you can enter at a small fee to see fields of these fantastic flowers.

Theatre

This theatre troop we meet by coincidence when we visited a museum in Yilan. All of a sudden all visitors of the museum started to walk to the same spot, and naturally we followed the crowd. The troop was very big and the involved the audience in the play which all ended up in a huge parade through the museum.

Sun Moon Lake

Sun Moon Lake is a big lake near Taichung which is very popular as a place to go in the weekend. We went there on a very hot summer day with the entire family and had a great day together. On trips like this, we always visit at least a couple of temples, and there are plenty to choose from, but this day we also went sailing on the lake.

Hot Pot

Taiwanese loves food. I use to joke that their whole life is about food. While they are having breakfast, they discuss where to eat lunch, and while they eat lunch, they walk through their options for dinner.

Chung Tai Chan Si

The Chung Tai Chan monastery is much different than most other temple I have visited in Taiwan, as it is modern and newly build. It is located in the mountain not long from Sun Moon Lake and is huge and very impressive, yet, it does not give you the rush from knowing, that this temple have been here for more than a thousand years.

Children in Taiwan

All Taiwanese are busy, but most busy of all are the children. Maybe this is part of training them for their adult life, but for sure, they are so busy.

A trip in the mountain

Taichung is surrounded of mountains, no matter what way you drive, you will end up in the mountains. The pictures from this post, is from a short weekend trip with the family to visit old friends who recently bought a house in the mountains.

Weekend lunch

One of the main attractions of Taiwan is the food. No way around that. Everywhere you go you eat well. In the fine restaurants, in the street kitchen or at home in the families. The pictures in this post, is from one of the rare occasions, where friends invited us to their home for lunch. Please notice how varied the menu is; meat, fish, sausage, vegetables, fruit and more. Everything is put on the table at the same time, and you eat it all at the same time. This is the way you do it in Taiwan. The taste was fantastic!

Food, food and food!

Taiwan was occupied by Japan until 2nd world war and the influence from this is wast even today. One of the good side effect of this is the huge selection of very good Japanese restaurants, from where today's pictures come.

Nightmarked

Going to a night marked is mind blowing for a Dane. Coming from a small country, where every person have so much space, can in no way prepare you for the feeling of walking he night marked. What we refer to as the personal space, which roughly defined is 30 inch around you, and where other people rarely enter, is totally violated when walking the night marked. Most Asian cities have them and you can arrive at 8 in the evening, but the crowd really build up after 10.

Taiwanese dolls

These pictures are from a wonderful day we had one summer with Jessicas and her family in Yilan. We were at a large cultural museum, and among many things we saw this puppet theatre where the puppet are moved by the hand. There are lot's of drama and even music and it attracted a large crowd as this kind of amusement is very traditional and popular in Taiwan.

The little temple

Before Wen and I meet, Wen lived her life alone, well she lived in her family's house, but she did not live with a man. When her parent past away she decided to go look for a husband. In helping her with this big task, she went to her temple and prayed to God to let her find a good husband.

Family trip to the temple

Late afternoon Wen's little brother and his family picked us up and took us to the temple. The day was carefully selected, as today was the birthday of the main God of the temple. For this reason the temple was full of people. Everybody was praying and presenting presents for the God. The air was full of incense and many tables were full of presents, even it is still true, that after presenting or giving the present to God, the Chinese people bring the present back home.

Drinking tea in Taiwan

We visited Wen's mothers god son, who is a mechanic, or I should say, he has a shop where they repair cars and motor cycles, and they were very happy to have us visit them. They invited us to the office and started to brew tea in the traditional way. 

The best ice cream in the world...

The Taiwanese have great ice cream, and ice cream taste so much better in 100 degrees! They take an ice block and shave thin layers of ice from this, then apply fresh fruit like Mango and some fruit juice on top. The taste is fantastic - and I hope - not that unhealthy?

Fortune teller

My wife's little brother recently redecorated the childrens rooms of his house. As a natural thing he contacted a fortune teller with special knowledge about Feng Shui. His task is to let  people know, how to decorate the house, in order for the children to have a happy life. 

Suan La Tang

Suan La Tang - Strong sour spicy soup with egg, tofu, mushrooms, carrot, meat and spring onion. This soup you can eat every day...

A walk on the marked...

This video is from the marked in Lu Gang. The only thing I cannot convey is the smell, which was so rich...

Xiao Long Bao

Xiao Long Bao - One type of Dim Sum with soup inside and there is ink from squid in the flower and this gives the color. Super yummi. The chef from this restaurant works in the Taipei branch of Din Tai Fung.

Pearl Milk Tea

I can still remember the first zip of pearl milk tea I had in my life. It was a revelation and the starting point of a life long relationship. I love pearl milk tea and especially from the locale tea shop near Wens appartment in Taichung.

Zui Ji

Zui Ji - translates into drunk chicken and is eaten cold. The reason behind the strange name is, that the chicken rest in the fridge in a strong wine one whole night. read more here.

House of the family

The house of my wife's family is a typically Taiwan town house. It has 4 levels and each level is about 100 m2. The ground level is for most families the shop where they earn their money, but my wife's family's shop was located somewhere else so they use this level for common rooms like dining, living and kitchen. 

Ba Bao Fan

Ba Bao Fan - sweet rice get the colour from dried fruit, read more here.