Exploring Hsinchu part 2

Sunset as seen from the backstreet of the Boai campus

I like Hsinchu. It doesn't have the hectic buzz of a capital but it's still large enough to amaze you with surprising discoveries and intriguing quirks. For instance, part of our (me & my lovely neighbour) Thursday night ritual nowadays is going to the same night market near the train station, basically to walk around the same stalls & booths, buy dinner and take the dessert with us to the nearby park. Although this might seem very plain and uneventful it's actually fairly entertaining, because in the park there are these flickering lights and a random variety of classical music playing. It's fantastic. And after a while we move on across the park to courtyard type of place to observe a group of people have their tai chi practice. Also fantastic.

Poker at the night market

The "stocking guy", sells stockings at the night market. Part of his sales technique is to wear the stockings. A definite must-buy before leaving this wondrous land!

Glass art and flickering lights. Frankly it looks like a landing space ship, but who cares! They play classical music in the park so all is well in the world.

Tai chi practice. It's mesmerizing to watch. Hopefully they don't consider us too creepy for just sitting and staring at them...

One Sunday we we're having dinner in the city center and on our way back we noticed a breakdance event going on in literally the centre of the city. And I mean literally. Upon closer investigation we realised it was a competition of sorts and they were dancing in the roundabout that's build around the East gate. There was an actual stage and a stand for the audience, but most importantly on the underground tunnels there were mirrors and everything for the dance rehearsals! Again, fantastic. So, we stayed for the end to witness some amazing breakdance and yes the first prize went to the right person & group! ;)

DJ, spin that record!

A musician playing nearby the city centre on a random Tuesday. 

Now, Hsinchu is located in the west coast, which means that the ocean is pretty close. So one day we decided to go explore the harbour. There's a bike trail that goes along the coast for 17km (one way). Frankly we were a bit late because it was already 3pm, however, we rented crappy crappy bikes and off we went. It was fun. A "little' night time cycling for 35km, because why not! :) I've yet to find a beach though. I've heard rumours about it, silent remarks whispered in the wee hours of the day...

Part of the biking trail. The more beautiful part... ;)

The endpoint of the biking trail.

That's all for now. Let's see if I can get the other three thousand ideas on paper one day, someday soon...

Time flies when you're having fun!

Gosh, it's been over a month since my last post. Shameful! I mean really! I'm so sorry. I promise to do better for the remainder of my stay.

So, what's been going on during this time of complete radio silence? The first thing that comes to mind is "nothing much"?? Really?!!!? Seriously?!! That's just wrong. Hence, I decided to go through my pictures and oh! how the memories start to come back all of a sudden! :)
My OCD initially had me posting topics in a specific order but now it seems that ship has sailed and it's time to just roll with the flow and embrace the mentality of post before you forget! ;) Also, I figured with gorgeous pictures you might forget about the long silence. Therefore, let's go explore Xiao Wulai now!

The uni organised a day trip to the Xiao Wulai waterfall and sky footpath one weekend. The trip was dirt cheap with only 300 NT$ (8e) that covered buses, breakfast, lunch and the entrance to the park. Not bad. Upon arrival we were led to the park entrance, which was the sky footpath on top of a waterfall. No big deal. Let's think about that for a while with the help of the following pics.

After the first (yes, I said first) waterfall was seen and pics were taken and so on and so on, we moved on into the jungle! Okay, there were actual paths that made us sweat like crazy but took us to a variety of intriguing scenic spots. These included yet another spectacular waterfall, a slightly smaller but still fantastic waterfall and a river where you could cool off for a while. Not to mention the amazing scenes of the mountains and the buildings amongst them that feel completely out of place. Oh! I shouldn't forget the suspension bridge! That was so effing cool too! :) :)

That was basically it. Afterwards we went to a couple of different villages for lunch and shopping at the (night?) market, but the main "specularities" were in the jungle. Overall, it was an awesome day.

As a side note: now, what you should know about Taiwan is that it is basically only mountains and mountain trails with "water features" randomly sprouting up from nowhere. Perhaps this was somewhat crudely put, but you'll get the general idea. I hope... Hence, be prepared to see some fantastic pics in the future as well. ;) (Don't even get me started on the trip to the Taroko national park!)
Stay tuned for more awesomeness to come soon...

Going back to school

I feel I should inform you guys about the actual educational part, as well. The registration for courses happens online of course. For reasons unknown the uni closed the registration right when we arrived, only to open it up again the next week. The registration was possible for two weeks and during that time you actually went to the lessons you were planning on taking because the courses might be full, so you were basically trying to get in by showing up. And sometimes pleading to the teacher quite heavily... Some of the people here had quite the workout when they were trying to catch a particular professor so that they could request a signature for a participation form.  

In my case, only the Chinese courses were full. I signed up for two: Introductory Chinese I & Introductory Chinese conversation I. These should be for students who have never studied Chinese and the other teacher actually kicked out all the students who knew even some Chinese. This was a good thing, since there were more room for us zero level students. And trust me the Chinese courses are popular so you really need to fight for your seat!

Dummy studying hard or hardly...?

So when comparing the language courses to my biology courses from the Institute of Molecular Medicine and Biotechnology the difference is like night and day. The courses that I chose have less than 10 people in them so we're fighting only for the seat farthest from the air-con, since it's usually freezing in the class rooms! I've 3 biology courses and I've been attending to each of them now more than once, but I've yet to figure out what exactly we'll be doing in them... It could be because of the fairly strong Chinese accents that the professors have. However, am happy that the teaching is actually in English, because I heard horror stories of supposedly English courses where the slides were in English but the actual teaching in Chinese and then you'd still have to participate in the three-hour long lecture! Must be an urban legend created just for the international students...

So far I can't say I've really started studying properly yet. Mostly my initial feeling is that the Chinese courses will be the most laboursome courses, or at least if you're serious about learning Chinese. The biology courses don't have any exams but some sort of reports and presentation(s), so I fear that most of the work will be done right before deadlines... Overall, it's the same here as it is everywhere: it really depends on the department/ institute you're studying in and the courses you want to take. Some courses just are better than others, and the same goes for the teachers. Luckily you can adjust to basically anything, it all depends on your attitude and how much work you're willing to put in your education. Luckily, everyone here seems quite happy with their courses and teachers.

Moreover, at times it feels like we're back in school. Especially in the Chinese lessons (I can't call them lectures). We're repeating phonemes after the teacher and usually before letting us leave the teacher asks each of us to perform a specific task and you can't leave until the teacher is happy with your pronunciation. Oh, and also, in the Kuang fu campus there's a bell that marks the beginning and end of a class! It is absolutely fantastic! Feels like I'm back in primary school! :') I'm quite thrilled that I don't live in that campus so I only have to hear it a couple of times, when I'm actually in class.

The bell tower at Kuang fu campus

Exploring Hsinchu - Guqifeng

It's a sunny Sunday. Very warm again. I see a billboard showing +34'C and there's absolutely no clouds anywhere to be seen. So overall, an excellent day for exploring the windy city. Today I'm heading to the Guqi mountain and Pu Tian temple, more casually known as Guqifeng. I've read about the place in my Lonely Planet travel guide and of course Google is a trustworthy friend of a traveller. As the place is located only 3-4 km away from our campus I decided weeks ago to find it. The first try a few weeks back didn't go quite as planned when it turned out that my map reading abilities were leading us to the opposite direction. Hence, I've been improving my Google Maps skills and today I felt confident enough to give it a second try. And boy was it worth the trip!
I walked in the scorching heat up the twisting and turning  road, almost losing faith of ever actually finding the place when I suddenly saw the huge Guanggong statue on top of the temple. I had found it! Finally! Excitement rising I paced quickly inside the gates to marvel the temple with its enormous statue of a famous Chinese general giving me the thumbs up for my efforts.

So what exactly is special about this place? Other than the above mentioned 20 m statue? Let me try to explain. The temple holds a museum of sorts (I think you could call it that) of various pieces of art, mainly statues. Apparently collected by the original founder of the temple over a 20-year period. There are some curiosities inside including various large jade-made pieces, cities made of wood and stuffed animals, of course. However, the main attractions are outside on the surrounding grounds. Unfortunately the place is clearly in need of restoration. Nature has overpowered large sections of the area destroying some of the pieces of art. Still, you can't miss the overwhelming feeling of out-of-placement once you dwell into the outside exhibition. The sheer number of statues is mind-boggling. Yet, fairly soon you'll notice something even more curious: the randomness of the displayed statues. They vary from traditional Buddhist and Chinese to more western-like. Which raises the ultimate question of why? Why these statues here in the middle of Taiwanese nowhere? I guess why not, is the only explanation we'll get. Frankly, I don't think anything I write can quite explain this magical place so I'll let the pictures try to convey the utter uniqueness of the place. Enjoy!

 

 

One of the wooden cities

Terracotta soldiers

 

Of course you need the bust of Beethoven

 

 From Egyptians to the Statue of Liberty

Monkeys with dogs tied to the water post...?

Closed off section, clearly it has seen better days

 

I hope the next mudslide won't take this guy with it

 

Dinosaur "skeletons", because why not?