xinzhuang temple parade 2009

last sunday was the xinzhuang temple parade, which is an annual event dedicated to the dizang nunnery (地藏庵). fortunately the parade goes through right outside my house so i don't need to go too far to watch it since it's pretty interesting. however, unfortunately they paraded through just as olivia and i were trying to take an afternoon nap. even though we have soundproof windows, the fireworks, firecrackers, music and horns were too much.

with my nap ruined and since it was just outside my house, might as well go take a look and take some photos.....


the alley to my house was packed and blocked with people and scooters. good thing we didn't have to go anywhere. would have been impossible to drive the car out.


the intersection outside my house is one of the biggest in town and the biggest in the parade route, so it was like the center stage of the event. a lot happens right here.




"people mountain, people sea". just a lot of people all over the place.






notice the driver. he's just some kid! almost ran over a couple of people in the crowd.












you know some people call taiwan "the land of million scooters". well, it definitely has some merits to it since even the gods ride them!

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love story building

on the way to hukou to have dinner with our good friends hui-chen and mj last weekend, we stopped by the love story building in dashi.....


as the name implies, the theme of this park is love. here's a couple cardboard cutouts representing "love bus".


i have no idea what these guards to do with love.


here's a temple where you can pray for eternal love with your significant other, or for a significant other if you ain't got one.




the "love boat" in the background.


a couple guys goofing around depicting the famous scene from the movie titanic.




an outdoor prop church. wonder if they do weddings?


tried to get both our heads in the cutout.


olivia going solo. yes honey, you will never have a husband and will stay with daddy forever and ever!!! muahahahaha!!!!!


the gift shop packed with people. for real tho', this place was kinda boring. there's really not much to see and way too packed for my liking. the traffic getting there wasn't great either. if you happen to be in dashi, go check it out but don't go to dashi especially to visit this place. just not worth it. another typical taiwanese tourist trap.

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tomsweeping holiday trip 2009

well, its taken a while but i was finally able to get all the posts up about our trip during the tombsweeping holiday last month.

here they are:

part 1 - "tombsweeping in hengchun".

part 2 - "taiwan national museum of marine biology & aquarium".

part 3 - "fort provintia (chih-kan lou) in tainan".

part 4 - "fort zeelandia (fort anping) in tainan".

part 5 - "puli, nantou county".

part 6 - "the puli brewery & distillery".

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the puli brewery & distillery

during our trip to puli, we visited the puli brewery & distillery.


the factory actually had to be rebuilt as it was severely destroyed during the 921 earthquake. this is part of the original factory that was damaged during the earthquake.


the puli brewery is best known as "home of shaohsing wine", which are famous for being packaged in these ceramic urns.


as you can see, shaohsing is big here and it's the main theme. even the skywalk is shaped like the shaohsing urn.


display showing all the different limited edition bottles and different types of alcohol that have been produced.


the shaohsing does also come in glass bottles, which are shown in this display.


a gift shop selling some aboriginal clothes.


a shaohsing urn tunnel.


dad goofing around.


everytime i see photos with olivia's face burnt, it makes me really sad and just makes make wanna cry.




signed by discovery channel's thirsty traveler.

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puli, nantou county

from tainan in southern taiwan, we made our way to puli, nantou county in central taiwan.....


we stayed at the moon river villa, which is a really nice b&b with hot spring spa.


a beatiful garden located at the back of the villa.


our room and bed. notice olivia sleeping. it had been a long trip up to this point.


our bath with a view.


our room came with a nice little relaxing balcony.


nice view from the room balcony.


olivia playing with the birdie on a fishing pole. yup, that's a paper birdie (kinda like a kite) tied to the end of a fishing pole. swing the pole around and the birdie flies through the air. easy and simple but actually a lot of fun for the kids.


visited the famous paper dome.

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fort zeelandia (fort anping) in tainan

continuing on with our tour of tainan during the tomb sweeping holidays, we visited fort zeelandia (fort anping).....








koxinga (zheng chenggong)






model of the original fort.


another model of the original fort and its surroundings.


a display showing the weapons used by the chinese against the dutch.




i think this wall was part of the original fort foundation.


temple outside the fort.




oyster cleaning operation on the sidewalk. we had some oysters at lunch just around the corner from here and they were really fresh.

from here, we made our way to puli in nantou.

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