你的部落格為什麼沒有中文版？

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Why isn't there a Chinese version of your blog? Why don't your write your blog in Chinese? You live in Taiwan, shouldn't your blog be in Chinese? 

你的部落格為什麼沒有中文版？你住臺灣這麼久，為什麼不寫中文呢？為什麼你不能有時用中文交流？

I get these questions from time to time, so I'm going to address them in a more formal way in both English and Chinese. 

我常常被人家問這些問題，所以今天我要來說為什麼我網站沒有中文版！

When I write a blog, I go out of my way to write factual information based off of research and a lot of translation work. Its true that I speak Chinese, but I also speak French and English. Why then do I choose to write my blog in English? Its very simple - Taiwan is somewhat misrepresented in the English language area of the internet and I hope I can make a small contribution to solving that problem! 

我寫文章的時候會花很多時間在研讀歷史和文化的部份. 我朋友都知道我的中文蠻好然後我也會講法語和英語 － 至於我為什麼用英語寫文章呢？是因為我覺得網路沒有很多網站用英語好好介紹臺灣給全世界看

My website is first and foremost about my photography, but what I attempt to do with my blog is to introduce Taiwan to people around the world who have little access to information about various tourist spots around the country as well as cultural events or anything that shows just how amazing of a country Taiwan is. 

我網站的重點是分享給大家看我攝影的作品 － 部落格的部分就是我介紹臺灣給全世界的人看; 臺灣其實已經有蠻多人用中文介紹這些地方，可是看不懂中文的人沒辦法享用這些資源，我希望我的部落格能像一個「橋」讓更多國外的人認識這個美麗的小國家。

Using my most recent blog about the Hsinchu City God Temple as an example I'm going to show why I don't think I need to have a Chinese version of my blog. Below is a screen shot of a Google search in Chinese for the temple. You may notice that Google's search algorithms turn up 607,000 results in less than a second. This shouldn't be a huge surprise - The City God temple in Hsinchu is one of the country's most important temples and Taiwanese people have written extensively about the temple. 

如果我們來用我最近PO的「新竹城隍廟」我要給你看我為什麼不覺得我需要寫中文版 - 下面有Google的螢幕截圖，如果我去Google寫「新竹城隍廟」Google會很快給我60多萬項的結果 － 新竹城隍廟是一個非常重要的廟，臺灣已經有很多人寫了這個地方。

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On the other hand, when you search for the temple using English you'll find that it only turns up with 10,700 results. Most of these results turn up travel sites that offer a paragraph of information about the temple and don't go into too much detail. This is the reason I spend so much time researching and doing translation work to provide as much detail as I can when I introduce places in Taiwan. 

如果我用英文找「Hsinchu City God Temple」你會看的很清楚差別在哪裡，因為英文只出了1萬多個結果，這些網站都是旅客用的網站然後內容資訊沒有那麼多。

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It takes a lot of time and effort to write a blog - I understand that I'm living in Taiwan and that I've been here for a long time. While I most certainly have the ability to provide a Mandarin version, I do have time constraints and its not really a possibility for me to keep up with the amount of work I have to do. 

剛開始寫文章的時候完全不知道會需要花多少時間寫完，一年後才知道寫部落格沒有這麼簡單。我有中文的能力，也有很多朋友可以幫我看文法，可是最重要的是「時間」我沒有這麼多時間。

When I spend a lot of time writing a blog, I spend less time being a photographer and that is my primary focus. Whenever I have free time travelling between wherever I'm shooting, whether I'm on a train or a bus or having a coffee break, my iPad is out and I'm writing - I never expected that it would take so much time but I feel it is a bit of a responsibility to represent Taiwan, a country I love in the best possible light - I don't think its my responsibility to help Taiwanese people better understand their own country - and I would never think I have the ability to actually do that. Taiwan belongs to the Taiwanese people - I'm just a big fan that has lived here for a while. 

如果我花太多時間寫文章然後把它翻成中文，我攝影的時間會更少 － 攝影是我的重點，寫部落格只是一個嗜好。我每次出門會帶著我的iPad有空的時候就可以寫一寫 ～ 我覺得臺灣人已經夠瞭解他們的國家，他們不需要我出來教他們什麼～我的責任是讓國外的人知道台灣為什麼這麼棒。

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Baling Bridge (巴陵橋) 

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Baling Bridge (巴陵橋) 

I know I have lots of Taiwanese friends who like my blog and I wish I had the time to write in Mandarin for them so that they could enjoy what I write as well as my photos, but I’m just one person. I’m not a huge company and I really don’t have enough time to write in more than one language.

For that I’m sorry - But this is an English blog and I hope I can help more people around the world know about Taiwan.

我知道有很多臺灣朋友會來看我PO的照片，我也希望我可以給他們一個中文版，可是我只是一個人，不是一個公司，沒時間寫英文版，法文版，中文版 － 這邊我跟你們說聲道歉，我知道我住臺灣，我應該要寫中文版，我希望我以後有辦法可以做到，現在只能說這個部落格只有英文版，拍謝。

Hsinchu City God Temple (新竹城隍廟)

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When I write these blogs, I generally take an academic approach to them and I always do my best to present factual information (usually translated from Chinese) to give the best representation of the places I'm shooting. I use all of that info as well as my personal experience and opinions to paint a picture of whatever I'm introducing which means that apart from taking photos, I do several hours of research before writing a blog

My site recently celebrated its one year anniversary (no celebration was had) and after reflecting over the blogging experience over the past year I found that it has taught me a lot about Taiwan and I have learned things that I probably never would have thought to look a bit deeper into. The temple I'm introducing today is a perfect example of how I've been a place dozens of times and never actually ‘fully’ realized what was going on inside. I'm quite happy to say that even after ten years of living here that I still have a lot to learn and through this blog and what I present to people, that I'll always be learning something and I suppose that is one of the most rewarding things about blogging.

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The temple I'm introducing today is the Hsinchu City God temple (新竹城隍廟) which is regarded as the most important ‘City God’ temple in Taiwan and the “provincial” (Oh how I hate that word) headquarters of all the City God temples in the COUNTRY (I like this word better) meaning that all of the other City God temples more or less need to pay homage or at least respect to the Hsinchu temple.

The Hsinchu temple isn't the oldest City God temple, nor is it the biggest, so why then is the so-called headquarters of all the City God temples in Taiwan? Well for that answer we have to look at the history of Taiwan and governance over the island. Hsinchu has always been an important place in Taiwan and has a history of over 400 years of development. When the temple was constructed back in 1747 during the Qing Dynasty the city was an important centre for political activity and therefore the Qing (who controlled a small part of the island at the time) designated the temple as the City God HQ for the island. Currently there are over 95 City God temples in Taiwan with the temple in Hsinchu, the temple in Taipei’s historic Dadaocheng (大稻埕) district and the Tainan temple (the first city God temple in Taiwan) being the most important.

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The City God Shrine

The City God, or Cheng Huang Ye (城隍爺) is an interesting figure in Taoism and is an important gods in the hierarchy of deities within the religion. His importance seems to me to be very Confucian in nature and is quite representative of ancient Chinese ideas of political ideology and methods of urban development. In the past, cities in China were walled and there were generally four different gates to enter the city with guards stationed at each gate for protection - These ancient gates are actually still visible in many cities throughout Taiwan and China and the gate in Hsinchu near the temple is pretty cool itself.

The function of the City God was to act as a supernatural magistrate of sorts that would make decisions about the city (along side human colleagues), keep it safe and make decisions regarding the final judgement of citizens who lived within the borders of the city. Currently there are over 95 of these temples in Taiwan and each one “presides” over a administrative region of the country. A few centuries ago, these temples would have been off limits to the public and would only be available to local magistrates and people of power. Today however things are quite different and people visit regularly to pray and make offerings to Cheng Huang Ye for keeping them healthy and safe.

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Today the temple has several shrines and inside you will find some set up to Taoist deities and important Buddhist figures. There is a shrine to the laughing Buddha (yes, the fat one), Guanyin, the Buddha of Compassion and interestingly enough, the wife of Cheng Huang Ye (城隍夫人) who is considered something of a Taoist version of Cupid. The shrine set up for Mrs. City God is quite important for people looking for romance, people looking for a supernatural way to spice things up and blessings for their marriage. If you visit the temple you’ll often see pictures of recent married couples who have visited the temple looking for her blessing.

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The temple is extremely important to Hsinchu and is one of the city's main attractions. It is also one of the older temples in Taiwan and the wear and tear of time and hundreds of years of burning incense is certainly noticeable on the walls throughout the complex. It's not as shiny and elaborate as most Taoist temples in Taiwan and you might notice from most of my shots that it is really dark inside. (For photographers: Most of my shots are really high ISO and have a slow shutter speed to suck up any available light.)

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There is a traditional wet market next to the temple that is open in the mornings and afternoon and a night market surrounding it. Within the temple complex there is a strange cafeteria-like set up offering all of Hsinchu’s finest foods making the temple a one-stop shop for all things “Hsinchu”, something you don't often see with the majority of the temples in Taiwan – especially since most temples only provide vegetarian meals. If you visit the temple, I highly recommend you stop at any of the restaurants offering Hsinchu’s fried rice noodles (炒米粉), Pork ball soup (貢丸湯), Taiwanese meatballs (肉圓) and braised pork rice (滷肉飯) or crossing the street for some amazing duck noodles or rice (鴨香麵/飯) if you see a line of people waiting for something that is probably a pretty good indication that something is good at that restaurant.

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Now that I've educated myself about the City God and his temple, I'm quite interested to take part in this years City God festival which will fall on November 29th on the Lunar Calendar. My plan is to follow up with a part two to this blog offering a bit more information about the temple and the cool festival that will be happening outside. I have a hard time keeping track of dates on the Lunar Calendar, so basically I have to remember to check in the new year to figure out when I should be back in Hsinchu to check it out – until then enjoy these shots and I hope you learned almost as much as I did!

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Gallery / Flickr (High Res Shots)

Silver Grass (芒花)

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Growing up in Canada, it was always really easy to tell when Autumn rolled around - Autumn meant that school had started, Thanksgiving was coming and Halloween was around the corner. Before I arrived in Taiwan I had never actually realized how popular Canada was as not only a travel destination, but a brand name as well. I had wrongly assumed that when people thought about my country that they would probably be scared away by our harsh winters - Surprisingly though, people always ask about the beautiful Autumn colours and how our iconic maple leaves all turn red before falling to the ground in winter.

Taiwanese people have a great respect for nature and people of all ages and walks of life enjoy the many different blooming seasons of Taiwan’s various kinds of flora (and fauna?) and just like in Canada, a sure fire way to know that Autumn has rolled around is to see the beautiful beige silver grass growing on the mountains, hills and along the side of the roads.

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As I've mentioned before in posts about water lilies, tiger lilies, cherry blossoms, etc. Taiwan has a multitude of flowering species and throughout the year you will find different species growing throughout the country. To help me out a bit I purchased a (Chinese-language) book a few years back that introduces all the species of flowers blooming in Taiwan, when they bloom and where the best spots to view them are. The book has been an amazing tool during my travels because it has let me know when and where to go check something out when I'm planning my weekly or monthly schedules.

Silver grass or Miscanthus Sinensis is a species of flowering plant that is endemic to East Asia growing in Taiwan, Korea, Japan and China. In both Taiwan and Japan, the plant is widely respected and during the Autumn months (October - December) people will flock to see it covering the mountains and hillsides. Coincidentally in North America attitudes toward the plant are exactly the opposite and it is considered an invasive species and is usually destroyed. It's interesting that the so-called “weed” is reviled in one area and highly respected in another.

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During the months of October to December you can pretty much see wild silver grass growing anywhere throughout the country. If you want to see a lot though, or you want to get some photos in a field full of it - you're going to have to do a bit of a hike as it grows more commonly on mountain tops. The most popular places to see silver grass in the north is along the historic Caoling Trail (草嶺古道) between New Taipei City and Yilan County as well as on Taipei city’s beautiful Yang Ming Mountain (陽明山)

I decided to do a bit of research in my handy book as to where would have the most silver grass and I found out that the western peak of Da Tun Mountain (大屯山西峰) was likely to have the most, but also an excellent view of Taipei city as well as Danshui and Bali. I figured it would be a perfect location to get shots of Taiwan’s Autumn flower and some landscape shots as well.

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When I got to the top of the western peak I wasn't disappointed in the slightest as the view of the city was spectacular and there was more than enough of Taiwan’s Autumn flower to get some really nice shots. I'm quite pleased with what I got, but I'm going to have to go back to Datun mountain again in the next little while to finish the rest of the peaks so I can post about that too!

There isn't much information online in English about silver grass, but take my word for it, it's pretty cool to see Taiwan’s typically green mountain tops changing colours during Autumn and if you are in Taipei, just look towards Yang Ming mountain from any vantage point between now and December and you'll notice that it doesn't look like it usually does!

You've still got some time left for this years crop of silver grass. If you haven't seen it yet, a nice hike might be a good idea for a day trip on the weekend!

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I see the coast! 

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Gallery / Flickr (High Res Shots)