Since at least the end of the last ice age, autumn in Penghu has meant the arrival of howling winds that for seven months scour its low, dry islands, leaving them raw and barren. Up until a few years ago these gales were considered an unmitigated scourge, but now with a growing interest in windsurfing, these winds are the motivation for a tourism festival.
The 2002 Penghu Sailboard and Cobia Tourism Festival began last week and runs through November 24. The capper will be the Adecco Penghu Pro-Am, one of five stops on the Asian Windsurfing Tour, which features the world's top competitors in the sport and runs Nov. 20 through Nov. 23, finishing on the second to last day of the festival.
PHOTO COURTESY OF PINGTUNG COUNTY GOVERNMENT
Last year, US$18,500 in total prize money was awarded at the competition, and for this year's Pro-Am the purse is expected to be bigger. Top names to appear at the competition include Frenchman Antoine Albeau, the current world number one freestyler according to the Professional Windsurfing Association (PWA), and last year's winner of the Asia tour, Australian Robbie Radis. Competitions will be held in both slalom and freestyle sailing events.
Now in its third year hosting a professional event, Penghu's reputation is growing fast as one of the windiest sailing spots in the world. According to Bump & Jump, a local equipment rental outfit that keeps daily records of wind speeds during the windsurfing season, 71 percent of days between October and mid-May have winds of 17-40 knots, 13 percent have winds of 41-55 knots or more, and only 15 percent have winds of 10 knots or below.
Penghu will be this year's first stop on the Asian pro tour. Other stops include Bintan, Indonesia, Boracay in the Philippines, the Marianas Islands, and "Monsoon Madness" in Kuantan, Malaysia.
Events related to Penghu's windsurfing and tourism festival include free outdoor concerts to be held every Saturday and Sunday from this weekend through Nov. 24. They'll take place from 7 to 9pm at Kuanyinting (
During this festival month, Penghu will also celebrate cobia, a type of fish that is harvested in the fall and that Penghu natives consider to be a special characteristic of their local seafood. Cobia commonly grow to about 15kg and are farmed in Penghu in a special inshore aquaculture area.
Visitors can visit the facility, and a government published tourism brochure describes potential visitors experiences as follows: "Here, they will not only experience the thrilling sight of thousands of cobia in a feeding frenzy but will be able to experience the ecology of clam farms as well."
For those who prefer to eat fish over watching fish eat, festival organizers will make cobia tasting available at concerts and windsurfing events. The fish is known to make a very good sashimi.
Last week Joseph Nye, the well-known China scholar, wrote on the Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s website about how war over Taiwan might be averted. He noted that years ago he was on a team that met with then-president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), “whose previous ‘unofficial’ visit to the US had caused a crisis in which China fired missiles into the sea and the US deployed carriers off the coast of Taiwan.” Yes, that’s right, mighty Chen caused that crisis all by himself. Neither the US nor the People’s Republic of China (PRC) exercised any agency. Nye then nostalgically invoked the comical specter
April 15 to April 21 Yang Kui (楊逵) was horrified as he drove past trucks, oxcarts and trolleys loaded with coffins on his way to Tuntzechiao (屯子腳), which he heard had been completely destroyed. The friend he came to check on was safe, but most residents were suffering in the town hit the hardest by the 7.1-magnitude Hsinchu-Taichung Earthquake on April 21, 1935. It remains the deadliest in Taiwan’s recorded history, claiming around 3,300 lives and injuring nearly 12,000. The disaster completely flattened roughly 18,000 houses and damaged countless more. The social activist and
Over the course of former President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) 11-day trip to China that included a meeting with Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Xi Jinping (習近平) a surprising number of people commented that the former president was now “irrelevant.” Upon reflection, it became apparent that these comments were coming from pro-Taiwan, pan-green supporters and they were expressing what they hoped was the case, rather than the reality. Ma’s ideology is so pro-China (read: deep blue) and controversial that many in his own Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) hope he retires quickly, or at least refrains from speaking on some subjects. Regardless
Approaching her mid-30s, Xiong Yidan reckons that most of her friends are on to their second or even third babies. But Xiong has more than a dozen. There is Lucky, the street dog from Bangkok who jumped into a taxi with her and never left. There is Sophie and Ben, sibling geese, who honk from morning to night. Boop and Pan, both goats, are romantically involved. Dumpling the hedgehog enjoys a belly rub from time to time. The list goes on. Xiong nurtures her brood from her 8,000 square meter farm in Chiang Dao, a mountainous district in northern Thailand’s