Yang Chin-hua
Historians say stone weirs were first built in Penghu 700 years ago. The origins of most aren't known because they were public works; anyone in the community who could lift a rock and wanted to eat had incentive to help with construction. Because they eventually succumb to the tides, they have to be maintained.
PHOTOS: DAVID MOMPHARD, TAIPEI TIMES
But to call folks like Yang fishermen isn't entirely correct. Penghu's traditional lifestyle was equal time spent catching fish (often building a weir to catch more) and time spent coaxing crops out of infertile soil.
In farming, too, they built walls. On every island in the archipelago where crops have been cultivated, locals have stacked coral to protect their plants from the fierce winds that scour the archipelago in the winter months. Kilometers of meter-high walls crisscross the islands in a honeycomb pattern that is as pleasant to look at as it is practical.
But the stone weirs that trap fish have captured people's fancy, as well; none more than Twin Heart (
Yang's fish trap isn't the tourist trap that Twin Heart is. Mention Twin Heart, and he grimaces.
There are no young couples coming to photograph themselves in front of his fish trap -- there's no birds-eye vantage point from which to get it all in frame. And even if they could, no couple would want to be photographed in front of a fish trap called Cow's Heart (
Yang was out of luck in terms of materials to build his weir, too. Where Twin Heart sits beneath a cliff that has supplied an ample amount of basalt stones for its construction, Yang had to carry stones from the base of Turtle Mountain, a promontory of basalt rising 70m above sea level and hundreds of meters to the west. He used large pieces of coral in building it, as well, but said the heavier basalt didn't wash away as easily in the tide.
Yang started work on the project as a boy, helping his dad. A half-dozen able-bodied young locals who agreed to work for a share in the spoils joined them. The group piled stones by hand, one stone at a time, across an area the size of a football field. It took the better part of a decade.
How many fish does it catch in an average tide?
"Oh, maybe none. Not many," Yang said. "Fewer than it used to."
Though they've brought Yang his dinner all his life, the tides have slowly changed for Penghu. For the first half-century of Yang's life, his native Hsiyu was, in effect, more of an island than it is now. In the late 1970s, bridges connected it to Baisha and Matsu islands, making the three, in effect, one large island. About the same time, commercial air flights connected them to Taiwan proper. Then everyone left for paid work and a more modern lifestyle. Yang figures the folks that helped him stack his stone trap were among them.
"I haven't seen them here in a while," he said.
By global standards, the traffic congestion that afflicts Taiwan’s urban areas isn’t horrific. But nor is it something the country can be proud of. According to TomTom, a Dutch developer of location and navigation technologies, last year Taiwan was the sixth most congested country in Asia. Of the 492 towns and cities included in its rankings last year, Taipei was the 74th most congested. Taoyuan ranked 105th, while Hsinchu County (121st), Taichung (142nd), Tainan (173rd), New Taipei City (227th), Kaohsiung (241st) and Keelung (302nd) also featured on the list. Four Japanese cities have slower traffic than Taipei. (Seoul, which has some
In our discussions of tourism in Taiwan we often criticize the government’s addiction to promoting food and shopping, while ignoring Taiwan’s underdeveloped trekking and adventure travel opportunities. This discussion, however, is decidedly land-focused. When was the last time a port entered into it? Last week I encountered journalist and travel writer Cameron Dueck, who had sailed to Taiwan in 2023-24, and was full of tales. Like everyone who visits, he and his partner Fiona Ching loved our island nation and had nothing but wonderful experiences on land. But he had little positive to say about the way Taiwan has organized its
Writing of the finds at the ancient iron-working site of Shihsanhang (十 三行) in New Taipei City’s Bali District (八里), archaeologist Tsang Cheng-hwa (臧振華) of the Academia Sinica’s Institute of History and Philology observes: “One bronze bowl gilded with gold, together with copper coins and fragments of Tang and Song ceramics, were also found. These provide evidence for early contact between Taiwan aborigines and Chinese.” The Shihsanhang Web site from the Ministry of Culture says of the finds: “They were evidence that the residents of the area had a close trading relation with Chinese civilians, as the coins can be
Michael slides a sequin glove over the pop star’s tarnished legacy, shrouding Michael Jackson’s complications with a conventional biopic that, if you cover your ears, sounds great. Antoine Fuqua’s movie is sanctioned by Jackson’s estate and its producers include the estate’s executors. So it is, by its nature, a narrow, authorized perspective on Jackson. The film ends before the flood of allegations of sexual abuse of children, or Jackson’s own acknowledgment of sleeping alongside kids. Jackson and his estate have long maintained his innocence. In his only criminal trial, in 2005, Jackson was acquitted. Michael doesn’t even subtly nod to these facts.
RSS