The ninth Taipei Military Dependents’ Village Cultural Festival is to be held from tomorrow to Feb 23 at Treasure Hill (寶藏巖) in Taipei’s Gongguan (公館) area with a focus on noodles and other food made from flour, according to the city’s Department of Cultural Affairs.
The military village, better known as juancun (眷村), is a collection of residential compounds set up to house soldiers and their families who came to Taiwan with Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) army in 1949.
While Treasure Hill does not fit the normal definition of a military dependents’ village, it housed veterans and their dependents in the early years and the area has retained the characteristics of a veterans’ establishment of the 1960s to 1980s, the department said.
Photo: CNA
It encapsulates the image of what a veterans’ dependents village looked and felt like, the department said, adding that it has also become one of Taipei’s noted tourist spots — on a par with Taipei 101 — after a report by the New York Times.
The department said the festival aims to satisfy the tastebuds of intrepid tourists and to give them an insight into the foodstuffs from the early years of Taiwan’s development.
Food available at the fair is to include noodles, fried flour twists, fried cakes that are called “twins” because of the way they are prepared in pairs, Chinese fried buns and scallion pancakes stuffed with smoked meat, it added.
People can prepare food themselves in classes at the festival, including miencha (麵茶) — a porridge-like snack made from ground white millet with a generous dash of sesame.
One Treasure Hill resident surnamed Chan (詹), who has lived in the village for 77 years, said he became tired of miencha after eating it all the time when he was little.
“I either buy some or make it myself these days,” Chan said, adding that the class brought back old memories.
Also planned for the festival are classes on how children made their own toys in the past, including using newspaper to make baseball gloves or kites and using bamboo chopsticks to make guns that shoot rubber bands, the city government said.
Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) said the village represented an indelible part of his memories because he had grown up in one.
“Taipei is a city where many different ethnicities have come together to live and find work. The veterans’ dependents villages are one of Taipei’s diverse cultures,” he said.
Hau said the public should be sure to pay a visit to Treasure Hill to get a firsthand impression of the special culture of a veterans’ dependents village.
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