Every day before she starts her shift at a government hospital in Singapore, Farah removes her hijab — the Islamic veil she has worn since a teenager. Although minority Muslim women can freely wear the hijab in most settings in Singapore, some professions bar the headscarf — and a recent case has triggered fresh debate on diversity and discrimination in the workplace. Now Farah has joined a growing number of Muslims — who account for about 15 percent of Singapore’s 4 million resident population — calling for the ban to end, with an online petition gathering more than 50,000 signatures. “They told me I can’t work here if I wear the tudung,” said Farah, using the local Malay term for hijab, as she recounts her job interview two years ago for a physiotherapist position. “I felt a sense of helplessness, it’s unfair. Why has the tudung become a barrier for us to look for jobs?” asked the 27-year-old, who used a pseudonym for fear of reprisals at work. She accepted the job eventually but has to remove her headscarf whenever she is at work. Farah’s case is not an oddity. There was outcry last month when a woman was asked to remove her hijab to work as a promoter at a local department store. Halimah Yacob, the country’s first female president who herself wears the hijab, said there is “no place” for discrimination when asked her view of the case. The store reversed its policy, but many took to social media pointing out restrictions remain on wearing the hijab for some civil servants, including policewomen and nurses. LIVELIHOOD The debate surrounding the hijab is not new in Singapore, a modern city-state which takes pride in its multicultural and multiracial background. The country is predominantly ethnic Chinese, many of whom follow Buddhism or Christianity. In 2013, then Muslim affairs minister Yaacob Ibrahim said
The men in the audience clapped and the women ululated as the band finished singing: it would have been commonplace except the venue was in Iran and the group on stage were all women. The catchy rhythmic music they played that balmy night is known as bandari. Its lyrics are from ancient folkloric songs, passed down the generations and familiar to many at the concert in an amphitheater in the southern port of Bandar Abbas. Only this time, it was being performed by women in front of a mixed crowd. “It feels as if you have been seen at last” by “a new part of society,” said band member Noushin Yousefzadeh, who plays the oud, the Middle Eastern lute. “All that training has paid off at last.” Dressed in traditional clothing, the band was taking part in a state-organized festival to showcase “Persian Gulf music” and, as well as singing, also played their instruments. Before long, the audience was ecstatically singing along with the four-piece band. Such public expressions of joy are usually frowned upon by officials in Iran, which has been under strict Islamic rule for more than 40 years. Formed in late 2016 after a conversation at the beach between two of the women, the band is called Dingo, which in the local dialect refers to the first wobbly steps taken by infants. The show — staged last year — was only the second time they had performed in front of a mixed audience. The first occasion was at the Shiraz Oud Festival in July 2018. “These festivals are a great opportunity because in normal circumstances we cannot sing in front of men,” said drummer Faezeh Mohseni. MANY RESTRICTIONS When performing for all-female audiences, Mohseni sings solo. But, informed only a few days before the festival that they had been selected and would be singing to both men and women, the
Sept. 21 to Sept. 27 If word got out that you were planning a wedding during the Martial Law era, the “Committee for the improvement of Folk Customs” (改善民俗實踐會) might knock on your door. Each borough in Taipei had at least one “agent” who kept a pulse on community happenings. They would visit the family planning the wedding with a letter from the mayor, touting the benefits of being frugal and not wasting money on lavish ceremonies, even encouraging the families to donate money for scholarships. The authorities also discouraged them from hiring musicians and dancers, who were often loud and caused conflict with neighbors. Those who donated the amount for scholarships received a certificate from the government. Big-money donors were personally commended by the mayor. The city’s district offices competed in donations received, and by 1984, nearly 6,000 students had benefited from the scholarships. Although the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) had been preaching austerity since it took over Taiwan in 1945, old habits die hard, especially those tied to social status. On Sept. 24, 1979, the Taipei City Government updated its existing guidelines on weddings, funerals and rituals for other celebratory events such as childbirth. Regarding weddings, the city discouraged exchanging bride prices and dowries and even gifts and wedding pastries; suggested that people join mass weddings or registrations instead of holding their own; and if they insisted on holding a wedding ceremony, they should only invite family and close friends, and refrain from throwing banquets and putting on “improper entertainment.” Former Yunlin County Civil Affairs Department director Chen Jen-kuei (陳壬癸) wrote in an 1984 government pamphlet that although Taiwan’s economic miracle had greatly improved the material lives of its people, their spiritual life lagged significantly behind. “[W]eddings, funerals and other celebratory events ... are rife with unnecessary extravagance and meaningless wastefulness,
Let’s get one thing straight: I have never liked the name Ironman. Maybe it sounded good in 1970s Hawaii when endorphin-fueled athletes with military backgrounds argued who were fitter, swimmers or runners. Or perhaps cyclists, someone else had chimed in. There was only one way to settle it: They would combine the 2.4 mile (3.9km) Waikiki Roughwater Swim with 112 miles (180km) of the Around-Oahu Bike Race and the 26.2 mile (42.2km) Honolulu Marathon into a single one-day event. Whoever won would be known as the Iron Man. That I don’t like the name doesn’t stop me from participating, however. Nor from attempting to qualify for the Ironman World Championships held annually in Hawaii since 1977. Unfortunately both this and Taiwan’s qualifying event for this year were canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic, but the 70.3 mile (113km) Half Ironman event would go ahead on Sunday. All I had to do was win my age category and I could attend the 70.3 world championship in Utah in 12 months’ time. SEPT. 2 It’s probably about time I start tapering, so I message Canadian Darren Cole. He’s been to the Hawaii worlds three times, so should have some useful advice. “Sleep, nutrition and stress management,” he lists as the fundamentals of pre-race preparation. “Last-minute training is self-defeating,” he says, recommending short, easy activities. My problem is weight, which can go up by a couple of kilograms when tapering for an event, so I will compromise and ride around 50km per day, but without many hills. SEPT. 7 I haven’t competed in any kind of triathlon for about 6 years, so am glad to find my wetsuit isn’t moth-eaten. I take it to Bitan and swim among the swan-headed pedalos. On the way home I ask a bike shop mechanic to swap my alloy wheels for the 600g-lighter carbon wheelset. This
For tourists visiting Hualien, Taroko National Park (太魯閣國家公園) is the first order of business. But if you find yourself in the city with half a day to spare — your train back to Taipei will leave mid-afternoon, say — it’s hardly worth busing out to Taroko Gorge. Instead, borrow or rent a bicycle or a scooter, or hail a cab, and set out for one of these attractions. At only one of these places is there an admission charge. CISINGTAN SCENIC AREA A literal translation of Cisingtan (七星潭) would be “Seven Stars Pond,” but there’s no pond here, just the vast Pacific Ocean. Back in the 19th century, this toponym was applied to a different place, one with a small lake several hundred meters inland of the current Cisingtan. In 1936, when the Japanese then ruling Taiwan established the military airfield which evolved into today’s Hualien Airport, the residents of old Cisingtan were forced to move, and the pond was filled in. The displaced families settled next to the sea. They carried the place name, as well as their belongings, to the new neighborhood. The beach here isn’t safe for swimming, but in good weather, Cisingtan Scenic Area (七星潭海岸風景特定區) offers top-notch views of huge mountains abutting the ocean. If you’d like to explore the area by bicycle, there’s a rental business at 76, Alley 1, Lane 10, Mingtan Street (新城鄉明潭街10巷1弄76號). It’s open 7am to 6pm every day. SHENGAN TEMPLE Few temples can date their founding as precisely as this richly decorated hall of worship. Shengan Temple (勝安宮) traces its history to six o’clock on the morning of the 13th day of the sixth lunar month in 1949. At that moment, following an all-night seance led by a widow who hoped to learn how her recently-deceased husband was faring in the afterworld, the Queen
For the first time in 19 years, there won’t be an Urban Nomad Film Festival due to COVID-19. But the event’s signature genre-bending Freakout Music Festival is still on — although arriving almost six months late — this time packed into a one-day, 15-hour multi-stage music marathon at the usual spot in Tiger Mountain. (Full disclosure: this reporter is playing in the festival with the band All My Boyfriendz.) Organizer David Frazier debated what to do in these dark times, despite Taiwan being relatively safe and one of the few places in the world where events can still go on as usual. Ultimately, the crew decided that they were going to fight for the right to party. “The Taiwanese government has it figured out, and as long as we obey the rules, people will generally be happier and healthier if they have their fun and social outlets,” he says. With 15 booked “god-almighty amazing” foreign acts out of over 40 performers, the festival was originally set to be the most international edition ever — but now it’s a completely local affair that aims to be “as fun as possible,” Frazier says. What sets the event apart from other festivals is the diversity and expected weirdness of the acts: one just has to be curious what “experimental electro-clown music” sounds like. Frazier calls the main stage the “happy” stage, with five out of six bands featuring horn sections. High-octane bands like Skaraoke and Higher Rootz are sure to get the crowd moving frenetically. The temple stage will feature a rocking mix of punk, shoegaze, urban folk, surf rock and prog rock until 10pm, when hip-hop, soul and funk acts take over and keep the party going until the wee hours. At the jungle stage, DJs such as Vicar and Yo Hey Li will be
The remake of Mulan struck all the right chords to be a hit in the key Chinese market. Disney cast beloved actor Liu Yifei (劉亦菲) as Mulan and removed a dragon sidekick popular in the animated original to cater to Chinese tastes. Still, the movie drew decidedly mixed reviews after its coronavirus-delayed release in China last week, with thousands panning it online. The movie was rated 4.9 out of 10 by more than 165,000 people on Douban, a leading Web site for film, book and music ratings. Negative comments and jokes about the film outnumbered positive reactions on social media. Mulan has earned an estimated US$23.2 million since its opening last week, according to ticketing platform Maoyan. It scored a higher 7.5 out of 10 on Maoyan, but also with mixed reviews. “Poor artistic level, misunderstanding of Chinese culture lead to the film’s failure in China,” the state-run Global Times newspaper tweeted. Chinese critics, both at home and abroad, said they were disappointed with the film’s inaccurate and stereotypical portrayals of Chinese history and the main character, infused with nationalist tropes. Others were not as bothered. “It’s fine that different screenwriters make up different stories,” Zhang Qin, a military veteran, said after watching the film in Beijing last week. “They can play with imagination and it’s a good thing.” IT engineer Zhang Fan also had positive things to say about the film. “What touched me is the humanity,” he said. The remake of Disney’s popular 1998 animation is based on the ancient tale of Hua Mulan (花木蘭), a young woman who takes her father’s place in the army by dressing as a man. The original tale, The Ballad of Mulan, has gone through multiple renditions. Themes such as filial piety and being loyal to the central government have remained as core tenets, which some find outdated
Chen Zhiwu (陳志武) says that the COVID-19 crisis puts into sharp focus that we are in a new cold war, with China and the US being the two protagonists. “It’s almost literally in front of us,” says Chen, Director of Asia Global Institute and Chair Professor of Finance at the University of Hong Kong. Political observers were hesitant, Chen says, even up to the beginning of this year, to confirm a new cold war was underway. “But ... the coronavirus has made clear the clash in values and way of life between what China would like to pursue, and what the US and other developed countries would like to pursue. That clash is clearly made evident by the coronavirus crisis,” he says. “I think this clash will go on for a while.” Chen made these remarks early this month as part of Socio-economic Shock of COVID-19: China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, a forum co-organized by the Lung Yingtai Cultural Foundation (龍應台文化基金會) and European Forum Alpbach. The forum was also attended by professor of economics at National Chengchi University and former Deputy Minister of the Taiwan Mainland Affairs Council Lin Chu-chia (林祖嘉) and moderated by Wu Yu-shan (吳玉山), distinguished Research Fellow, Institute of Political Science, Academia Sinica. COLLABORATION OR CONFLICT? The tensions exacerbated by the coronavirus also means collaboration between China and the US on a vaccine for COVID-19 and other public health measures seems unlikely. Chen compares the current crisis to the 2008 financial crash, when the US led efforts to stabilize the global economy. He says that because the financial crisis began in the US, it was not “in a position to make a big deal about it, to blame other countries,” as it has been with the coronavirus. Additionally, as incumbent US President Donald Trump continues to slide in the
I had really hoped that this film would be a Taiwanese answer to the American camp classic Snakes on a Plane, but Spiders on a Ship — er, Abyssal Spider (海霧) — takes itself way too seriously. One major gripe about Taiwanese commercial features is that they are prone to being unnecessarily over the top, but that’s the one element that could have made Abyssal more watchable. The lack of camp is especially disappointing since director Joe Chien (錢人豪) first made his mark with the intentionally trashy horror movie Zombie 108 (棄城Z-108). Released in 2012, it is considered Taiwan’s earliest zombie flick. Chien has since moved away from that style, helming in 2018 The House That Never Dies: Reawakening (京城81號2), the follow-up to China’s most successful mainstream horror production. Featuring violent scheming factions on a creepy fishing ship that is stuck in radioactive waters infested with giant crab-spiders (and a beautiful woman who appears out of nowhere), Abyssal Spider has the right elements for a so-bad-it’s-good B-movie bonanza. But Chien crams too many themes and storylines into a claustrophobic vessel, when perhaps all that’s needed is more blood and zaniness. Objectively speaking, the film is a decent effort at a monster-disaster thriller, slickly produced with a star-studded cast that seems to be chosen just for their names, as there is little chemistry and uneven acting. Those raised on a steady diet of Hollywood productions of the same ilk will find it quite derivative. There are glimpses of promise for sure, especially with the special effects, cinematography and set design. But there isn’t a solid plot to match the technical competence. The main storyline revolves around A-jie (Sunny Wang 王陽明), who has become depressed after his impulsiveness led to the death of his marine rescue squad captain, while his wife dies in labor
To mark what would have been acclaimed Shanghai-born novelist Eileen Chang’s (張愛玲) 100th birthday at the end of this month, Taipei Dance Forum (舞蹈空間) director Ping Heng (平珩) decided to revive one of the company’s 25th anniversary works from 2014, Red and White (紅與白), but give it a more personal feel. While the original production, created by choreographer Cheng Yi-wen (鄭伊雯) and theater director Liu Shou-yao (劉守曜), was performed at the Taipei City Shuiyuan (Wellspring) Theater, the company will be performing this weekend at its much smaller space at the Crown Cultural Center. The updated production seats audiences much closer to the dancers, hence the new title, Red and White, zoom-in (紅與白zoom-in版). Red and White used Chang’s 1944 novella The Red Rose and the White Rose (紅玫瑰與白玫瑰) for inspiration. Set in Shanghai in the 1930s, it is the story of a young man who returns to China after studying in England and has an affair with the wife of a friend. However, when the woman suggests she get a divorce so that they can wed, he ends the affair — and later marries a woman with a “virtuous” reputation. Cheng used tango to help convey the passion of the lovers, and the torments. As Ping said at a press preview yesterday afternoon, tango is very romantic, it comes from the heart. Cheng yesterday said some of the changes she made for the new production reflect the differences in her own life from six years ago. “The first time, I saw so many scenes straight out of the book … the images were already very clear,” she said. “But for my piece [for the company] last year I included talking, so I decided to include it again this production.” “Allowing performers to talk makes a performance more whole, it’s not just about dance,” she said. Being married has
Inaka apparently means “countryside” or maybe “out in the sticks” in Japanese, and this is a collection of 18 essays on the experience of living there. Rural Japan has had a bad press, not least from longtime Japanese resident Alex Kerr who in Lost Japan describes a country where many of the rivers have concrete beds and are frequently dammed. But it isn’t all like that, and the articles in this book by and large tell a different story. It’s so attractive, for instance, to this book’s editor, Camphor Press’s John Ross, that he writes that he’d like to move there from his present home in central Taiwan to take advantage, among other things, of the four distinct seasons. Inaka: Portraits of Life in Rural Japan is arranged from south to north, so it begins with the experiences of a former teacher in some of the remoter islands of Okinawa, notably Tanegashima, where she had to take a boat from one school to another. She was there at the time of the tsunami in 2011, though its force was considerably lessened by the time it reached her. One of the most impressive chapters is by Stephen Mansfield, a potter who describes in extraordinary detail the ways local potters vary the surface of their creations using the natural minerals and the like in the local clays. His prose is superb, and his vocabulary exceptional. CALL OF RELIGION The call of religion is what brings some of the writers to Japan, notably Brian Buke-Gaffney who spent nine years in Zen monasteries after following the “dharma bum” hippie road overland to India and then, being disappointed with what he found there, onwards east to Japan. Another modern devotee follows the Shikoku Pilgrimage, agonizing for cans of cold Pocari Sweat as he struggles upwards through astonishingly high temperatures, only to find
To bring sustainability and prosperity to their farms, some agriculturalists in southern Taiwan have embraced innovative types of companion planting. In contrast to the monoculture that dominates much of the rich world’s farmland, companion planting is the cultivation of different crops in proximity, usually to optimize the space, for pest control or to enhance pollination. The symbiotic relationship between cacao trees and betel nut, which may be unique to Pingtung County, is striking when one visits the cacao plantations maintained by Choose Chius (邱氏可可) and Wugawan (牛角灣) in Neipu (內埔). The history of growing cacao in Taiwan goes back to Japanese colonial rule. Taichiro Morinaga, founder of Morinaga & Co — the first modern candy company in Japan, and the first manufacturer of chocolate in that country — visited Taiwan in 1927 to find land suitable for growing cacao. He hoped the company could become self-sufficient in cocoa in order to meet the high demand for chocolate in Japan. His successor, Matsuji Ogushi, continued the cacao mission in 1937, setting up a cacao-focused research institute in Pingtung County. However, challenging conditions and the outbreak of World War II dashed Morinaga’s and Ogushi’s Taiwan chocolate dreams. When the Japanese left in 1945, the Neipu area was dotted with cacao trees, but unsustainable farming techniques meant few of them survived. The growing of cacao became a forgotten wrinkle in the region’s agriculture history, especially after the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) regime began to promote betel nut for its economic value. HAKKA CHOCOLATE Now, as before, cacao cultivation is concentrated in Hakka communities in Pingtung County. Chiu Ming-sung (邱銘松), a Hakka farmer who started growing betel nut in 1975, led the cacao comeback in 2000. He was seeking a new business direction, recognizing that the popularity of betel nut was beginning to wane. Chiu discovered that growing cacao
Four hundred years after English colonists landed on Plymouth Rock and upended the lives of her ancestors, Paula Peters is on a quest to recover a small part of what her people have lost. A year of trans-Atlantic commemorations marking the 400th anniversary of the Mayflower voyage opens in Southampton, England, on Saturday with an exhibition centered on one casualty of colonization: the wampum belt of Metacom, a 17th-century leader of the Wampanoag Native American nation. Woven with imagery depicting tribal history and legends, the beaded belt was “as important to the Wampanoag as the crown jewels would be to the king of England,” said Peters, a Wampanoag writer and educator. In 1620, the Wampanoag, who had lived for millennia in what is now New England, helped the exhausted Mayflower settlers survive their first winter. But within a few decades, tensions had erupted into a brutal 1670s conflict known as King Philip’s War. Metacom was killed, and his belt sent to England’s King Charles II as spoils of war. “From all we can tell it did arrive in the U.K., but it never arrived in the hands of the king,” Peters said from her home in Mashpee, Massachusetts. “We have been searching for that belt for generations of our people,” The hunt took Peters to the British Museum, which has one of the world’s largest collections of wampum belts. She didn’t find it there, but she had an idea: The Wampanoag would make a new belt, then send it to England for display. It would help share their story, and might bring new leads in the search. Wampum belts — made with beads fashioned from the white and purple shells of whelks and quahog — play a central role in the culture of the Wampanaog and other Native peoples in eastern North America. The new
Warren Hsu (許華仁) sees chocolate making as creating art and performing magic. Zeng Zhi-yuan (曾志元) “talks” to his cacao beans and compares the fermenting process to devotedly caring for a child. Despite their different products and business models, the two helped put Taiwanese chocolate on the map in 2018 at the prestigious International Chocolate Awards’ (ICA) World Finals when Hsu’s Fu Wan Chocolate (福灣) claimed two golds, five silvers and two bronzes, while Zeng took home four golds. That year, Taiwanese chocolatiers burst through the gates with a total of 26 medals, an impressive feat given that many locals don’t even know that the nation produces cacao. The two bagged even more awards at last year’s ceremony. This year’s results will be announced in November. “I personally believe that my artistic creations are beautiful, flavorful and layered,” Hsu says; some of Fu Wan’s more unusual offerings include zesty white pepper and fleur de sel, as well as sergestid shrimp and almond. “I’m just making something that speaks to me, and I’m fortunate that other people feel the same way too.” Virtually all of Taiwan’s cacao is grown in Pingtung County, which now boasts between 200 and 300 hectares of plantations in the heart of betel nut country near the foothills of Dawu Mountain (大武山). When betel nuts started losing value due to their decline in popularity about 10 years ago, some farmers took to growing cacao — an ideal companion crop with betel nut trees because it protects them from the sun — but only in recent years has the chocolate-making side matured. Unlike their European or US counterparts who import their beans, Taiwan’s chocolatiers employ a tree-to-bar, one-stop-shop system where they either work closely with farmers or grow their own beans. ICA officials noted that Taiwan produces cacao, boasts
In Japan — where they take their cats very seriously — they call Yuki Hattori the Cat Savior. He is so popular that he saw 16,000 patients last year, and crowds regularly queue up to hear him talk about neko no kimochi (a cat’s feelings), while people from all over Japan make the pilgrimage to his practice. Sometimes clients turn up from further afield. “One flew in from Iraq for a personal consultation,” Hattori says, “without his cat, due to border quarantines.” In Japan’s rarefied world of cat doctors, the vet Hattori is very much a superstar — but now there is a chance for English-speaking feline fans to benefit from his wisdom thanks to What Cats Want, a translation of his 2017 Japanese best seller Neko no Kimochi Kaibo Zukan (“The Encyclopedia of Cat Feelings”). The Japanese original is a breezy 162 pages of illustrations, diagrams and short observations that delve into cat behavior and activity. “All I want is for more people to realize what’s special about living with cats,” he tells me when I visit his office. Over two decades, Hattori has written 14 books about raising and treating house cats. His fans point to his uncanny ability to interpret feline body language. It is Hattori’s opinion that every tail swish, whisker twitch, ear flick and miaow is a subtle telegraphing of an animal’s desires. Here’s one example: cats spend a lot of daytime hours asleep, he says, so don’t be alarmed by their frantic bursts of nocturnal activity. And another: when a cat rubs up against your leg, it’s not necessarily scratching a hard-to-reach itch or showing affection. What you’re probably seeing is a form of territorial marking. And: when cats rub up against each other, in that friendly seeming way they do, they’re establishing mutual trust. If you think cats are hard
SEPT. 14 to SEPT. 20 When then-county commissioner Chen Ding-nan (陳定南) announced that movie theaters in Yilan County no longer needed to play the national anthem before each showing, the authorities were displeased. It was Sept. 13, 1988, over a year after the lifting of martial law, but the decades-old tradition where moviegoers had to stand and sing the anthem still endured. Of course, Chen sugarcoated his decision: “Considering the environment of the theater, the contents of the movies and the reactions of the audience, we believe that it’s actually disrespectful to play the anthem before each showing. We should ensure that the dignity of the national anthem is no longer degraded, and in addition, there is no law mandating that theaters must play the national anthem,” he stated. The national authorities didn’t buy it, and the next day the now-shuttered Government Information Office (GIO) ordered the Yilan County Government to correct its decision on grounds of violating Article 15 of the Motion Picture Act. Chen blasted the request, arguing that Article 15 only mandated that government promotional videos be shown after the national anthem clip and before the movie — it did not directly require theaters to play the national anthem. “The GIO’s argument is fallacious,” he told the media. “How can I correct something that has no legal basis?” It was not the first time Chen defied authoritarian-era institutions, as the Liberty Times (Taipei Times’ sister paper) ran the story with the headline, “Chen Ding-nan strikes again (陳定南又出新招),” adding that the GIO was left “dumbfounded.” Shortly after being elected to his second term in 1986, he abolished the New Year’s Day flag-raising ceremony and later did away with the Human Resources Second Office (人二室) that essentially served as the thought police in every public institution. He also destroyed “loyalty records”
Taipei is almost flat. At least the parts in which most people live, work and play. Furthermore, many major thoroughfares have designated bicycle lanes separating them from motorized vehicles, while minor roads offer quiet, sometimes leafy alternatives. There are also over 200km of riverside bike paths connecting the downtown with places as distant as Tamsui, Keelung, Muzha, Xindian, Yingge and Bali. Less than five percent of all journeys in the capital are undertaken by bicycle, however. “And this proportion is falling,” says Chan Kai-sheng (詹凱盛), founder of the non-profit Taiwan Urban Bicycle Alliance (台灣城市單車聯盟; TUBA). Chan thinks this may be due to stagnation in developing cycling infrastructure over recent years, since cycle use tends to increase whenever more bike paths are built and YouBike stations are opened, before falling off again. Chan founded TUBA in 2016 with fellow bike enthusiast Chen Pu (陳濮). Both men had newborn children, and Chen had quit his job to become a stay-at-home dad. “Helping improve the urban environment for my son to grow up in seemed essential,” Chan says. Wanting to influence fellow citizens to make more journeys by bicycle yet knowing constructing bike paths was beyond their ability, they hit on offering free coffee to commuters who used bikes. In the spring of 2016 they set up a roadside stall in Neihu District (內湖) and distributed hot beverages once a month. Other cycling friends volunteered their time, and by September of the same year they had stalls in six locations, Chan says, each giving out about 60 to 80 cups. OFFICIAL SUPPORT This attracted the attention of the Taipei City Government, and TUBA was invited to tender a bid for financial support. Thus Cycle Commuting Day (單車通勤日) was launched in November 2016 with the English slogan “Bike Friday — Free Coffee — Free Yourself.” Now with
Ten kilometers off the coast of Dongshih (東石) Fishing Harbor in Chiayi County, a long stretch of sand rises up from the seafloor, forming Waisanding Sandbar (外傘頂洲). This unassuming mass of sand is economically important for two reasons: Not only does it generate local tourism revenue from curious visitors, but it also offers protection to Dongshih’s offshore waters, Taiwan’s largest oyster-producing region. OYSTER FARMS EVERYWHERE Tourists who wish to visit Waisanding Sandbar may do so by boarding one of the tourist boats at Dongshih Fishing Harbor. Reservations are recommended as the boats often fill up with large local tour groups. The boat ride takes just under an hour, and at noon there is even a nice buffet seafood lunch included on board (with oysters, of course). The cost is NT$450 without lunch and NT$600 with lunch. The ride out is usually quite calm. In fact, these flat-bottomed tourist boats have a very low profile and are clearly designed only to operate in the protected, shallow waters between Taiwan and the sandbar. At the time of the Japanese takeover of Taiwan in 1895, Waisanding Sandbar was located off the coast of what is now southern Yunlin County. The sand that formed it was then being continually replenished by deposits from the Jhuoshuei River (濁水溪) system. At the time, the Beigang River (北港溪), which forms the border between today’s Yunlin and Chiayi counties, was a distributary of the mighty Jhuoshuei River. Large amounts of sand were being continuously delivered to the ocean adjacent to Waisanding Sandbar. However, the Japanese built a dike in 1911 that severed the Beigang River’s connection to the Jhuoshuei River system. This greatly reduced the amount of sediment being carried downstream to the outlet at Beigang, setting in motion changes to Waisanding Sandbar that continue to this day. By the
Fittingly released at the high point of Ghost Month on Zhongyuan Festival (中元), The Rope Curse 2 (粽邪) rides the wave of local blockbusters based on Taiwanese religious and folk customs, loosely continuing the events of the first installment. It seems to be a formula that works, as the film grossed NT$26 million in the first week, holding its ground against the triple-headed Hollywood onslaught of Mulan, The New Mutants and Tenet. Both Rope Curse films deal with the song rou zong ritual (送肉粽, sending rice dumplings) prevalent in coastal Changhua, where Taoist priests purify the soul of someone who hanged themselves. Locals believe that if the ritual is not conducted, the deceased will remain in the human world searching for someone to take their place so they can be reincarnated. Perhaps due to the success of the first film, this ritual has actually gained popularity in recent years and has spread to other areas of Taiwan. Residents are not happy about this because they feel that the ritual, which had never been a folk tradition where they live, brings them bad luck. This reviewer did not watch the first Rope Curse, and while there are guest appearances in part two that tie in to the first part and foreshadow a third film, it’s not too hard to figure out what’s going on if one has some knowledge of how Taiwanese religious and supernatural beliefs and practices work. But since this is the second installment, those who don’t know much should do their research or watch part one beforehand, otherwise the plot will be quite difficult to process since it jumps straight into the action. Rope Curse focuses on the Zhong Kui dance (跳鍾馗) portion of the ritual, where a Taoist priest assumes the spirit of Zhong, a deity who is known for his abilities
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