People visiting Kinmen during the Lunar New Year holiday should visit the Wind Lion Gods, the guardians that embody the memories and history of the outlying county and serve as a symbolic part of its cultural landscape, the Kinmen County Tourism Department said.
The Wind Lion Gods — or “Wind Lion Masters” (風獅爺) in Mandarin — are stone sculptures brought to Kinmen from Quanzhou and Zhangzhou in China to protect the group of islands from evil spirits, bad luck and natural disasters, including monsoon winds that are particularly fierce during the winter months, information on the department’s Web site says.
There are about 100 stone lions around Kinmen, which is only 10km east of the Chinese city of Xiamen, with some painted in bright colors and others sporting fierce expressions. The “females” are often decorated with pom-poms or ribbons.
Photo: CNA
Over time, the lion sculptures have become deeply entwined with local legends, said Chang Che-jui (張哲叡), a representative of the local travel company Whoyo Travel.
The lions are believed to possess special abilities, such as discovering lost items, catching thieves and protecting the islands from intruders, Chang said.
The Anqi Wind Lion God, the tallest among the lot at 3.78m, is painted in green, red, blue and yellow, and stands guard over the sea frontier.
Legend says it once fended off invading pirates, the department said.
Local residents often make cloaks for and bring offerings to the wind lions to “thank” them for their good deeds, it said.
However, the lions’ powers were not always so revered, Chang said.
A lion statue in the Guningtou (古寧頭) region shows visible cracks on its ears and teeth, even after being restored to repair damage caused by nearby residents.
It is believed that the lion’s open mouth, facing the Lincuo neighborhood, emitted negative energy and disrupted the area’s feng shui (風水).
Chang recommended that visitors check out a chubby yellow wind lion in Jinning Township’s (金寧) Husia Village (湖下) that he found particularly cute.
In Lieyu (烈嶼), which lies west of Kinmen’s main island, the “Wind Chickens” are similarly revered, he said.
The stone chickens perched atop residents’ roofs and at village entrances have the power to control the wind and protect locals from evil spirits, the department said.
Kinmen is also known for its military legacy as a front-line against the Chinese Communist Party, given its proximity to China, it said.
As well as tanks and forts on display, history can be seen in residential villages, from tunnels people took shelter in to holes in the walls of houses, the department added.
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The next minimum wage hike is expected to exceed NT$30,000, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday during an award ceremony honoring “model workers,” including migrant workers, at the Presidential Office ahead of Workers’ Day today. Lai said he wished to thank the awardees on behalf of the nation and extend his most sincere respect for their hard work, on which Taiwan’s prosperity has been built. Lai specifically thanked 10 migrant workers selected for the award, saying that although they left their home countries to further their own goals, their efforts have benefited Taiwan as well. The nation’s industrial sector and small businesses lay
Taiwan has activated backup communications for its northernmost territory, the remote and strategically located island of Dongyin (東引), after poor weather conditions apparently shifted the wreckage of a ship onto an undersea cable causing it to break. The vulnerability of undersea communication cables linking Taiwan with its outlying islands has been a persistent cause of concern for Taipei, whose government has on several occasions blamed Chinese ships for intentionally causing damage. Dongyin, home to about 1,500 people, sits in a strategic position at the top of the Taiwan Strait and the island has a heavy military presence. It does not have an
RSS