Moving Northward

I settled into my room at HUB hotel- comfortable, spacious, quiet, and with a window into a central plaza. I enjoyed my gluttonous walk through the nighmarket- the highlight was watching someone cook me these dozen tiny quail eggs.

That night, at 1am Taiwan time and 1pm in my familiar EST, I had a meeting for a group I've been participating in this last year. It is called Hospicing Zionism, and it is a collection of Askhenazi (Eastern European ethnicity) Jews who meet to discuss and work on how we can detach from the Zionist ideals that most of us were raised with. It is always challenging and invigorating to meet, and even more so to wake from a doze in a foreign place, listen to high emotions and articulated pain, and then not know if I should fall back asleep or keep the fire blazing. Eventually, I drifted off again, after watching some soothing documentary about the use of art therapy for children with cancer in Taiwanese hospitals.

I slept in the next morning and set an alarm to get to my free breakfast at the final part of the available window. I had a meal that was very beige, but with a lot of different flavors! Featured is a latte, creamy pumpkin soup, scrambled eggs with vegetables, a rice noodle salad, fries, buttered toast, a single mediocre fried thing, and some yellow watermelon. Then I followed it up with some more soup, salad with EXCELLENT dressing, eggs, and a roll that came pre-filled with butter!

I lazed the heck around for the morning and eventually went out in the afternoon. I rented a you bike and rode up a path along a river. As I look at these pictures I see the brilliant bright sun and reflection on the water and I see how beautiful it was. At the time, I was a little stressed because I was trying to get to what I hoped was a wild hot spring, then plan my route back down to the harbor area before sunset. In retrospect I wish I had just gone to the harbor, but the adventure ended up being an adventure and that's good.

I rode past the old North Gate of the city and then turned into a run-down and cozy-feeling neighborhood near the military school and Naval training center, and then found myself among a high rise looking for a 7-11 Google was promising me existed. I eventually found it and bought an onigiri, an asparagus juice to satisfy Dakota's curiosity and my own thirst, and my new sinful delight- a ham-egg-and-cheese white bread sandwich which was primarily filled with a butter spread that my arteries were just BATHING in. It had this sweet taste and rubbery texture and I unfortunately have not forgotten them.

As I docked my bike and walked onwards to my Google Maps pin, I started to doubt more and more that this was leading me to a hot spring. Yes, it did look like this area was near a a river or other flowing body of water. But it was quite residential, and there was a construction area where a river gorge might actually be. Plus, my map was leading me along a road that went directly into the naval base/school area. The area went from a school-type of environment to more of a storage-for-camo-adorned-vehicles, and I saw men guarding a gate up ahead. I had and did not ever feel actually unsafe at any point in Taiwan, but this was one of the moments where I seriously checked in with myself to see if I was. It was unlikely that there was a hot spring beyond this gate, and even if there was, would I feel comfortable enjoying it?

So, I sat down on a bench, looked at the murals on the buildings and wondered what went on in them. I pulled out my sandwich and took a moist bite. I thought about the trillions of dollars that the US sends to other countries for their military technology, so that their presence as an empire may continue around the globe. I thought about how differently I feel about the existence of Taiwan vs the existence of Israel. I wondered if I was allowed to feel different about two different places that fill a similar role in US foreign policy, and then I remembered that complexity and non-duality can exist. I thought about the celebration of Taiwanese ethnic /indigenous people that I'd seen in Wulai, Taipei, and Beitou. I thought about how the diversity of plant life is celebrated here. I said a prayer for the roots of all the olive trees cut down in Palestine. I said a prayer for everyone who fears death from above, who breathes in white sulphur. I pulled out my headphones and listened to my anthem, "El Derecho de Vivir en Paz" by Victor Jara, a man from another place of massive US military intervention, Chile.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkXise2bHE0.

And then, I acknowledged the sun was fixing to set and I'd best look westward if I'd like to see that. Walked back to the YouBike terminal and got an electric bike this time :)

The path back was essentially along the same road. A temple that I had passed that had been blocked off with scaffolding was disrobed and the festival stage that had been built in the afternoon was revealed. They were playing pop music and the construction workers were bobbing along. I think it was the god's birthday celebration.

I turned into another narrow twisting neighborhood of neat apartment buildings, and rode along a cycle-way made of an old train track, leading into a railroad park with the old trains and turntables as public art. This was also just a large recreational park and there were people playing soccer, tennis, and doing exercises. Ahead of me I saw signs for the portuary area and the customs building- Kaohsiung is the main import location for all of Taiwan. To the south-east was the old port docs, now turned into Qijin Island, and literally everyone I know recommended I ride my bike there. I sort of forgot that that existed and instead turned right, and road through a neighborhood, then a long pedestrian tunnel to the Sun Yat Sen University. Now that I looked into it more, this is evidently a rich-kid, foreign-study-abroad, party-time school, with a focus on arts and marine biology. With that caveat, it was a beautiful and spacious in a way that I had not gotten to observer yet in Kaohsiung. There were plants everywhere, including ficus tendrils wrapping around buildings that grew near trees. Students walked between buildings and along paths. Very little car traffic, lots of flashy mopeds. I was going up to a sunset spot, past "Monkey Point" where I did see a monkey climbing a wall! While cute, they are very interested in human food and will mess with your belongings and steal your snacks if you get too close.

Very grateful for the power on my bike, as this ride was directly uphill with several hairpin turns. I kept stopping to get a breath, take a picture, and re-orient my map to my constantly pivoting direction. Eventually, I found the spot on the map, dodged some motorcycles to cross the street and park my bike, and joined three emo youths to gaze at the pink sky, bounding water, cliff face below us, and land mass behind. You could hear the waves even from this high distance above the surface. I smiled a lot.

I didn't want to ride down the hill in full darkness, so I didn't stay super long at the lookout spot and instead rode down to Shiziwan Beach, one of the few swimmer-friendly beaches on this part of the island, and (as now makes sense), a favorite youth spot. I left my YouBike on a boat ramp, hoping it would be safe, and walked down onto the soft, warm black sand. The waves were mild and smooth, and I saw some people further along trying to continue to surf. Container ships passed by on their way to the port around the corner. At first I waded in the shallows, enjoying the feeling on my feet and rolling up my pants. A white girl and a Taiwanese girl finished whatever was in the thermos they were drinking from their beach picnic. The white girl pulled off her over clothes and danced into the water in her bikini. After a few minutes, I looked at her friend, gestured with a pleading look to my backpack and now-shed pants, shoes and shirt. She nodded enthusiastically and swung her upturned palm to the gently waves. I said "xie xie" and waded in.

As it was after 6, the light of the sun was gone quickly, and smoky black covered the landscape, reflecting off the ship, the clouds, the tops of the waves, and of course the sand and land. There were slivers of orange, purple, and the reflection of white light adding contrast. My fellow swimmer and I smiled at each other and bounced together and didn't touch and didn't say a word. She was fully going under water and enjoying getting tossed around by the waves. I was a little more demure, a little more mindful, and got out after- I had my YouBike to return and there's only so much beauty you can take in- or at least that's the case for me.

Soggy and sandy, I got my clothes back on, I rode back through the dark campus and the well-lit tunnel. Checked in my bike- the whole trip on the bike would cost me around $3. I ate my onigiri at a bus stop, then hopped on the train- we were at the end of the line and the car was empty- though it did quickly fill with well-dressed college students.

It happened a few times in my trip that I was over-tired, didn't realize or acknowledge it, and thus acted really inefficiently. This was one of those nights. I needed to do laundry, buy detergent, and get some food. But I spent like 35 minutes wandering around a drug store, feeling morally inflexible about using a "small business" laundry mat as opposed to the one connected to my hotel, and completely indecisive about what I wanted to eat and if it was somehow ethnically not ok for me to eat Thai food while in Taiwan, while I had yet to try all the foods of Taiwan. After walking back and forth along the same two blocks literally three times, I ended up doing laundry in the "laundry mat" attached to the HUB hotel (literally just this room open to the street with a throne like chair in it), getting some GREAT Thai takeout, talking to my sister, and having a fine time.

I was super sad to leave HUB hotel the next morning- like I said I loved this place and wish I had gotten more time there. I didn't take a picture of it, but they had a lending library/take-a-book-leave-a-book of all Chinese books- except for one book for Chinese speakers learning English that was all about how to order in restaurant, how to describe foods and recipes, different vocab for cuisine, etc. Very interesting.

For breakfast I had this plate of scrambled eggs, fried rice, chicken nuggets, rice noodle stir fry, sauteed greens, a salad of cabbage and sprouts, some pickles that i did not enjoy, a side of red dragon fruit and a coffee concoction that took advantage of the free ice cream for a final time.

I got on an e-YouBike for the 2km ride to the station. I had put my daypack inside my big backpack as you see in this picture and that was much easier to balance during my ride. I also got well hydrated and packed a bunch of water because my previous train ride had been so thirsty!!

The train station had great roof artistic architecture but all the restaurants were closed, despite it being close to 10am. I spent a lot of time wrestling with a vending machine before finally getting a "muskat" soda. I also had a beer that I'd bought during my manic dinner-time the night before, so I spent a lot of time on the internet trying to figure out if it is illegal to drink a beer on a train in Taiwan. It apparently is not. Also in public health news, the train station had a display of various airbourne contaminants! how thoughtful to allay my fears.

The train ride to Changhua was about 3 hours long. My friend from the class had asked if I was going to take the bullet train and, with hindsight, I wish I had as it would have been a cool opportunity. But this ride was also nice. It was mostly suburban and industrial. there were a lot of ponds with ducks living in them- and important meat and egg source for the country. Please enjoy these videos:

Wendy was waiting for me at the train station, waving the extra motorcycle helmet she brought with her in the mid-day sun. I'd never ridden anything more powerful than the e-bike the day before, but Wendy had assured me that she was a very good driver several times as we arranged our meet up over Line (messaging app used a lot in Taiwan and surrounding countries), and it was obvious that it was much safer to ride a two-wheeled vehicle here than in, say, Baltimore Maryland. We made it to her mother's house in about 15 minutes, me learning to lean with the weight of my backpack into the turns. Her mother is a semi-retired high school teacher and Wendy was visiting her for a few days before she returned to her home in Taoyuan, near Taipei, where she practices physical therapy. Her mother spoke no English and I didn't get service in the house for my translator app. Wendy did some translating for us, but mostly we ate her mother's delicious food in silence and pantomime. She brought out metal dishes full of different foods: smoked duck, sausages, scrambled egg, the bony milkfish that is apparently classic for Taiwan, sauteed greens and rice. After we ate that she brought out a soup with clams in it. The food was so so good. I felt grateful that she couldn't say much to me because I got the feeling that she would have encouraged me to keep eating until it was all gone, and that I would have been spitting and effusive complimenting her food. A calligraphic scroll of the Buddhist Heart Sutra was on the wall and Wendy had a game of the World Series on TV.

They offered me a nap but I was ready to sight-see through my food coma. I'd said that I wanted to try swimming if it was possible, so Wendy made our itinerary to two spots near the ocean. The first was Fang Yuan beach, which is apparently huge and popular during summer weekends. We arrived to find it almost totally empty- parking areas, vendor stalls, light house for touring empty and being battered by a strong wind from the south. We parked and walked past some serious construction to the boardwalks through shallow water. At high tide, this is a mild beach. At low tide, the oyster structures look huge sticking up from the the 3 cm of rushing water, and the wind turbines' shadows are long and add to the optical illusive nature of the place.

In addition to the visual distortion it was also windy as hell! It quickly became clear that the that no swimming was going to be taking place- the wind chill made it chilly and literally hard to move about easily with such strong wind. Nonetheless, we all took many photos there and at nearby Gomai Wetlands

After feeling like I was going to be lifted off to Oz, we returned along the long wooden boardwalk to the shore. There was a temple a ways down the road, and we walked to that because I wanted to see it and use the bathroom. We talked a bit about the temples and Wendy explained that there is a shrine at almost every port city in Taiwan (and lots of other places too) so that the sailors that arrived there could do their prayers. So, shrines are slightly different but they are generally very similar because they are being used for worship of the same dieties. This makes so much sense, of course. It also helped me understand how one temple could be home to the worship of many dieties- but when you think of the temple as an iteration of a place to worship a particular character, then it makes sense that it could be the place for the worship of someone else.

Interesting business this religion stuff.

With the wind rising and the sun moving towards its final quarter before the always- 6- equatorial evening Wendy continued our tour to Leukan! I'll address that in the next entry :) Enjoy this demonstration of the wind while you wait!