Chinese New Year seems to be gaining a foothold in other cultures more and more these days, as mentions and nods to the Year of the Rooster are made in different countries and environments as the years move on. For us, it signals a break from work along with all sorts of traditional practices which we need to be aware of as we negotiate the landscape for the unusual week.
Apart from the cacophony of fireworks at weird and wonderful hours, the unpredictable location and duration of same, and the intermittent shutting of shops and restaurants depending on the festivities planned for certain days, we also enjoyed the post-apocalyptic feel of the streets and the muted audio track that the city plays out during this time.
We headed to the north coast for a super long drive on Sunday, traveling with a cruise of other folk who were heading for various family celebrations. We weren't, so we negotiated the north coast highway with a vague eye on the surf (boards on board, of course!), as well as lapping up the fine weather and beautiful sights of ocean and mountain hinterland. After a long drive up and back along the coast we ended up at the far end of Green Bay to watch a succession of tandem para-gliders drift down from the looming coastal mountain to a pin-point precision landing on the beach right before our eyes. (see video above).
A couple of days later we set off on an ambitious hike up through the back slopes of Yangminshan to the pinnacle of the near slope up near the Cultural College. Luckily we motored up the first slopes, so steep I had to jettison Cass from the back for a short stint so that "Blacky" could make it up to our base camp. From there we navigated our way past abandoned mansions and huts being overtaken rapidly by encroaching jungle, up knee-shriekingly steep flights of stone steps covered with a mist of moss, across access roads and past huge electrical towers piercing the native bushland. Eventually, past the little temples and the grand concrete edifices dotting the peak of the ridgeline, we emerged at the back of the floral experimentation centre. Even though it took us a long way from our intended destination, it was a beautiful and peaceful spot carpeted with flowers and plants and manicured paths and trails.
We wandered back from the main road into the strange little ghost town of former American Institute in Taiwan housing. Long abandoned and conjuring up images of the Dharma Initiative housing from the TV series "Lost", this village of 60s era housing stock is slowly being re-imagined by creative restaurateurs. Many of the restaurants are embracing the retro feel of the houses and grounds by outfitting them in sympathetic style. We passed numerous houses that had been transformed into an American diner style cafe, some with classic American cars as mascots, others with quirky and interesting garden furniture and cleverly matching decor inside. Our selection, Cine, with just a whiff of French about it, was vaguely disturbing in that we sat at a lounge suite with a coffee table exactly like ours at home.....sixteen year old furniture has become retro! It also housed lots of betamax videos, Japanese robots and sit-in classic Nintendo gaming machines!
Anyway, we dined in fine style with assurances to each other that we would visit again soon, before embarking on our journey back down the mountain. My illiotibial band was crying foul half-way down yet I managed to make it down without too much damage. Cass and I can still feel a bit of a calf burn even now, but we were pretty much crippled for the next day or two afterwards!
The rest of the week was relatively uneventful save from a stimulating trip down to the impressive Taipei Arena for a major WTA international tennis tournament! We'd spied some advertising for this competition, so dutifully sourced the website and saw that our very own Samantha Stosur was slated for action on Friday afternoon. Allowing us yet another sleep-in and laconic breakfasting, we headed down in the early afternoon to be treated to great entertainment. We had superb court-side seating and I managed to do my share of "C'mon Sam"s at prodigious volume, despite the fact that the Taiwanese crowd was reminiscent of the one hushed over Eddie Charlton's snooker table in venerable English billiard halls! Cass and I soon managed to rev up some of the locals by encouraging our fellow Aussie, unfortunately though it might have backfired, as the Chinese girl seemed to get stronger and stronger from that point on and Sam subsequently lost. Undeterred, we soldiered on and eventually dined in the Eslite building nearby at Yokohama Monogatari, where we each had a mouth-watering steak with salad bar accompaniments.
We watched the entire first series of "The Crown" during the week along with some one-day cricket (both of us) and the Auckland Nines (mainly me) and UFC (exclusively me!). The girls luxuriated in the available warm laps and covering at various unusual periods of the day, as well as resting their arthritic joints in the soothing blankets of our bed! We had an amazingly relaxing week to recover fully from our Christmas travel exertions, partly aided by delicious home-made lemon butter on slabs of hot toast each day....Cassy's CNY treat! Bring on Semester Two!
Photos: fairly self explanatory I think....the baby is Wal's youngest son, Eli. Books: We're both reading Alan Furst WW11 spy mysteries courtesy of Gurecki. Cass is reading "A Hero of France" and I'm reading "Spies of Warsaw"
