台灣之旅 - Ten Smith Students Experiencing Taiwan

Sunday, July 03, 2011

Tradition and Japanese Cultural Influence in Taiwan

Hello class and readers!

Thank you for tuning in to our class blog. Our trip to Taiwan was truly an exciting and rare opportunity. I feel I learned about Taiwan with a depth that could only be gleaned from a trip like this. Each step of the way Prof. Wu made sure that we understand the significance of each place in the context of Taiwanese history and culture.

One aspect of Taiwan that is fascinating to me is the influence of Japanese culture. As a student who has previously studied Mandarin in Mainland China, it was like a form of culture shock. Because the Japanese government has never formally apologized for Nanjing Massacre and other events of WWII, in addition to other tensions, Mainland China (at least on a surface level) is wary and resentful of Japan in many ways. Taiwan however, having been cut off from the Mainland in terms of communication and political experience, its long history as a Japanese colony, and Modern trade relations, seems to display its Japanese cultural heritage openly and with pride.

I would say the peak experience of our trip for me was our visit to a very traditional tea house in the mountains outside of Taipei. This was the rarest of opportunities, as this place is normally quite expensive by Taiwanese standards and is usually booked up months in advance. (For this experience we owe our thanks to 吴老师 and especially to 张老师，who also accompanied us earlier that day to the Wisteria Tea House for a lesson in traditional tea ceremonies.) Not only were we able to sample tea, but we heard the most beautiful traditional tea ceremony music and saw a brief opera performance from The Peony Pavilion.

Afterward we enjoyed a delicious meal of healthy, local foods meant to complement our tea. The tea house is part of the “养身” movement in Taiwan, encouraging Taiwanese people to live life with health, and balance.

吴老师 Prof. Wu explained to us how the traditional Japanese architecture of the tea house, rarely found in Mainland China, is actually derived from China's Tang Dynasty- the point at which immigrants arrived in Japan from China and settled there. Due to political upheaval as well as the difficulty of maintaining these wood and paper based buildings over such a long period, this Tang style architecture can for the most part only be found in Japan today.

The traditional tea house is of this style- tatami style mats, low tables and paper shade windows. We also spoke to the waitstaff, who not only live at the tea house but are also practicing Buddhists. This tea house actively preserves traditional Chinese tea culture, although the style would seem Japanese to a viewer not versed in ancient Chinese history.

To be in the fresh air of the mountains, to hear the rush of the streams, the rain, and the breeze outside, while savoring the aroma of the tea, was an experience I will never forget. Taiwan has so much more to offer than just to city of Taipei. It is fascinating that the fast-paced economic development in Taiwan, which has created one of the most modern cities in the world, seems to also have provided avenues to actively preserve some of China's most ancient and complex cultural traditions.

Thursday, June 30, 2011

Some Reflections from Shi Laoshi/史老師

大家好!

I have been back from Taiwan a month now and I, like Zarah/蘇若才, still think frequently about our experiences there. There are several reasons why I enjoyed the trip (besides the obvious fact that the members of the group were all wonderful people!). Here is Myra/林安 showing her enthusiasm about going to Taiwan while we were waiting for our plane in Minneapolis.

First, I felt that 吳老師/Wu Laoshi’s scheduling provided a great combination of listening and observing plus hands-on activities. As Quincy/倪倩 mentioned in her post, the classes we attended were an excellent opportunity to try out various skills. Clearly Wu Laoshi knows how important it is to get everyone participating and using their hands every now and then (especially when fighting jetlag!) and how that physical involvement is essential to absorbing the information being imparted. The classes on tachi, Chinese medicine, and Chinese rice dough figure-making as well as pottery making in Yingge, opera mask-painting, and tea-picking, roasting and brewing all afforded us the chance to learn about and practice various traditional art forms and techniques.

Second, I really appreciated the trip’s focus on how tradition is manifested in modern Taiwan society. One experience that left a deep impression was our visit on our first full day in Taipei to the Longshan Temple/龍山寺. We were there at approximately 5:00 p.m., and worshippers of all ages and walks of life were thronging to the temple to burn incense, pay respects to the gods, and to join in the late-afternoon round of twice-daily mass chanting. The scene was truly熱鬧. Here was a centuries-old ritual, taking place in ultra-modern Taipei; it was very moving.

I liked how our visits to places in Taipei progressed from the traditional to the modern: we started with the Longshan Temple and the Lin Family Mansion and Garden/林家花園 and ended with shopping and eating in the district of the skyscraper Taipei 101. Also, I thought the choice of having us stay at National Taiwan Normal University was a good one: the area surrounding 師大 had a good mixture of old and new. Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts, supermarkets and fancy stores could be found right next to shops selling traditional-themed wares, famous old restaurants, and new eateries serving homestyle Taiwan dishes and other provincial cuisines.

Which brings me to a third reason that the trip was so enjoyable—and I am sure most of the group would agree with me here—the food. I think I liked every meal I had over the course of two weeks, but several that we had as a group stand out in particular: 春水堂 (at the Chiang Kai- Shek Memorial Hall/中正紀念堂, for its bubble tea—first served here, as Candy/李家寶 pointed out in her post—snacks, and noodle dishes ), 豐盛食堂 (for its traditional Taiwan fare), 春天素食 (for its sumptuous vegetarian buffet), and 一佳村(五行餐)in Yilan/宜蘭 (for its local homestyle cuisine). Our dining at all of these restaurants was in keeping with the traditional-within-modern theme of the trip.

Many thanks to Wu Laoshi for all her efforts to make this visit to Taiwan a great success. Best wishes to everyone!

非常感謝吳老師細心的安排與熱心的指導!

Monday, June 27, 2011

Yingge Ceramics Museum and Pottery Making

As Quincy said, Yingge Ceramics Museum and Old Street Ceramics Pottery Making 鶯歌陶瓷博物館/老街製陶 were amazing. The museum is relatively new, and it has become a popular place for visitors. We walked through the history of Taiwanese pottery in the museum. We also visited younger generation's creative pottery works there. Here are some more photos to share.

Saturday, June 25, 2011

Classes in Taiwan

One of the great things about this trip were the lectures that we were able to attend, an activity unique to a class trip arranged by professors.

Here's a few pictures of us in Yingge, a town famous for its ceramics. We got to experiment on our own with the clay, after a brisk lesson on the pottery wheel.

Our first lesson on how to shape the clay: we all started out with a preformed foundation...the first time. The rest of the times, we started out with a block.

We ended up with some pretty artistic shapes!

Here's a few pictures of the Chinese medicine class at the university. We learned about cold, cool, warm, and hot foods that could affect our bodies. We also learned about the acupressure meridian points on our bodies, and spent the rest of the trip hitting ourselves on those points to activate them. Also, it felt nice to pound away the stress on our bodies.

Here's a sort of gun thing used to create suction, a modern version of cupping. The suction in the bulb draws the blood to the surface of the skin, allowing bad toxins to leave the body. The bulb stays on for about 10 minutes or more.

Shi Laoshi, from Swarthmore College, experienced this sensation first hand.

This bulb is a smaller version of the same cupping idea.

Wu Laoshi has burning mugwort on her right arm, and an acupuncture needle in her left hand. The acupuncture didn't hurt as much as I might have expected.

This next set of pictures was taken on the same day, when we learned how to make some figurines out of flour dough. Originally, this type of dough figurines could be eaten, and were used as edible decorations. These days, the recipe involves a few more chemicals in order to allow the figurines to harden and stay mold free, so we were repeatedly warned NOT TO EAT THE DOUGH. We had a good amount of fun.

Besides the parrot, we also made a panda and an angel.

Finally, one of my favorite classes was the Chinese opera face painting class that we took. We went to a Chinese opera school where the students, who attend the school from around ages 10 until 20, study all aspects of Chinese opera including the dancing, singing, acrobatics, artistry, and music that is involved.

We either painted masks, painted our own faces. The students painted half of our faces and we painted the other half in the mirror. While we painted, one of the teachers there spoke to use about the meanings of the various colors in Chinese opera painted faces: red for courage, white for selfishness and slyness, green for impulsiveness, and so forth.

Myra had a pretty complicated face.

Sarah's face was very courageous.

This is the midway point of me painting my face...of all the days to wear my glasses instead of my contacts!

Candy's face was also complex. I love the eye part of her face.

Xuefei's face is Sun Wukong, the Monkey King. It really is reminiscent of a monkey!

Thanks to everybody who organized this trip!!!

Friday, June 24, 2011

哎呀， this blog keeps eating my posts, so I certainly hope that this post sticks!

Although its been a few weeks since my return from the beautiful city of Taipei (and the crippling jet lag that followed), I still think of my experiences on a nearly daily basis. While a countless number of Taiwan's cultural aspects left deep and lasting impressions on me, I have found that those which I can come nowhere near recreating are those which I miss the most. Sure, I can and often do attempt to recreate Taiwanese cuisine (a process which frequently ends in failure...) and listen to the Taiwanese music that I bought while traveling. Furthermore, don't get me wrong, my American friends' reactions to tasting the unusually strong and spicy Xylitol-infused gum which is nearly exclusive to Asia are priceless ("Oh, oh. My sinuses!"). These small things allow me to continue to relive the indescribable time I had in Taiwan, but cannot compare to the beauty and warmth of Taiwanese culture which one can only experience when completely immersed.

Of all my experiences in Taiwan, I was most taken by Taipei's night market culture and the very human experience I had taking a trip to some hot springs.

I'll start with the night markets, then. Sure, I've been to night markets on the mainland before, and I realize that they are by no means exclusive to Taiwan. However, the Shida night market near the dormitories in which we were staying had an entirely unique feel in comparison to any other night market I'd ever been to. Being rather tall, rather blonde, and rather fair, I usually attract a fair amount of attention in the night markets, a fact which results in a lot of vendors hollering "Hey lady!" at me and following me down the street while enthusiastically waving their products in the air (a habit that is particularly menacing when you are being followed by a sword vendor..); transactions tend to transpire almost exclusively on a calculator with little time for more than cold, clinical digits. Don't get me wrong, I love these night markets, too. However, they don't have the same personal dimension that captivated me in the Shida market.

Wandering around Shida, every vendor which I approached proved loquacious, inquisitive, and extremely friendly; I never finished a transaction before learning something interesting about the person selling to me, and in return telling them a bit about myself. I think I know what you're thinking at this point, being a cynic myself. Here, let me guess. "Of course they hammed up a gawky Caucasian wandering around their market! Tourists always bring a lot of money, this human aspect surely amounts only to a business strategy." At first, I thought so, too! However, I had plenty of interesting conversations with vendors who I came nowhere close to buying from, and I never experienced impatience or pressure to buy from these individuals. Even more interestingly to me, upon returning to Shida, many of the vendors recognized me and made a point to say hello and initiate further conversation (which very often did not even approach the subject of business, nevermind lead to any additional purchases). Of all the individuals I spoke to, I was most touched by a rice porridge vendor who I ordered from in one of my first nights in Shida, and who would subsequently wave to me each night I passed, or unobtrusively poke my shoulder and make a strange face at me. This special level of personal connection in even a business environment can hardly be experienced elsewhere, and I believe it really encapsulates uniquely warm attitude of most 台北人 I ran into while overseas.

This is just a taste of what I have to say, and I look forward to posting more, but right now I have to go pack, because I'm moving into my apartment in a little over a day (!!!!!!!). 再见 for now!