Comments on: Around Daliao

By: Erin

Erin — Mon, 11 May 2009 21:47:44 +0000

Great posts and a nice a site

By: Shan Ding Lu » People in the Neighborhood

Shan Ding Lu » People in the Neighborhood — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 16:40:51 +0000

[...] is very working class. It sits right on the industrial saturated rural edge of Kaohsiung [...]

By: Stephen

Stephen — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 01:32:02 +0000

Thanks for the link and info Michael,
Your photo essay covers our very streets. Even the billboards are the same, albeit more faded and dirty. Daliao has hardly changed. The old KMT soldiers miltary housing has been demolished (thankfully), the furnaces slowed down (a little), the working class chaos and disorder… all the same.
But there are some gems around here too. Another photoblog sometime.

By: Michael Turton

Michael Turton — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 00:40:45 +0000

BTW, as I recall there is an unregulated waste incinerator on the grounds of Fooyin University there in Taliao.

When I taught English there, in the evenings we had adult extension classes. The school was right next to the Kaohsiung garbage dump you’ve pictured above. When the trucks rolled in at the end of the day and disturbed the trash, the smell that wafted over the school was unbelievable. Sometimes on rainy days they would set the trash on fire, and flakes of ash would rain down on the city, obscene gray snow.

Taliao. Brings back memories.

By: Michael Turton

Michael Turton — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 00:21:33 +0000

I posted a photo essay from Daliao several years ago on my Teaching English in Taiwan website:

http://www.michaelturton.com/Taiwan/taliao.html

That was a fascinating photo essay. Very enlightening. I lived in Taliao at the end of the 1990s and it was without question the worst place I’ve ever lived.

Michael

By: Stephen

Stephen — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 01:36:20 +0000

You are right Brad,
The mountains are often visible for an hour os so after dawn. Not a time of day I, or most Kaohsiungites, see unfortunately.
Kaohsiung has not changed much in the past 5 years. You can enjoy clean NSW in the comfort that Kaohsiung is still the bustlying, busy, friendly, smoggy, dusty city of before.
They have almost got rid of all the old smokey two-stroke motor-scooters though!

By: Links 26 January 2009 - David on Formosa

Links 26 January 2009 - David on Formosa — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 00:14:15 +0000

[...] Shan Ding Lu has a photo essay of Daliao, site of the recent poisonous gas leaks. [...]

By: Brad Geyer

Brad Geyer — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 08:36:24 +0000

Hi Steven ,

On Kaminoge , during 2000-04 i also taught English in Koahsiung . During that time i shared an apartment with a mate from Canada & South Africa , living near Chen Chin Ho & the Koahsiung’s Baseball stadium i never got tired of waking up at 6am seeing a mountain range disappear by 9pm covered in smog i guess ???

All the best with living in TW ,

Brad Geyer
Broken Hill , Outback New South Wales .

By: Stephen

Stephen — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 04:29:57 +0000

I had exactly the same revelation 3 months after living and working in smog filled Kaohsiung. One clear day during a roof-top BBQ I looked across and saw the majestic 3000m Beidawu mountain range not 30 kilometres away. More shocking than me taking 3 months to discover it was when I asked my friend, now wife, she was also surprised and amazed at its sight. Things are no better these days, we see those mountains about 1 day in 7. Many weeks never at all.

By: Kaminoge

Kaminoge — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 03:20:48 +0000

Mention the name "Yokkaichi" to most Japanese, and the first thing they will think of is a respiratory disease (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yokkaichi_Asthma)! Actually, we do have a nice view of the central mountains from our apartment building in Fengyuan...on a clear day. When I first moved to Taiwan, I lived in Taichung. I was there for about two weeks when, one day, the smog lifted, and it was only then that I realized there were mountains on the outskirts of the city!