Shan Ding Lu

A good tropical torrential rain is a wonderful thing. It is cooling and so refreshing. At this time of year Taiwan is blessed with so many torrential downpours.

Typhoon Fung-wong has been bearing down on Taiwan for the past few days. Like a thundering bowling ball it hit the central east coast early this morning, hurled over the 3000m mountain range and left the central west coast early this evening. Though the winds were not too strong, the rain has been steady. And there is yet more to come over the next day as the tail of the typhoon drops its remaining water. It is now on its way to China and hopefully on course to Beijing for a final scrub down before the Olympics.

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Tags: Shan Ding Lu, Weather by Stephen
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The thunder clouds have been threatening for a while but today Kaohsiung received it’s first large showers of the plum rains that signal the start of the long hot humid summer ahead.

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Tags: Children, Insects, Shan Ding Lu by Stephen
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Just across the lane by our house is a field that has been growing rice for the last 5 months. I was lead to believe that farmers could get two rice crops a year from their fields. Having watched the field opposite us I can say that while they may be able to, no-one down here in the south does. Some farmers put red beans in between rice crops but most of the fields used for rice have remained fallow for the remaining 7 months.

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Tags: Around Da Liao, Shan Ding Lu by Stephen
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It absolutely astonished me the first time I saw a team of diggers came to dig up the road not more than a week after it had been freshly repaved. They did their job and roughly patched over the hole leaving a beautiful street with a large uneven blemish. When I see these things now it doesn’t phase me at all.

It seems that each essential service is responsible for connecting to any new development. And these services typically run down the middle of the road. Most streets are a patchwork of different service entry scars, even the recently paved ones.

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Tags: Around Da Liao, Shan Ding Lu, Uncategorized by Stephen
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Yesterday Taiwan held its election for president. This was a simple vote for one of two candidates numbered (1) and (2). Along with the presidential vote there were two referendum votes. So every voter had 3 ballots to fill out. An easy and simple affair.

Ma Ying-jeou and running mate on the left. KMT, red and blue, number (2). Frank Shieh and running mate on the right. DPP, green, number(1)

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Tags: Shan Ding Lu, Taiwan, Uncategorized by Stephen
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The local temple is a few houses down the street. You can spot it to the far left of the Shan Ding Lu banner at the top of the page. It is within earshot of the karaoke machine, baton dancing music , snake-oil sellers, fire-crackers and monthly gonging. To name the more noisy activities that take place there.

Our temple is fairly small by Taiwan standards. It services a few hundred households in the immediate area. But there is always some activity, day and night.

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Tags: Shan Ding Lu by Stephen
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Now I am a great fan of firecrackers, firework and any chemical combination that goes pop. Despite growing up in a land where such things were severely restricted and before an Internet search for “How to make a bomb” was possible I still enjoyed a childhood of banging, burning and occasional bodily bruising.
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Tags: Children, Shan Ding Lu by Stephen
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There is a real fear of mosquitoes here as almost everywhere in the world. And for good reason too, while Taiwan has been malaria free since the 60’s there is an ongoing problem with Dengue fever here in Southern Taiwan. My father-in-law is forever vigilant about having doors closed, window screens tight and the 5000 volt blue light zapper always on.

I often wondered why there were few mosquitoes around our house or even inside our house while if you walk into the bamboo hills not more than 100 yards across the field you are likely to be sucked dry.

And yesterday I discover why; The Dengue Fever Prevention and Control program.

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Tags: Shan Ding Lu by Stephen
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