Big Buddha

This is close to the same temple where Molly and I experienced hell. On Buddha's backside, we met a large group of people doing ballroom dancing in the open air. It was quite romantic to watch and made me want to take it up again.

2 Hours of Heaven

On the left is my masseuse(sp?)/shampoo specialist. On the right is my hair stylist. Combining their powers, they provided me with 2 hours of blissful relaxation.

Knowledge Is...

Chinglish!

I can't seem to get enough of these hilarious translations! Check out www.engrish.com for more fun Asian sayings.

On the Links

Thomas, a friend, teeing off on a beautifully scenic hole.

Thomas and his wife. notice the long sleeves on both of them. His wife took off her gigantic sun-blocking visor for the picture. One thing's certain...these folks ain't dyin' of skin cancer. Reminds me of my grandpa hess---the only tan part of his body were his hands.

This is my caddy. Yes, I had a caddy. That's a first for me. She undressed a bit for the photo, too. Her pink whatever it is was closely tied around her face, making her look like she was wearing hijab with a hat. It was nice to have a caddy. She would point out to me where I should hit my putt every time and give me yardage estimates that seemed to be accurate. I beat everyone, so she must have known something.

Playing golf in Taiwan weather causes one to sweat quite profusely and so the private club provides a shower with a number of special creams, shaves, etc. after the round. It was a relaxing way to end the round. Its cool to to things in a foreign country that I regularly do at home and notice the differences and similarities. I'll have to tell you more about it, dad, since you're probably the only one who cares and knows about golf who reads this blog.

Engagement Feast

I am eating the menu. Each vertical line represents a separate dish that was served at an engagement lunch this afternoon. The dish pictured below only counts as one dish. Notice it has about 5 different foods on it. We had loads of fancy seafood. I guess the wedding feast is even bigger. I am amazed every day at how much these people can eat, given they are so small. The set-up is pretty clever--tradition has it that each guest leaves a certain amount of money for the couple in a red envelope. The better you know the couple, the more money you leave. This pays for the feast and leaves the couple with a little dough in their pockets. I just thought the whole thing was a bit excessive, but then, so is my body hair.

Now I Know What Hell Is

As we stepped over the rickety wooden bridge, it suddenly gave way, allowing us to freefall for no more than a foot. It was enough, though, to elicit sharp cries from my traveling partner, Molly. This marked our symbolic entrance to hell, found within a local temple. It functioned much more like a haunted house than a temple to me, but was definitely worthwhile. Grotesque statues put in motion the various punishments that one would receive for various sins while ghosts and headless corpses randomly flew from the ceiling. Molly wonders if the widespread usage of these punishments as threats to children in efforts to get them to behave only serves to make Taiwanese people more judgemental.

Love in Beijing

The paths people walk sometimes shock me. I met an extremely attractive white dude en route to Beijing who spoke impeccable Chinese (not that I could tell impeccable from atrocious). He just finished recording a 100 episode Chinese soap opera series, in which he plays a lead role. His path started when he served a Chinese speaking Mormon mission. Who would have thought he would end up where he is? Benji Battelle (if you are looking for some eye candy on facebook)

Then, take the dude above who is the most muscular man I've seen in Taiwan. He developed his guns by touring with the circus for a number of years. His specialty--spinning tops, which he now does in street performances around the country. This one he is getting ready to spin weighs at least 200 pounds (I couldn't even budge it off the ground). He let us try our hand at spinning the smaller tops. This was part of a snow-flower festival. The mountains literally looked covered in snow from all the white flowers.

WO SHI WEI SHEN!

A friend I met at the top of a mountain in Yang Ming Shan Nat'l Park. He's following a popular Taiwanese tradition of yelling to the universe from a tall mountain peak, announching who he is and what his deepest hopes and dreams are.