It’s Saturday July 13 around 11AM Taiwan time as I type this. The typhoon force winds and ‘extremely torrential’ (Central Weather Bureua’s wording) have subsided here in Taichung. Now we’re down to run of the mill high winds and really torrential downpour.
Taiwan gets hammered by typhoons pretty regularly, so they’ve got preparations down to a bit of a science it appears. I went for a bike ride yesterday and noticed all of the work underway. Most obvious were construction sites with their literal battening down of the hatches. Many skyscrapers under construction here have fabric wrapped across the scaffolding surrounding the building. It was amazing to see an entire 20+ story building with all of the fabric furled and secured. Same with the giant vinyl billboards all around town - all furled and secured. It made sense to me yesterday pre storm, but after experiencing the wind howling, and the building shaking, and the windows bowing nearly all night long - it all makes that much more sense!
Here are some photos and video....
The coming storm
Around 9AM Saturday July 13, 2013
I think I've got this correct that this was the rainfall total at that time for the area around Taichung... 480mm is over 1.5 feet of rain... at 7:38AM Saturday.... I wouldn't be at all surprised if there has been another 6 inches that have fallen since then.
So after earthquakes and a typhoon, I guess all we’ve got left to deal with is a plague of locusts, or a rain of frogs and perhaps a possible sharknado?
As we ride around Taichung, more and more wonderful roads keep turning up.Not that I feel like we’ve seen them all by any stretch, but just when I think I’ve got a handle on a particular area, I go on a ride with others to that same area, or go explore on my own and then get exposed to a whole new network of roads.It’s big fun to see how things connect up and be continually surprised at new vistas.The only tough part at the moment is the heat.Haven’t seen any leeches though, so that’s nice.
Both Julia and I have been doing a bunch of great riding. She rides to and from work several days a week, usually with some colleagues. I often join in for one or both ways of the ride, which is big fun.
As I type, we’re watching the Tour de France on TV. This is always one of my favorite 3 week stretches of the year, and in past years when it is finished, I end up having some measure of withdrawal. I think some of that used to spring from the fact that we didn’t have that much cycling on TV to watch. Curiously, moving to Tai ewan has allowed us to see a great deal more pro cycling on TV. There’s much to love about Eurosport Asia coverage - not only the Grand Tours, but the shorter stage races, Classics, and significant one day races, so it’s a wealth of amazing cycling telecasts.
We also have a place to go watch all this coverage with others similarly addicted - a great coffee shop called Caffe Terry. It’s a coffee shop that is covered up in cycling memorabilia, tables made of bike wheels, shod with tires etc. Terry’s a great guy, a strong rider/racer and also a bike builder. They make really good coffee and food, and have a wide selection of beers available too. http://taiwanincycles.blogspot.tw/2010/11/caffe-terry.html
I’ve always been interested in transport issues and specifically how bicycles can be integrated into a transport network, so it’s been fascinating to notice Taiwan and Taichung’s efforts to support cycling. Unfortunately the Taiwanese too often miss the mark in my opinion - the overall thrust of the local efforts can be summed up in this one photo... (it’s not Photoshopped, honest, come visit, I’ll take you there to see it).
We’ve only been here for 6 months now, so I cannot really comment too much, but if you’re interested, I’ll direct you to a great blog whose writer can speak far more eloquently than I on this topic, plus he’s got some other staggering photos
There are some really nice rails to trails that have been built around Taichung, and some nice signage designating cycling routes on existing roads, so it’s not all for naught, but there are far too many misses as well. To me, cycling could be a viable addition to the larger transportation infrastructure here. Much of the city itself is flat, ideal for actually getting around by bike, but most all cycling infrastructure efforts seem to focus on recreational cycling, as with the aforementioned rails to trails and cycling route signage. Hopefully this will all change with time.
The link above on Caffe Terry is also from the blog Taiwan in Cycles.
I owe Andrew, the blogger, a big debt of gratitude. Right after we learned of the possibility of Julia getting a job over here I immediately started doing some research about what it would be like living (and riding here). Taiwan in Cycles is such a great and wide ranging resource and it really helped me wrap my head around aspects of Taiwan and Taichung life such that I could imagine living here. It certainly wasn’t the only point of information to our decision making process, but it sure helped!
Have I mentioned that Nike takes really good care of us here? After 6 months, we qualified for our first R&R trip and they help pay for us to get away from it all here... we thought it would be restful and relaxing to go to the jungles of Malaysian Borneo to trek and mountain bike... and it was. It was also eye opening, as travel often is.
I knew about the jungle deforestation going on around the world and I imagine you do too. But in the last few days there have been reports of Beijing level pollution hitting Singapore, from.... wait for it... slash and burn jungle deforestation in neighboring Indonesia. We didn’t get any of that as we were a long way away, but what we did get was a rather heartbreaking view of nearly 200kms through an uninterrupted swath of former jungle that has been turned into plantation after plantation of palm trees for the production of palm oil
It’s obviously providing jobs and money there, which is no small thing, but as is often the case, the real money goes elsewhere it appears. And while the locals get jobs, they also get to be totally deforested, and the plant and animal habitat vanishes. Palm oil is a major ingredient in snack foods, cosmetics and increasingly, bio fuels, which is all frustrating to no end when you see the results of these plantations.
I know I’m simplifying a complex situation here, but it does seem like it should, in the early stages of the 21st century, be possible to develop an industry like this without cutting down everything in sight - we’ve seen this movie and we know how it ends - how about leaving some habitat and corridors for wildlife?.... I just don’t buy the bogus binary construct about about jobs vs ‘the environment’ (as though ‘the environment’ is something other than the planet upon which we all live and depend), or that there aren’t jobs to be had by more responsible farming/extraction etc...but who can stand in the way when there’s a dollar (or Ringgit) to be made? To the Malaysians credit, they are trying to protect some areas, but it sounds as though it’s an uphill battle every step of the way. We visited one protected preserve, and sure enough, there’s a semi recently built planation that abuts the preserve, 30 miles from the nearest main road, across a treacherous dirt road for access.
So in the interest of all of the cool animals below... and the rest of the planet, here’s another thing I would ask you to watch for on ingredient labels and avoid. Palm Oil, Palm Olein, Palm anything basically...
Ok, I’ll descend for the soapbox now...
Julia found a new tour company based in Lahad Datu called Bike and Tours www.bikeandtours.com. They were highly rated online and they worked with us to create a cool itinerary that included time cycling as well as trekking in the jungle. You can see where we were on this map:
We flew into Kota Kinabalu on the NW side of the island, changed planes and immediately headed for Sandakan for the start of our journey. After a night in Sandakan, we headed by boat, east from Sandakan up the Kinabatangan River, (not named, but shown on map heading south towards Sukau). From there we headed to Imbak Canyon for two nights (also not shown, but I think it is somewhere generally around the ‘H’ of Sabah on the map.) From there we combined riding and driving to work our way towards Lahad Datu, and then on to Danum Valley Conservation area for a few nights We travelled by mountain bike and truck to get between locations. All of the riding and much of the driving were on dirt logging/plantation roads. We did several trips on the river to see wildlife, including at night with the aid of a powerful searchlight. In both Imbak and Danum Valley we hiked in the jungle - though in Danum Valley, we saw more wildlife right at the rest house where we were staying. The folks who run the tour company are great and we had a wonderful time with them. Accommodations ranged from very rustic to slightly less rustic to really nice in the guest rooms that they also rent in their home in Lahad Datu.
Hiking in an equatorial jungle was good fun, if incredibly hot - the ambient temperature and humidity were both quite high - this was compounded by wearing long pants and long sleeve shirts much of the time - to try to keep down the amount of blood loss/malaria risk from mosquitoes... and microscopic black flies, and best of all.... leeches!... When I first heard mention of them from our guide, I thought he said Lychees, which are now in season and for sale on the side of the road all over Taiwan right now, and I thought “Great! I love fruit...” Imagine my disappointment to learn that he said leeches....you can’t even eat those... or you probably shouldn’t. Seriously, they were fascinating, tenacious, clearly quite hungry, and everywhere. It wasn’t too big of a deal, but it was novel. Sing along with me won’t you, to the tune of The Steve Miller Band’s ‘Jungle Love’... “Jungle Bugs are driving me mad, making me crazy, crazy, etc etc”...
Like any good jungle, in addition to small bite-y things, there were bigger chompy things like crocodiles,
cats of varying sizes and bears, along with gore-y, trample-y and stomp-y things like boars,
elephants and small rhinos... sadly, it sounds like there are only a very few of the native rhinoceroses left (rhinocerii?) - it appears they are heading for extinction, 30-40 known alive and we were told that breeding efforts in protection/preservation effort are not going well. See plantation deforestation/habitat loss rant above for what appears to be a large reason for their demise.
We saw a wide range of different primates, silver and red leaf monkeys, long tailed and pig tailed macaques, proboscis monkeys (astonishingly unusual creatures when it comes to appearance... beside the nose, they are also naturally pot bellied) I’m thinking one of the other primate species could make a killing with nose jobs and liposuction for the proboscises (proboscii?). My favorite of them all were the orangutans, which we learned literally means People (orang) of the Forest (utan). I think I feel a measure of kinship with them as a result of having freakishly long arms myself. It is so cool to watch all the different types of primates moving through the trees. Video doesn’t really do it justice.
Besides the animals, the trees of the rainforest were amazing, several different types of trees with buttresses of roots for stabilization, others with literal supports that appeared to be rooted as well that were located away from the trunk and supporting branches, vines and all nature of other really cool plants. We didn’t really see any, but the area also hosts a variety of different meat eating plants.
The sounds of the jungle, particularly in the morning, but really anytime was pretty amazing to hear.
For animal geeks following along and scoring this trip at home, here’s a comprehensive list of animals we saw:
Crocodile
Pygmy Squirrel
Proboscis Monkey
Orangutan
Long Tailed Macaque
Pig Tailed Macaque
Red Leaf Eater Monkey
Grey Leaf Eater Monkey
Several types of Kingfishers
White Hornbill
Wild Boar
4 types of Owls
Eagle
Monitor LIzard
This lizard was probably 6 feet long
Many different Egrets
Civets - (small cat)
Mouse Head Deer - which is aptly named, sort of looks like a sci-fi movie experiment gone awry
Some other more traditionally sized and appearing deer, pretty similar to white tails in the US, but actually darker/greyer coat color
Giant Cicada
Tree Frogs
Leeches - Tiger and Leaf
Supersized Centipede type thingy, supersized Pill bug/potato bug, supersized earthworms of several types
Amazing big butterflies, and spiders
And a horde of very grateful (at least I hope they appreciated the meals), black flies and mosquitos
It's getting hotter and more humid here in Taichung, and I'm told it'll get even hotterer and more humid soon. Along with that heat and humidity, the smog and general haziness can get even worse than normal. So it's been a real treat for the last few days that we've had wonderfully clear air and skies despite the heat and humidity. I've wanted to include this view here previously, but every time I've tried to get some video, it's been less than stellar and unworthy of sharing, but no longer...
These two videos were shot from the nice rooftop deck we have on our building, 27 stories high.
I completed my first trip back to the US for some work (and a bit of fun as well)... it was interesting to pay attention to what it all felt like - being back in Portland, seeing friends, seeing the town, you name it.
We’ve only been in Taiwan for 6 months, but it was a surprise how much had already appeared to change around town - houses and buildings that weren’t there when we left etc (though to be fair, neither Julia nor I were in Portland much after Labor Day, and when we were there, we were pretty pre-occupied with getting set to move). But either way, it reminds me how much will be different after 3 years have passed.
I was on a regional jet for my LA to Portland flight, which I mention not because I’m a plane geek, (though I am), but rather to point out that I walked off the plane into the outside air - no jet bridges at PDX for those planes. Even with the jet exhaust etc, I was amazed at how good the air felt, how clean, how fresh, how breathable and how different it is from the air here in Taiwan. It’s a bit scary to realize that I’ve gotten accustomed to Taichung air - perhaps I’ve just thrashed my lungs into submission already?
It was a similar experience in drinking water straight from the tap, happily and eagerly. Here in Taiwan, drinking from the tap probably won’t kill you, but it’s rare to see anyone do it - I think it’s reasonably ok in terms of microbes, they probably chlorinate the heck out of it, but who knows about the water mains to get it to the tap. But more likely an issue is the high possibility of chemical pollutants - which gives me a bit of pause when it comes to local veggies as well. I see the water running out the back of factories into the waterways that irrigate farm fields and rice paddies. What could possibly go wrong there?
Numerous people have asked what I missed most about Portland and the US. At the risk of sounding too Portlandia for my own good, this trip helped me answer that question. Kale. We can get stuff that they call kale here.... but it’s not comparable to any of the kale varieties you see commonly. It’s much more closely akin to lettuce or something - who knows, maybe it’s got loads of vitamins and stuff, but it looks and feels like it’s got a nutritional value only slightly above iceberg lettuce, though it is greener and leafier. So there you have it.
I did also notice the difference in the noise of the city - even downtown Portland is not as loud as Taichung. Same with the vegetation and topography - it’s very green here, and we have mountains (when you can see them) but seeing Doug Firs and Mt Hood every time I turned around - *that* was nice.
Sunset this time of year is profoundly different between US and TW...granted there's no daylight saving time time change here in Taiwan, but even with that, this far south, summer's a whole different deal in terms of time of sunset. The sun set here in Taiwan today at 6:37PM - a far cry from Portland sunset today at 8:45 - and it's almost a month until the Solstice.
We haven’t been here long enough for real homesickness to take hold I don’t think - there’s been too much to do and to learn - no time to really get into that funk so far. But I did notice that I felt very much like coming back to Taichung felt like coming home. I cannot see us living here forever, but it’s very happily home for now.
.... why? Why not!... (and if you're just joining in, this should help explain what these photos are all about)
He totally digs this coffee, so you probably will too...
He's reminiscent of the Little Guy on the box of Quisp cereal, it might just be the propellor head, not sure... this giant ship building is the sales office for a yet to be constructed residential complex on the East side of town.
Directly across the street from the sales office is this billboard... man are you gonna have fun if you buy a place in this complex... well, I wouldn't cause clearly you cannot bicycle if you live there...
As these photos illustrate, the Little Guy often has a helmet, and cape, and occasionally even a rocket pack... this is a Changhua City sign listing local bike paths... Good to know that Changhua City has their own Little Guy...
Here's an advertisement for a locally produced wine that caught my eye on a ride and I thought it would be cool to share. The wine, however, is not cool - I’ve had some (long story involving stop on bike ride outside a shop/restaurant and a guy smoking cigarettes, chewing betelnuts and drinking this wine, which by itself is a whole other post for another time).... Back to the wine, it’s kinda like grape juice with hints of Sterno or something... But this billboard has an angle that I’ve never seen elsewhere in a wine ad, apparently touting their adherence to the ISO 22000 standard, which as best I can tell, is a ‘thing‘ here in Asia...Many ads tout various ISO certifications... not that there aren’t ads in the US or elsewhere that do, but outside of Asia it seems they’re generally confined to trade mags or more specific, narrowly drawn ads. Taiwan, China and Thailand all have many signs and ads touting compliance with one ISO standard or another across all kinds of products/services. As for the wine, if this catches on, I can imagine a future review in Wine Spectator “It’s got a wonderful bouquet, great legs, and hints of strawberry, kumquat, old shoe leather and Sterno with a delightfully piquant ISO 22000 finish”... but seriously, why do wine reviews never mention grapes amongst the various fruit tastes in a wine? Just wondering.
