Tales of Expat Living, Teaching, and Tramping in Taiwan and Beyond.
Peanut butter and jelly. Apple pie and ice cream. Wine and cheese. Self mutilation and fireworks? Last night, a religious group in Taiwan hosted a celebration in my neighborhood. It couldn’t be ignored, as thousands of fireworks were exploding for a span of 4 hours. As it turned out ,the Ba Jia Jiang were celebrating one […]
The full moon has been known to make people do crazy things. Good thing the final day of the Chinese New year is always planned to fall on one. It’s my theory that the spell of the moon is one of the reasons the Taiwanese have the balls to jump into a sea of fireworks […]
The Yanshui Firework Festival takes place tomorrow in Tainan, located 40 km north of Kaohsiung. Also known as the Beehive Rocket Festival, it has been deemed the 5th most dangerous festival in the world. The event is compromised of bottle rockets, ritualistic dancing, and good food. Who could ask for anything more? But to make it to […]
I’ve noticed a trend, and I’m sure you have noticed it too. It seems to be that everyone and their mom’s birthday takes place during the Chinese New Year. Today the birthday of Guan Yu, also known as the Chinese God of War, is celebrated with-you guessed it- fireworks. Who is Guan Yu? Guan Yu […]
Jade Emperor, they say it’s your birthday. And by they, I mean the industrial sized fireworks that went off by my building this morning at 7 am. My boyfriend and I (in our half- asleep state) surely thought we were under attack. One would think we would be used to it by now, what […]
To be honest, day six of Chinese New Year is absent of special rituals. We are at the part of the New Year where things have hit a lull. The middle days are a time of quiet (minus the fireworks) when families feast and spend time together, leading to the final day celebration blowouts. Shockingly, […]
Day five of Chinese New Year is the God of Wealth’s birthday. And what does one do on the God of Wealth’s birthday? Well obviously feast on dumplings, duh. And Karaoke. Yes, you gotta have karaoke. Dumplings (餃子, jiǎozi) symbolize wealth because their shape resembles a Chinese tael, an old school system of Chinese weight […]
Day four of Chinese New Year is somewhat uneventful compared to the last few days. The fires have dwindled, the firecrackers are fewer and further between (but make no mistake they are still going strong ), and people have slowly started to make their way back into the cities from holiday. Most importantly, the trash […]
Day Three of Chinese New Year is known as the Chìkǒu 赤口, which directly translates to “red mouth”. It is customary to burn more paper offering over trash fires, but I have witnessed none of this in Kaohsiung. I have been told it is still practiced in rural areas. I guess people in big cities […]
Day one of Chinese New Year is the day for welcoming the Gods of the heavens and earth. At the same time, the evil spirits need to be chased away, hence the non-stop fireworks. In the Western world, fireworks take place on New Years Eve, and then everyone must wait another year for the time […]
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