Day 15: July 18, Hualien, Taiwan 中華民國

[clay dube]

Hi Joseph and all,

Thanks for popping some Chinese into the mix. Taiwan's formal name is 中華民國 (Chinese Republic or Republic of China). Using the Wade Giles romanization: Chung-hua min-kuo. Using the pinyin romanization: Zhonghua minguo. You've got an interesting hybrid: Taiwan republic (using the PRC's gongheguo 共和国 for republic).

You may be interested to see how business cards and other printed matter lists the name of the place. We received cards from people which listed, in English:

Taiwan (R.O.C.)
or
Republic of China (Taiwan)

Names, of course, matter. Many folks could discuss this sort of thing with students. During the 2000-2008 Chen Shui-bian era, the government even revived the name Formosa as part of an attempt to deemphasize the China links....

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the correction Clay. I attribute my mistake to jet lag. =)

[Anonymous]

And there is a film called Formosa Betrayed set in Taiwan that came out last year. It's coming from my Netflix queue and I plan to review it in the Film Festival pages.

Joe, hope your jet lag is getting better. I've had mine for a week, plus!

Kyle

[clay dube]

Hi Joe and Kyle,
I hope both of you are doing better jet-lag-wise. Kyle mentions Formosa Betrayed. Here's an article and video interview our Asia Pacific Arts offered on the film and its creators.
http://asiapacificarts.usc.edu/article@apa?taiwan_conspiracy_interview_with_formosa_betrayeds_will_tiao_and_tzi_ma_14706.aspx

[Anonymous]

Thanks Clay!

[Anonymous]

pic

[Anonymous]

a brave soul

[Anonymous]

team building

[Anonymous]

This is the company who took care of us during the River Trek and Kayaking

[Anonymous]

This is the company who took care of us during the River Trekking and Kayaking.

[Rob_Hugo@PortNW]

Schedule for the day - per itinerary

Nature outdoor activities, river-adventure
Lunch
Hualien train station to Taipei
Dinner box on train
Check into Howard Hotel (1 night of 2)

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We weren't quite sure what to expect from this "river adventure" as we didn't have any details beforehand. Our energetic local guide to Hualien, Theresa, filled us in on what we would be doing.

After departing out hotel, our bus arrived outside a local school. Upon arriving, we saw several other tour groups getting geared up in wet suits, helmets, and life jackets. Our rag tag team of educators, suited up and headed out for our river adventure. Upon further research on the internet, I found that several sites call our river adventure either "river walking", "river tracing" or "river trekking"

Athough we were told what we'd be doing, I don't think we really had any idea until we got closer to the entry point in the river. Along with our tour guides (Theresa and her helpers), we were lead by two river guides and one teenage volunteer (turns out he has the same sur name as me. Chan 陳

We submersed ourselves into the cold icy water, acclimated our bodies and began our trek up the river.
Basically, we traveled upstream in the river by walking, rock climbing, roping, rappelling, jumping, and swimming. Team work was needed to help each other and to encourage each other. Physically, it was a good workout since we've only been sitting and walking for most of the tour. There were parts of the river where we could easily walk while there were other parts where we had to carefully plant our feet while climbing up slippery moss covered rocks. We did have a few slight injuries...minor cuts and bruises due to slips.

There were several other tour groups trekking the same times as us. All groups waited patiently and courteously for each other to pass.

Our group had a lot of fun during this activity. Our two lead tour guides enjoyed "dunking" the girls in water. They displayed a mischievous type of playful attitude while leading us.

This is the website listed on the business card of company that led us on this river trek. It is all in Chinese but if you play around on the site, you can see a lot of pictures from people who've trekked with them.
http://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/streamtracing

The ending point of the trek upstream was where we could jump off a "big cliff" or "small cliff" Everyone in our group, except yours truly, jumped off both cliffs. I'm unsure as to the exact height of the cliffs. (Anyone give a rough estimate?) While people were jumping, our guides/helpers made hot tea/coffee for us to enjoy. Several decided to jump off the cliffs again. Several adventurous souls decided to take the more difficult way up the big cliff by repelling up a rope that ran along it's side.

After we rested up, we headed back downstream. I believe the entire river trekking experience was only about 2 hours. It seemed much longer though because we had a lot of fun. At many levels, this was a stress reliever and I believe, brought our group a bit closer.

We headed back to the school to change out of the wetsuits and headed to lunch.
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After lunch, we had two options 1. Biking around the lake or 2. kayaking in the lake.
We opted for option 2.
We headed to lake (don't know the name) where we were taught by Stan, an Olympic kayaker from ? (somewhere in Europe) who was in town helping to train the Taiwan Olympic teams. Several of the ladies in our group took a strong liking to Stan. Stan taught us the basics of Kayaking. After a quick lesson, we headed down to the lake to kayak. Some in individual kayaks, and some in two-person kayaks. It was a hot day and we were ready to be refreshed by the cool lake water. To our surprise, the lake water was like warm bath water. The lake is fed by underground springs which makes it warm. I believe we kayaked for about an hour before we needed to head back.

After we returned the kayaks, we headed into town for some local Shaved Ice. This Shaved Ice place is well known and we had to wait a long time. In part, because they needed to restock on some supplies. I had the taro with red bean. It was refreshingly cool! The guys from the River Trekking/Kayak place (from the same outfit) joined us too.

Afterwards, we headed toward the Hualien train station where we stopped off at some local shops for last minute souvenirs/mochi shopping. We boarded the train for a about a 3 hour train ride back to Taipei. We had box dinners on our train ride. I found it to be quite good.

We were randomly "assigned" seats on the train. I had an enjoyable conversation with my seat partner.

http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=1275444&lang=eng_news&cate_img=132.jpg&cate_rss=news_Travel_TAIWAN [Edit by="josephchan on Aug 7, 3:46:05 PM"][/Edit]
[Edit by="josephchan on Aug 7, 3:49:17 PM"][/Edit]
[Edit by="josephchan on Aug 10, 11:44:39 AM"][/Edit]

[clay dube]

Hi Everyone --
No one's said anything in the forum for a long time, but I thought I'd drop in and share this article about Hualien:
http://eng.taiwan.net.tw/m1.aspx?sNo=0017048

We spent much of our time climbing a river and paddling about a lake, but this article notes several interesting places within the city itself. Emphasis is on places built during the Japanese colonial period.

[Author]

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