I was highly anticipating both of the visits we had scheduled for today. First, we visited a small printing company called Hong Jaan, which is owned by Prof. Chen’s brother in law. I was interested for this reason, but I also desired to see the manufacturing side of the supply chain after having visited other companies that were more on the management and shipment side of business. It was also a chance to see more concrete examples of how religion influences business, as it would be more evident in a company with seven total employees. Indeed, if you look in the picture below on the right, there is a shrine mounted in front of a red rectangle of wall paper. Employees and owner alike pray to it every 2nd and 16th day of each lunar calendar month, which is the day after they would pray to their family shrine. The deity on display is known as Tu Di Gong, the earth god or the real estate god. Burnt incense and spirit/paper money are used to appease him and bring wealth and fortune to the company. In December, around the same time employees receive bonuses, they also prepare a larger offering of chicken, fish, and pork that they will eat together when the ritual is done.
You’ll notice another connection to religion in that same picture, as Chu Feng Yi (the owner) is holding up a sheet of uncut talismans. Some temples will handwrite the characters on each talisman, which contain the location, name of the temple, name of the deity, and the god seal. However, as such talismans are used so often for burning, keeping in the house, or made into talisman water, some temples will utilize automated machinery to print them.
We were also lucky to see the production line for an example printing job. Chu Feng Yi showed us all the steps that involved automation versus manual labor. He first cut the paper down to size and lined it up to move it between machines, as seen in the first video clip below. My favorite part was seeing how they used air pumped through small holes in the table to move the heavy block of paper more easily, like skee-ball. There are two machines that use offset printing, or printing with a steel sheet onto a rubber roll and then rolling that over paper, and one prints double-sided while the other is one-sided. For the duration that these machines are active, the song Greensleeves would chime out a warning. You can hear this faintly in the background of the second video clip below. I think this sounds a lot better than a blaring alarm, but I can imagine it gets really annoying to hear every time you need to use the machine. It reminds me of the FamilyMart jingle that plays everytime someone walks into the store: I heard the cashier humming along to it today and thought it might represent his descent into madness. Here’s a link to a video of the current FamilyMart jingle https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlEejhv_x-E.
Peter then gave us a short tour of Dihua Street before releasing us to explore, shop, and get lunch. We saw many traditional Chinese medicine stores with all manner of dried fruits, herbs, and other unique products. Two primarily stood out to me: caviar and swallow’s nests. Taiwanese caviar, or mullet roe, is baked into slabs so that you can cut slices off to eat. Swallow’s nests are evidently valued for not only the health benefits of swallow saliva, but for its taste too. A box of nests, which has about 10 if I remember correctly, costs about US$1500. Maybe I’d eat a bite of one just to try, but I couldn’t even get my classmates to go splitsies on a box so I’ll just have to live without this delicacy. The roe was more attainable, pricing at about US$40 for a medium-sized package. Since we only had about an hour and a half to look around on our own, we spent most of it window shopping a bit and then finding the nearest ramen place. It was Malli and Mikey’s first time having real ramen, and they gave it good ratings.
We then had the evening to ourselves, and we first endeavoured to find the nearest cat café. It was only NT$50 for 10 minutes plus unlimited refills of either milk tea or pomelo green tea. I could picture myself parking myself there for over an hour with a book and access to unlimited refills of over 25 flavors, surrounded by fluff. Although some of the cats were shorthair or sphinxes, one of which was completely hairless! I’ve put some of my faves below. Two of them are from a different café called Entry Time, which sends a postcard associated with your drink order to your future self.
Later in the evening we journeyed up some 20 stops on the red line to Beitou, a region with some of Taiwan’s best hot springs. There was a riverside foot path that ran from the Xinbeitou station up to near the Puji Temple, which ended up being a primary destintation. It was raining buckets and my feet were drenched all the way through, but the sacred lotuses in the rain were so picturesque and prototypically mediative. Places often close on Mondays here in Taiwan, so unfortunately some other attractions such as the Thermal Valley were not open, but I would absolutely come back. Especially on a clearer day, as the steam from the hot springs would be a lot more visible and we would have an easier/faster trek.
After ritual washing our already-wet hands at the base of the stairway and then climbing a few flights of the rain-slick steps, we reached Puji Temple. It is a Buddhist temple that was built during the Japanese occupation, same as Beitou. Much of the temple expresses this Japanese influence, such as the tatami floors, and also influences from Tang and Song dynasty architecture. It is made fully from Taiwanese wood and has no nails: all the wood beams are cut to fit together perfectly. As we had arrived at around 4:40, we aimed to linger long enough to see the closing ceremony. Many temples will open with a bell’s gong and close with the banging of a drum. Instead, we were greeted by a Taiwanese monk who was staying for two months before heading to Vancouver. He said he had two English names: Deep Ocean and Stupid. Why the second one? Because if anyone ever called him stupid, rather than become angry he would say “Wow! How do you know my name?”.
Our conversation with him followed along much of this same vein. We stayed for about an hour learning about who Buddha was and what some of his teachings were. The monk gave us five lessons specifically. I will do my best to summarize. First, do not be a slave to others by giving into your anger (as by his name example). Second, life and energy must be balanced: you must absorb both the good and the bad things that come your way. Third, you are the master of your life and you may walk through it proudly and in peace. Fourth, you must be like ocean, unaffected by the comings and goings of waves. As in, do not get carried away by earthly worries. And lastly, there is no “my” but rather “I”; if everything is you, treat everything and everyone with compassion and respect. He was a very friendly monk, and very good at storytelling and explaining. I do wish he’d given his real name so I could maybe look him up since he’s traveling to the states haha. He gave us a parting gift as well, a blessing bag for one’s health.
