Taiwan OELP Day 6 Reflection

Gladys:

Today we visited Shih-fen Old Street.

Shih-fen Old Street is filled with souvenir shops, grocery stores and sky lantern stalls on both sides of the railway. I think this is a really interesting place as we get to light sky lanterns which we will never get to do so in Singapore due to the lack of space. We also get to see the unique scene of trains running right through the old street. This is a really good place for photography and also sampling local snacks. Different colours of the sky lantern had different meaning but since we went there for a learning experience, we were given purple which represented studies. Every CID group was given a sky lantern to write our wishes on. Some of us had one entire side for our own, while others had to share. When we finish writing our wishes on the sky lantern, it was finally time to light the lantern. One of the staff there helped us take photos of us with the sky lantern. I think all of us felt really happy and proud when we released the sky lattern and watched it rise into the sky slowly. Some of us went to walk to the Jingan Suspension Bridge located near the Shihfen Station.

The view from the bridge was really breathtaking and I heard it was originally used for transporting coal.  I really had a great time at Shihfen Old Street and will never forget those wonderful memories.

Next we went to the National Dr. Sun Yat-sen Memorial hall.

This museum was built not only served to provide a place of rememberance of the national founding father but also for culture and artistic education, leisure recreation and academic research. Dr Sun Yat-sen is a universally respected historical figure. Later generations honor his memory in a variety of ways. His theories still continue to be studied and advocated and serve as the foundation of cross-straits peace. His three principles of the people "Nationalism, Democracy and Livelihood" are still put into practice everywhere in Taiwan, awaiting the evalution of history. We can also find a portrait of Dr Sun Yat-sen on Taiwan the front of New Taiwan Dollar today.

After the visit to the museum, I got to learn more about Dr Sun Yat-sen and why he is so important in Taiwan.

Lastly, we went to The National Palace Museum.

It houses the largest collection of priceless Chinese artifects and artwork in the world. I was really fascinated by all the artwork being displayed as all of them look really nice. I think all of the artwork were skilfully made and it would be really rare if anybody still had the skill to make the art pieces with such detailed drawings. The skill for making those art pieces had already been lost, so if the museum don't preserve this art pieces, the younger generation will never get to appreciate and learn the culture. One of the art piece that I remebered vividly was the jade cabbage. It was carved from a single piece of jade that is half grey and half emerald green. The artist used the green part to carve the leaves and the grey part to carve the outter part of the cabbage. It was one of the treasures of the museum  as it was part of the dowry Concubine Jin in the Qing Dynasty. I really learned a lot from this museum and it also taught me that every single art piece has its own story and I learned how to appreciate art better.

Jing Yan:

We visited Shih-fen old street today also known as 十份老街。

We were there to send our wishes up via sky lanterns (放天灯). It was a very meaningful experience as we saw everyone writing their well wishes for their studies/family etc. We saw that the teachers mostly wrote stuff about winning the lottery xD As there were only 4 sides to a lantern and there were 5 people in our CID group, i shared a side with Emily.

We wrote many wishes, including those silly ones like meeting various celebrities. Sky lanterns were invented by Kongming, where he first used it to summon troops for help. Hence till now, it is also known as Kongming lanterns (孔明灯). There were also many souvenirs available for purchase. They sold mostly keychains of mini sky lanterns of different colours/designs and well wishes on it such as 早生贵子，各家平安，十分幸福. Apparently from our tour guide, Uncle Jeff, the phrase 十分幸福 was popular as the place we went to (十份) had people with the sirnames (姓) Foo which had the same pronunciation as the Chinese word (福). 

We went to the Sun Yat Sen memorial hall after that. When we arrived, i found it rather strange to see two guards in the Navy uniform standing very still. I later learnt they were there to guard the statue of Sun Yat Sen and i felt it was a rather strict way to train their discipline as well, due to the fact that they have to stand still for around an hour and then perform some stunts for 15 minutes during the changing of guards. It was really cool and i enjoyed the "performance". We learnt many things about Sun Yat Sen and some of them were also beneficial to our History lessons. We also found a paragraph about the Communist and Kuomintang from our History coursebook there at the memorial (Haha Mr Tan we found out where you got your information). Sun Yat Sen was also really smart and is on the Taiwan note. 

Next, we went to the National Palace Museum. It was indeed as beautiful and grand as the photos i saw on google. It looked just like a palace and was really nice. Our very own Uncle Jeff was our 讲解人 for that trip. He explained each artifact and the use of it. Some of them stretched to dates very long ago like the Qing Dynasties. Some artifacts required advanced skills and sadly, not even the best technology could be able to forge the artifacts. It showed that modern technology may not be better than the past. The artifacts were very precious and mostly made of expensive elements such as jade, 琉璃 etc. It was an enriching experience and the artifacts were all very pretty. As photography was not allowed, i could not take any pictures. 

Kheng Lon:

Today was our 6th day in Taiwan, Taipei. We went to Shih-Fen Old Street after having breakfast. On the coach, the tour guide explained that we are going there in the morning instead as Shih-Fen Old Street is more crowded during the night. I was really excited after knowing that we were going to release the sky lanterns into the sky. Before we knew it, we reached Shih-Fen Old Street. The tour guide said that in Shih-Fen, we were able to walk on the train track! We walked on the pebble-filled track, taking pictures and having fun by trying to balance on the rails. It was a totally different experience for me as I had never walked on a train track before. It is really hard to imagine walking on the train tracks in Singapore. Suddenly, we heard a whistle, signifying that a train is approaching. We quickly kept to one side and saw an old train slowly trudging pass. We were given some free time to spare. I saw a lot of shops selling small lanterns as souvenirs, with blessings written. I found them unique and bought some. Most shops sold souvenirs, drinks and food. Before long, we returned to our meeting point to release sky lanterns! There were many lanterns of different colours but we were only allowed purple as it represents doing well in studies. We wrote our wishes on the enormous purple lanterns. Afterwards, it was time to release the lanterns. Someone from the store helped us to light the lantern and offered to take a picture. We then released the lantern and watch it rise higher and higher. It was a splendid sight as our lantern slowly vanish into the vast sky. This was my first time releasing sky lanterns and I enjoyed myself tremendously. In Singapore, we were not allowed to release sky lanterns without permission probably due to space constraint or the possibility that it might affect planes nearby. After all the groups were done releasing the lanterns, we moved to our next destination—the National Dr. Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall. When we arrived, we managed to catch a glimpse of the majestic Taipei 101!

At the memorial hall, we were greeted by an enormous statue of Dr. Sun Yat-sen. I realised there were two guard statues in front of the statue. After closer inspection, I realised that they were real! The guards stood so still that I thought they were statues. I later learn from the guide that there is a formal changing of guards every hour and the guards must keep extremely still for an hour. We managed to witness the changing of guards which I find really cool. I feel that the guards have high levels of discipline in order to stand still for so long. I could not even stand still for a minute! I really admire these guards as it physically and mentally tiring to stand so long. The tour then went on to explain some artifacts and Sun Yat-sen's beliefs. Since we had some general information about Sun Yat-sen during history lessons, we were able to understand the guide's explanation. The trip was interesting and we even got to see a realistic projection of Sun Yat-sen. After the visit, I had a better understanding of Sun Yat-sen's beliefs and noble contributitions as the Father of modern China.

Our third destination was the National Palace Museum. Our tour guide will be our guide in the museum. He explained that the museum will be extremely crowded, thus he will communicating with us through headphones. We saw many priceless artifacts, some of them collected by Chinese emperors. The artifacts were crafted beautifully, some made of precious metals like jade and emerald. Before leaving us some free time, I remembered that the tour guide telling us about the interesting origin of qingming. It happened during 寒食节 when chong er had no food to eat. Jie zitui would cut meat from his own thigh and offer it to chong er. When chong er was enthroned, he wanted to repay Jie. When he could not find Jie in the forest, he ordered his men to set fire, thinking that a filial Jie would escape the forest with his mother. However, he found out that Jie had been killed together with his mother and was extremely remorseful. He then ordered 3 days without fire to honour Jie. Qingming then turned out to be a holiday where people honour their ancestors at burial sites. It was a good learning experience and I learnt a lot from the ancient artifacts.

Today was another amazing day and the dinner was awesome as we had Xiang long bao. It was also the last day we are staying at a hotel as we are going back to Singapore the next day. Nevertheless, we had a wonderful time today.