Trip to Taiwan, part three of many

After much talk about what W and I could do with our remaining time, we decided that on Sunday we were going to see Juming Museum. Located north of Taipei in the Jinshan area, the outdoor museum occupies a large chunk of mountain and was originally conceived as a lot where the artist Ju Ming (Zhu Ming) could store all his sculptures. Naturally any such large collection of art could be retooled into a tourist attraction, so that's exactly what Mr. Ju did.

Getting there involved a pleasant drive through Tamshui, along the northern coastline of Taiwan (where the sea was beautiful), then snaking up Jinbao Mountain. Once we got there we got a fantastic view of the valley below, toward the town of Jinshan. We managed to find a tour group that was one short of the group discount (score!). By that point it was already noon, so we had lunch in the cafeteria before entering the museum grounds.

Mr. Ju's art is organized into several series: there's the Living World series of everyday people, the Tai Chi series of various rock sculptures inspired by his experience practicing the martial art, and the military series of soldiers from the army, navy, and air force. The media range from bronze cast sculptures (often showing the twine-wrapped foam that he used to create larger pieces), bent steel tubing, large rock carvings, and wood carvings. In all of his art the lines are simple, yet somehow he manages to convey lifelike expression in the faces and postures. The giant rock arches (which must be some two stories tall) in the Tai Chi series come to life, even with the human element so thoroughly abstracted away that at first glance they seem to be inanimate.

There was also a side exhibit of photographs by Laurent La Gamba called "Urban Camo". In what he called "Pro-cryptic installations", the French artist got his friends and family to wear white jumpsuits and painted their clothing to match the background behind them. A series of photos showed these people in supermarket aisles, and another merged human and appliance (fridges and washers) together in many different colors reminiscent of Andy Warhol's silkscreened prints. La Gamba also convinced swimming pool owners to pose in front of their pools with a fridge nearby, and even photographed "cosmonauts" inside a model of the Mir Space Station.

Trip to Taiwan, conclusion

This week was much less exciting. My gums behind my lower left second molar were inflamed and somewhat tender to the touch, so on Monday I went back to my cousin for a brief checkup, who applied some topical medication and told me it should be better within the week. Afterwards I paid a visit to my Aunt #5, who talked to W and I for an hour, mostly about how I can apply to med school (with the underlying assumption being, of course, that I am continuing my studies....).

The next day we drove up to my grandmother's grave, cleaned up her tombstone a bit, and sealed it to the wall with some silicon caulk.... wait a minute, I guess I have some explaining to do. So in Taiwan, graves are shaped like the top of an armchair. The tombstone is affixed what would be the back of the seat, the coffin itself on top of the seat cushion with one end touching the back, a little shrine to the Earth God just inside one arm, and a miniature furnace inside the opposite arm. The entire gravesite is tiled over (including the coffin). So if the seal between the tombstone and the back is damaged by water, gravity takes over and you can imagine the mess it would make.

Late Tuesday afternoon I was watching TV, and W came into the living room asking me if I had noticed the earthquake. I said, "uh, what earthquake?" and then noticed that a power cable dangling nearby was swinging in the air. Apparently I was just unobservant because my parents also noticed the ground shaking downstairs. Only later did we find out that there was in fact a quake of magnitude 6.7 down south in Hengchun, which killed 2 people when a three-story furniture store collapsed and wounded some 42 people in various other collapses and fires. Luckily up in Taipei it only felt like a quake of magnitude 2....

The last full day we were in Taiwan, my parents wanted to take us out to lunch, so we dropped by a restaurant serving cuisine from Xinjiang for a special treat. It wasn't exactly an experience to write home about, but I rather enjoyed my leg of lamb and noodles. And all of us tasted the three different soups they had to offer, which were all meaty broths with generous helpings of julienned ginger. While I was eating I looked around and noticed the hangings on the wall--a traditional Uyghur tapestry, a large poster explaining Uyghur cuisine, and a map of the Silk Road. I didn't get a chance to get a good look up close, but I did manage to take a few snapshots on my camera phone.