This so-called chinese Venice

From Shanghai we took a 2 hour bus trip to the so-called chinese Venice. Well, I've been to the true Venice, and this is not the same. I loved Venice, but maybe cause I'm european, and I like art more or less like european people do. Though, I must say that I liked this chinese Venice. In this life, I think it's better not to compare things, and enjoy places for what they are and not fot what they are mend to be.

Anyway, everything in this place is about eating and buying, two things chinese people enjoy a lot. The streets are filled with people, selling, eating, buying things, and asking for a cheaper price. I also enjoy these kinds of activities, so I have had a really good time there.

The Jade Garden of Shanghai

In the old new neighborhood of Shanghai there is a Jade Garden.
The garden was first established in 1559 as a private garden created by Pan Yunduan, who spent almost 20 years building a garden to please his father Pan En, a high-ranking official in the Ming Dynasty (1368-1344) , during his father's old age. Over the years, the gardens fell into disrepair until about 1760 when bought by merchants, before suffering extensive damage in the 19th century. In 1842, during the Opium Wars, the British army occupied the Town God Temple for five days. During the  Taiping Revolution the gardens were occupied by imperial troops, and damaged again by the Japanese in 1942. They were repaired by the Shanghai government from 1956–1961, opened to the public in 1961, and declared a national monument in 1982.

Jade in chinese is called Yù (玉), where emperor is written like 王, cause he was supposed to be the ruler on Earth as Heaven was ruled by the god of Heaven, thats why there is a stick 一 on heaven and and a stick一 for earth and they are both of them united by a stick 一 in the middle, that means that the rules of Heaven would apply to Earth trhough the actions of the Son of Heaven, the Emperor. So, as you can see jade is something very precious and priceless for the chinese culture.

This garden is very beautiful because it's filles with trees and beautiful pieces of art, of sculptures carved in stone, like dragons.

It has the elements, that the chinese tradition says every garden has to own;these are:

• Lake.

• Bridge.

• Trees.

• Stone.

One of the curious things about this kind of gardens is that in every builduing there are windows, but these windows don't have glasses. So every hole, even if it's just a door, can let you watch and enjoy a magnificient view of nature.

The last picture it's seems to be a mirror, but it is not, two brothers wearing the same red jacket.

Campo y playa (Country and beach)

Tres cosas que llevaba tiempo sin hacer:

• Escribir en el blog en castellano (lo siento por los que no lo entienden, pero me lo han pedido).
• Ir a la playa.
• Ir al cine solo, o sin más, ir al cine.

Ayer, aprovechando que el tiempo parecía que cambiara, me fuí a la playa de Anping, ubicada en Tainan. Como no, me perdí, pero un amable vendedor de licores me indicó el camino, a lo que añadió:"...vés ahora, habrá mucha gente." Después ví, como era de preveer, por el día y por la poca afición que tienen los taiwaneses en ir a la playa, que tan solo había 5 o 6 personas aparte de mí, cuatro de las cuales estaban en la arena.

Tenía campo...

y playa...

Como podéis ver, la playa estaba muy limpia y llena de conchas de bivalbos, incluso llegué a ver un pequeño cangrejo, pero tan pronto como cogí la cámara y el objetivo adecuado, se escondió.
A lo poco de llegar, empezó a lloviznar.
La verdad es que aquí, lo de "pel maig cada dia un raig" , se cumple más que en Catalunya.

Cómo véis, el bambú no sólo es un ingrediente del típico "bambú con setas", también lo ponen en la playa, supongo que es para que el agua no se coma el trozo de arena.

Después, por la noche , a eso de las 19.00 me fuí al cine a ver "Thor". Dejando de lado la "mala calidad" de la película, no sé en que anda últimamente Keneth Branagh!!!, la sorpresa me la llevé cuando tuve que pagar la entrada: 195 NTD (que no llegan a ser unos 5 euros), por una película que lleva menos de un mes en cartel. Me sorprendí gratamente. Claro que cuando entré en la sala de proyección, ya no me pareció tan barata: la pantalla era grande pero no muy grande y la calidad del sonido era bastante deplorable.
Aún así disfruté de la película y no descarto la posibilidad de ir la semana que viene a ver "X-men First Class" o "Hangover II".  En el cine, había "tantas" personas como en la playa, pero no eran las mismas.

Lo bueno del cine, aparte del precio, eran los baños, o las puertas de los baños. Al más puro estilo marcial.

Me acordé del cine de "Los Alcázares", en mi infancia, al aire libre con el suelo de arena, donde se podía comer un bocadillo, pipas o lo que quisieras. Además, los vecions del cine podían ver la película desde sus balcones sin pagar. Valía 300 pesetas y tenías dos películas del año de la María Castaña. Era un lujo de cine.

Beauties of Taiwan, Danshuei

In the north of Taiwan, there is a small village called Danshui (淡水) which means "fresh water". It takes about one hour to arrive there from Taipei by subway. The first time I've been there was around 5 or 6 years ago, and a typhoon had killed a great amount of fish, so the water was covered with a bed of fish.

This year I've been there twice, and now I know why the spanish and then the dutch that came here were that amazed by the views and the quiteness you can feel in this place.

Far away from the noise of the capital (Taipei) but also full of life, people walking around and buying, eating, drinking, well, what taiwanese like to do, and most of the people from the planet.

There is a good walk all along the river side, the Danshui river, and good looks from the Fort Santo Domingo (como lo bautizaron los españoles).

At the end of the ninetenth century there was a canadian presbyterian father who came to Taiwan, then he met a taiwanese woman, and they got married. So, this man lived in Danshui, with his wife until he died.

N'Anna ha perdut ses claus!!!

Well, for non-catalan speakers I must say that the title translation is: "Anne has lost her keys!!!". Instead of Anne, put Roger and then add motorcycle before keys, and you will know what happened to me when I took "my" Tainan motorbike keys from Tainan to Taipei and then I lost them.
That happened on April, and I sure I spend like 3 hours of my life desperately looking for this m******* keys. My search and my desperation didn't serve for anything.

I thought that I would have to change the key engine, and they told me that will be like three thousand NTD (75 euros). As soon as I arrived Tainan I told that to my wife's parents, and they called the key maker, who looked like the one in Matrix Reloaded. After 30 minutes and 600 NTD (15 euros), the key maker gave us 2 keys of the VINOmobile,.....and they worked!!!!

The funny part of the story is that two days ago, I've found the VINOmobile's (motorbike) that apparently, I had lost on April...!!!!!

The VINOmobile in the VINOcave (La VINOmóbil en la VINOcueva)

So, as you can see in the picture, now we have 3 keys for my VINOmobile!!!!I'll keep an eye on them, and two of them will be permanently at home, just in case!!!

So, remember, if this happens in Spain, don't call the spanish keymaker, cause it will cost you like 150 euros, and then the keys would not worked!!!!!Anyway, I don't know probably a spanish guy who would have the ability to do the thing the taiwanese key maker did here in Taiwan,  in Spain, will have a lots of motorcycles to sell!!!!I'm just kidding!!!

Looks can be deceived!!!

Yakuza tatoo...nooooooo, they kicked my back.....nooooo, they kicked me with glasses ....nooooo
I just received a massage method consisting of putting glasses in my back, heating them to make void and then applying them to my back. It's called the cupping massage therapy. It seems very painful, and it is, in some parts of the body. Three days has passed since they treat me like that and I still can feel the heat in every spot. I planned to go to the beach, since Tainan is very hot these days, but I'll wait till these spots are missing.....

Do you remember a beer TV ad about Heineken? Well, for me it's the same with UOC.

In that advertisement people spoke using only the word "Heineken", well for me these past days and also now, my only word is UOC.

So UOC, UUUUUUUUUOC, UOOOOOOOC?

That's my world now, but I do something more. This past week I've been taking care of children and at the same time I was supposed to be doing my homework at the UOC University, Studies of Oriental Asian.

That situation reminds me about what the big master Hitchcok said once about not making films with kids...
and something that said the magnificent director Alejandro Amenabar to the kids' actor who played a role in "The other", it was like: "What a little movie you are giving to me", in spanish has more sense since it's:"Vaya películita me estáis dando".
Anyway, I had to deal with it and i rather died in my experience, then i've passed two days working from dusk till dawn (6 in the morning) and then I had to make a conference about Spain, Catalonia and Barcelona, very easy, but in chinese....
I've survived and I'll make this blog live again!!!!!
Yet, lots of things not yet explained!!!!!!!
Something about China and a lot about Taiwan!!!!!Maybe, something about Vietnam, but this would be on June......