Jinshan and Jinbaoli Street
Jinshan
is home to the famed Taiwanese sculptor Ju Ming’s museum, which is an open-air
museum set on a large estate.
The scale and number of his works provides an immersive experience for visitors who, like me, like to get lost in someone else’s imagination. You could easily spend half a day exploring the grounds, and you might not be done even then. Ju Ming is most famous for his Tai Chi series, which you
can find dispersed throughout the world, including one piece on Mont-Royal in Montreal. It’s amazing how elegant these massive hunks of roughly hewn rocks can be, and even a clueless amateur like me can appreciate the artist’s talent in finding fluidity and grace in rock. Those rocks probably dance better than I do, too.
Nearby, Jinbaoli Street offers one of the quirkiest eating experiences in Taiwan. You’re basically asked to “rob” food from a temple, and then find a table somewhere else down the street. Eventually you do pay, but it’s cheap, delicious, and it shows just how trusting Taiwanese are in the honesty of people. You should try the bamboo and the chicken, as both are exquisite.
The scale and number of his works provides an immersive experience for visitors who, like me, like to get lost in someone else’s imagination. You could easily spend half a day exploring the grounds, and you might not be done even then. Ju Ming is most famous for his Tai Chi series, which you
can find dispersed throughout the world, including one piece on Mont-Royal in Montreal. It’s amazing how elegant these massive hunks of roughly hewn rocks can be, and even a clueless amateur like me can appreciate the artist’s talent in finding fluidity and grace in rock. Those rocks probably dance better than I do, too.
Nearby, Jinbaoli Street offers one of the quirkiest eating experiences in Taiwan. You’re basically asked to “rob” food from a temple, and then find a table somewhere else down the street. Eventually you do pay, but it’s cheap, delicious, and it shows just how trusting Taiwanese are in the honesty of people. You should try the bamboo and the chicken, as both are exquisite.
Meinong
Meinong is a small Hakka town in Kaohsiung. It has a Hakka Culture Museum, and
the food there will make it hard to leave. It doesn’t hurt that the drive there
is spectacular. It winds from Kaohsiung through the “Tianliao Moon World”,
Taiwan’s badlands.
It’s a very impressive drive, and the badlands are worth
exploring on your own, off trail if you can. There are many spots that have
been prepped for tourists, but they civilize the place a little too much for my
liking. Badlands should be rough, not all properly landscaped. So go ahead and
get well off the beaten path here.
If you wish to get a taste of Taiwan’s Hakka culture, Meinong is a good place to start. By the time we got there the museum had closed, so Meinong’s place on this list depends entirely on the scenic beauty of Meinong and Tianliao, and a mind-blowingly delicious yet quite simple meal. We stopped at a small restaurant to get bantiao,
and it was so good that sharing it was a
real testament of our love for one another. Meinong makes for a lovely day trip
from Kaohsiung, with the option of extending your stay to explore the badlands.
Unfortunately, we have somehow managed to misplace our pictures of both Jinshan and Tianliao. So the pictures shown here belong to the public domain.
If you wish to get a taste of Taiwan’s Hakka culture, Meinong is a good place to start. By the time we got there the museum had closed, so Meinong’s place on this list depends entirely on the scenic beauty of Meinong and Tianliao, and a mind-blowingly delicious yet quite simple meal. We stopped at a small restaurant to get bantiao,
Unfortunately, we have somehow managed to misplace our pictures of both Jinshan and Tianliao. So the pictures shown here belong to the public domain.
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