jeanne boden

honoring the ancestors

One of the common things in the streets of Taiwan's cities is a table with gifts for the ancestors. As you can see the ancestors should not complain with all this food and drinks and on top of that a pack of joss paper money. As people believe that ancestors continue to have influence after the pass on to the hereafter, they are well looked after.

cosmic symbols and chinese characters upside down

What looks like an ordinary door at first sight carries a lot of symbols if we look a bit deeper. 

The design on the door reflects the traditional view of the cosmos, with square earth and round heaven. This pattern is very popular in design in China. 

Next to the door we see the Chinese character for Spring '春', upside down. Around Chinese New Year people paste Chinese characters for 'good fortune' or 'Spring' on red paper on the door to obtain a lot of good luck in the coming year. The Chinese character is pasted upside down because 'upside down' or ‘dao' '倒' in the same pronunciation 'dao' '到' also means 'to arrive'. Pasting the character upside down thus means 'good fortune arrives'.  

 

98th year of the republic of china

The poster behind the gods shows the moon calendar from which people can read their 'luck' during the '98th year of the Republic of China'. 

Taiwan uses a particular system of counting the years that starts with the establishment of the 'Republic of China' in 1911. In 2009 it was the '98th year of the Republic'. This poster is an example from a temple in Taiwan, but also in business Taiwan uses this way of counting years, as of course opposed to the 'People's Republic of China'. 
 

Quite complex all these calendars!

The People's Republic of China uses the Gregorian calendar and the traditional moon calendar. 

Taiwan uses the Gregorian calendar, the traditional moon calendar plus it's own system starting in 1911.

temple roof in tainan

 

male and female

 

it's all in the hand

'The chart of good and bad between man and women'

In the holistic concept of the universe man is just a tiny part of a bigger system. That means that fate can be read from all kinds of things: the eight characters of birth, one's physical appearance, the shape of one's face, and so on. Not only fate can be detected, also the match between man and woman can be read. Do you want to know if you match up? Just take a look: it's all in your hand. 
 

falungong and pigeon meditating at the sun yat-sen memorial

You don't see them in the People's Republic of China anymore, as the sect is forbidden there. But in Taiwan and Hong Kong they are actively trying to convince everyone passing by. 

The falungong is a religious sect established by Li Hongzhi in 1992. When they started to take a clear anti-Chinese government stand they were forbidden in Mainland China. They are very active in Hong Kong and Taiwan, engaging on the one had in what looks like deep meditation and on the other hand strong anti-China propaganda.

tainan petrol station

 

tainan street

The streets in Taiwan have a very different feel than the streets in communist China. More bikes instead of bicycles is one reason, traditional Chinese characters instead of simplified Chinese characters is another reason. This is Tainan.

‘universal love seats’ - 博爱座

In Taipei Subway