From paddy to table

This is a video that shows rice cultivation from planting, harvesting, processing, packaging and eventually cooking. It is a Taiwanese commercial farming operation and equipment they use to plant and harvest the rice is pretty amazing.

  

Playing with fire

I find these two guys to be entertaining and informative. They lived in China for several years and speak fluent Chinese. After sensing things were going south in China, they moved to the States, but they still primarily cover China. Their insights are always interesting and presented in an entertaining manner. Among other posts, they run a weekly podcase a podcast I usually watch at least in part.

As for Taiwan, after Hong Kong we should state that the 'One China Two Systems' position is clearly no longer tenable and that we don't recognize the CCP's position on that matter.

 

Walking in Taipei on a windy night

The above video is a bit different than my usual walking in cities video in that it is a night walk. He starts out in side streets and alleys, walks through a small and busy commercial area and ends up on quieter streets again. It is a long video and about half way through he enters what I think is a park. It is pretty dark in that portion of the video, so you may want to skip forward through parts of that.

As an aside, I have my own walking in Taipei at night story. Something they used to wash the sheets in the hotel I was staying in disagreed with me and my entire body turned into one giant itch. To get as far away from the cursed sheets as I could I went out for a walk.

One of my markers for how safe an unfamiliar neighborhood is how many women are out and about. Well, as long as they're not the sort of young ladies that dress trashy and ask sailors if they want a good time if you know what I mean, and I think that you do. Although my walk was later than the video walk, there were still a fair number of women unconcerned to be out alone. In fact, I would hazard they were more apprehensive at the sight of a hairy, big nosed barbarian emerging from the shadows than I was over anyone I encountered or anything I saw.

Taipei used to have walls and I read in a guidebook that all that was left of them was a single gate. It was near my hotel, or at least from looking at the map I thought it was near. It took a bit of walking, and getting lost now and again, but eventually I found it. That's it below as seen in the daylight. Altogether it was a pleasant walk -- certainly more pleasant than those itch infested sheets. 

Taipei's North Wall Gate

 

Street food at the Ruifeng Night Market

This video shows some food from a night market in Kaohsiung Taiwan. I love Taiwanese night markets, they feature a lot of stalls and stores with all sorts of goods and have a lot of venders selling street food. Tasting the different foods is a lot of appeal of the places.

Of the food shown I would love to try the Big Takoyaki Ball in a cup (although the commenters to the video seem to think they are overcooked and that it is a shame to break the balls up before serving them) or the Flaming Beef Cubes cooked with a blowtorch.

Legislator vs legislator

With the Holidays it's not exactly hump day, but that's no reason not to have a fight video to get you over the hump in a Monday that comes on a Wednesday. This one features the Taiwanese legislature in one of their frequent brawls.
  

The painted village

In the 1940s a village was built in Taichung, Taiwan to house soldiers and their dependents. Over the years it began to fall into decay until Mr. Huang Yung-fu, an older gentleman in his 80s, began to paint its walls and pavements. As you can see in the pictures, he got quite carried away with his painting, but in the process he revitalized the neighborhood by turning it into a popular tourist destination.

You can see more pictures at Amusing Planet, or at Steve Barringer's (the photographer who took these pictures) flicker stream.

Wednesday Links

The persistent and dangerous illusion of political unity.

President Nanobama.

The demise of the Republican party?

Ruby + Lisp in one slick package.

Obama and the KGB.

Are sharks going extinct?

The opportunities of Taiwan.

The home of the apple.

Obama and the Founding Fathers.

Evolving white blood cells to kill HIV.

Introducing BeatMyPrice.

Opportunities sadly missed.

The robot guitar tunes itself.

Close the border!

Rethinking the idea of the gene.

Just how do you lose a whole pyramid?