People of Taiwan

There are very few foreigners visiting Taiwan. When I've asked people, (including Ben and Enshi) the consensus is that most people would visit the mainland given the choice. Although lots of signs are in English as well as Mandarin and Taiwanese, we haven't seen very many foreigners. People either point us out to their neighbors or we are greeted with a warm, "hellohowareyou?"

It seems like the people around here not just allow photos, but really like them. Oddly enough, almost any occasion is worthy of a picture.

On our last day on Green Island, our scooter refused to start. We had just toured the Human Rights Memorial and were at about KM 7 (out of 20). Paul tried over and over again to kick start it (the electric starter never worked) but to no avail. A friendly guy (a fireman getting training in ocean rescue on G.I.) with a very limited knowledge of English called the hotel for us since our grasp of Mandarin is even more limited. The hotel guy came and got the scooter, leaving us in the shade (at least 85 degrees) waiting for a replacement. This group of young people took our picture and before you know it, we were posing with them and taking pictures of them and so on.

The group of workers are making Sha Lom Bao, fantastic steamed dumplings. It is not uncommon for a group of people to work together to assemble food and they never seem to mind photos. In another restaurant, about 5 guys sat around a table folding dumplings, laughing and enjoying themselves and making hundreds.

The little girl (in the picture) was practicing her English with us at the encouragement and to the delight of her proud Mom. It was fun until they sat next to us on the one hour boat ride and the picture-taking started. It seemed for awhile like we would be entertaining her, but then they went outside and all was well.

The final picture was taken by me at the B&B in Hualien, at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Wu. The young man is another tenant, Singing Li, a student in NY from Taiwan, home for the summer. Ben guesses that one of the photos taken that night will be posted on their website.