Trip to Taipei: July 4-5

On July 4-5, San Sin High School was being used for standardized testing administration.  The Summer English Program could not be held during this time.  So the American teachers traveled to the capital city of Taipei with Jerry and Ellie Fussell as their tour guides.  They boarded the High Speed Rail at Zuoying, and reached Taipei after a 90-minute train ride (a 4-5 hour ride by car!). Their time was planned wisely for the two-day trip to maximize their opportunities to experience the very best tourist sites in Taipei. Their first stop was the Taipei Zoo!

 

Next, the group traveled to the National Palace Museum, one of the largest museums in the world. It has a permanent collection of 696,000 pieces of ancient Chinese calligraphy, ceramics, bronzes, and other artifacts. Over 8,000 years of Chinese history is revealed through these artifacts.  Many of them were collected by the ancient emperors of China from the Neolithic age to the late Qing Dynasty. 

In 1949, civil war was raging between the Nationalist Government and the Communists. The government shipped 600,000 works of art to Taiwan in order to protect them.  The permanent collection of over 680,000 pieces has been stored in the National Palace Museum in Taipei since 1965.  The museum is extremely popular and is visited by a large numbers of tourists!

The teachers traveled to the Taipei 101 Observatory, one of the tallest buildings in the world.  They traveled up to the 89th floor in the world's fastest high-speed elevator and viewed the extensive city of Taipei in all directions. The Observatory holds the world's largest wind damper, and is built to resist the strongest earthquakes and gale winds.  The teachers dined in the Taipei 101 Grand Market, which seats up to 1,200 people---and it was so crowded that nearly every seat was taken!  

Their next stop was the remarkable Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall, a tribute to a great leader who led the wars against the Chinese Communist Party. This beautiful memorial hall was inaugurated in 1980, five years after his death, to acknowledge him and to his efforts to modernize the Republic of China. The teachers witnessed the impressive changing of the Taiwanese military guard at the memorial, and they visited the six chambers of the history museum on the bottom floor.  The inscriptions on the side walls describe Chiang Kai-shek's philosophy: "The purpose of life is to improve the general life of humanity", and "The meaning of life is to create and sustain subsequent lives in the universe." 

Before leaving Taipei, the group stopped at the Chinese Handicraft Mart. This four-story building houses many lovely gifts and souvenirs suitable for bringing home!  Handmade traditional items are on sale for very reasonable prices.  Bags in tow, the teachers boarded the High Speed Rail once more and headed back to Kaohsiung!