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Historic Landmarks of the Inland Plains
1. Dining Out in Pingtung City
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The Pingtung Academy (Confucian Temple), near a military dependents"village, with its door locked, has a sense of loneliness and desolation. It was once a strategic educational and cultural center for southern Taiwan.
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Pingtung City is the administrative seat of Pingtung County. It's not large and its main tourist attractions are Tzufeng Temple (Pingtung's Matsu Temple), always replete with incense smoke and offerings, and the Confucian Temple (Pingtung Academy), with its famous eye-catching screen wall.
Near Pingtung railway station is the Mintzu Road night market, a favorite street for eating out. You'll find the usual meat zongzi, fried rice noodles, and lamb hot-pot, but the ingredients are all genuine and fresh. It's delicious food at a cheap price. Not far away, you'll find the well-known Tsao Family Taokou roast chicken, and Houchia delicacies cooked in brine. One Houchia specialty is salted boiled duck. Each duck weighs no more than 1.8 kilos and the flesh is extremely tender. They're marinated for four or five hours in a special sauce with more than 30 ingredients, and then
steamed.The taste is quite exceptional and when Pingtung people go visiting family and friends, a Houchia duck makes a very welcome gift to take along.
2. Six Hakka Townships
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| The venerable Hsiao Family Residence in Chiatung, classed as a Grade III national historic monument, is about to undergo restoration. It is currently covered by a sheet-metal awning, but the stone carvings in the lobby give a hint of its former glory.
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"Liutui,"or Six Townships, refers to six Hakka communities scattered through the Kaohsiung and Pingtung area. In former years Hakka people migrated here for self-protection and formed a defense organization involving eight townships, including Meinung in Kaohsiung, and Tsochou, Neipu, Wanluan, and Chiatung in Pingtung. The Hakka treasure their own historical legacy and there are many fascinating historic landmarks, amongst them the famous Matsu Temple and Changli Shrine in Neipu, the Hsiao Residence in Chiatung (the current restoration is due to be finished in early 2003), and the Liu Family Ancestral Hall in Wukoushui. These are all well worth a visit.
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Changli Shrine is dedicated to Han Yu, whom the Hakka people of Pingtung regard as a deity of scholarship and learning. |
Construction of the Matsu Temple in Neipu began in 1803 and its style is very much that of the Hakka's original home in Chaozhou in Guangdong. Matsu temples in southern Fujian always depict a black-faced Matsu but here she is depicted with a red face. The temple has many inscribed placards and stone tablets and is classed as a Grade III national historic monument.
The Changli Shrine next to the Matsu Temple is the only shrine in Taiwan dedicated to the worship of Han Yu, also known as Han Chang-li, who was one of the
浺ight Great Masters of the Tang and Song." Han Yu was exiled to Chaozhou, where he served as governor. While there, he set up many halls of learning throughout the region which is why to this day he is held in such high regard by Hakka people. The Changli Shrine is quite small but its two side walls are completely covered with exam IDs, each with a red slip on top. It's considered that the higher you paste them, the better your chances of doing well in the senior high school examination.
3. The Basilica and Wanhui Temple
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| Wantan's Wanhui Temple is a masterpiece which integrates elements of different styles from mainland China and Taiwan, the result of both competition and cooperation between them. The styles of the floral decorations carved and chiseled into its two sides are radically different from each other, and the two sides depict artistic allusions to different stories. |
Wanluan, which neighbors on Neipu, is the home of Wanluan pig's trotters, known all over Taiwan. The Catholic church at Wanluan's Wanchin Village is the oldest in Taiwan. The Spanish priest Fernando Sainz OP preached Christianity here 150 years ago, and his followers subsequently built this church. The exterior of this magnificent building was made using traditional materials, such as crushed stone, lime mortar, brown sugar, and honey, kapok, and kiln-fired bricks, and it has a horizontal inscribed granite tablet, given by the Emperor Tongzhi. The Wanchin Basilica is the only Catholic church in Taiwan with the title of Basilica, an honorary title given to a Roman Catholic church for the religious, historic and artistic significance it has in its locality. This title was bestowed by Pope John Paul II in late 1984.
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| The Wanchin Basilica, begun by the Spanish Dominican priest Fernando Sainz OP, tells part of the story of the Roman Catholic Church's history in Taiwan, from the earliest earthen bricks to its present-day grandeur. |
It was at the Wanhui Temple in Wantan Township that the hand of the statue of Matsu miraculously deflected a bomb during the fighting at the end of the Jap a nese occupation, something still spoken of to this day. Wanhui Temple is famous throughout Taiwan for its exquisite artwork. The left-hand side of the temple is carved in a rough free style, the work of Yang Hsiu-hsing, a master from Quanzhou in mainland China. The other side is finely detailed and is the work of Huang Kuei-li, a master wood-carver from Taiwan's Panchiao. At the time of its construction two groups of workers labored quite separately, secretly vying with each other. When the work was completed and the two sections were brought together to assemble the building, the two halves joined perfectly, without the slightest error.
Another place that should be mentioned is the Liyushan mud volcano located on the boundary between Wantan and Hsinyuan. It spurts out bubbling hot mud at irregular intervals. Each such burst of volcanic activity usually lasts four to eight hours.
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