I did too 
He was his chief aide from 1965-1970.
[quote=âTempo Gainâ][quote=âhansiouxâ]
hmm, looked at Haoâs wiki, maybe thatâs not him. I donât think he earned a spot behind the Chiangs until 1981.
[/quote]
I did too 
He was his chief aide from 1965-1970.[/quote]
to be honest, I canât recognize Hao without seeing his eyebrowsâŠ
Definitely. FAR too much concrete has been poured all over the island, including countryside areas. Youâve also got two massive highways going down the island (and a smaller coastal one) and each county has at least one expressway across. That picture really illustrated Ihla Formosa. If you want to see similar scenes now you have to go to more undeveloped places like Cambodia and Vietnam.
The population explosion didnât help matters either though, itâs ridicilous how many people are crammed into the North West coastal plain of Taiwan. Not only that, but there has been pretty indiscriminate (and ongoing) development in every corner of the island.
BTW, the Puyuma picture was also fascinating. I hate the way Taiwanâs textbooks and articles on Taiwan start with âââwhen the Dutch and the Spanish put a fort on TaiwanâŠand then the Chinese cameâ⊠Such a false version of history.
[quote=âheadhonchoIIâ]
BTW, the Puyuma picture was also fascinating. I hate the way Taiwanâs textbooks and articles on Taiwan start with âââwhen the Dutch and the Spanish put a fort on TaiwanâŠand then the Chinese cameâ⊠Such a false version of history.[/quote]
I thought the KMTâs version starts with:
"During the 3 kingdoms era, Sun Quan, the King of Wu sent Wei Wen and Zhu-ge Zhi off shores to find legendary lands of Tanzhou and Yizhou. The two generals claimed Tanzhou is too far, but they arrived at what they believe is Yizhou and captured a bunch of savages to Wu as slaves, thus proving Taiwan has historically been a part of China.
By the way, during Sui dynasty, Emperor of Sui also sent his troops to what they called Ryukyu, and they also pillaged and abducted thousands of people from there, thus again proves Taiwan has historically been a part of China."
This hybrid European/Tang styled Taoyuan train station was built in 1905. The original designer used German timber frame for the walls but added traditional Japanese roofing.
It was rebuilt in 1962 by the KMT into this
Canât blame them â there was nowhere to plant an ROC flag ontop of that old building!
[quote=âhansiouxâ]
in rural Taiwan, this used to be the standard living quartersâŠ
harvest[/quote]
Nice pictures. Was this really âtypical living quarters in rural Taiwan?â I thought most people lived in those red-brick houses with a courtyard.
These houses seem typical of the Pingpu aborigines (èçȘè Gemalan). Iâm currently reading a novel set in both the early 1800s and early 1990s, and these houses look like the houses described in that book.
[quote=âCharlie Phillipsâ]
Nice pictures. Was this really âtypical living quarters in rural Taiwan?â I thought most people lived in those red-brick houses with a courtyard.
These houses seem typical of the Pingpu aborigines (èçȘè Gemalan). Iâm currently reading a novel set in both the early 1800s and early 1990s, and these houses look like the houses described in that book.[/quote]
Red bricks used to be a sign of wealth. The typical farmers werenât able to afford them. Also many rural farmers are actually descendents of Pingpu aborigines. From what I was told, the most common construction in rural areas used mudbricks (thĂŽo-khak-tshĂČo ććć) and bamboo weaves applied with mud (pinn-ĂĄ-piah ç·šä»ćŁ). Construction mud is often infused with rice, straws and other materials. Thatâs for farmers already doing ok, otherwise they might live in straw huts.
For those that have a bit of money, they can afford to build their houses with red bricks. The Dutch were the first ones who began brick making in Taiwan, but during the Qing dynasty, most bricks were imported from Amoy. European structures before or during the Qing dynasty were often built with imported bricks. These bricks are flatter and wider than typical red bricks today.
For the Taiwanese, it was uncommon to build the entire structure out of bricks. Instead, a inner layer of mud and river rocks is then covered by a thin layer of bricks. It is referred to as (kim-pau-gĂźn éć é, gold wrapping silver), which became a term synonymous with rich in Taigi.
when the Japanese took over Taiwan and wanted to use it to show case Japan is capable of colonialism, I think they referenced what the British were doing in their colonies and decided to also build a lot of red brick houses. Most of the government offices built by the Japanese were built with bricks, as opposed to Qing dynasty official buildings were built primarily with wood and mud.
The correct romanization for ć¶çȘè is Kavalan (from the Dutch), the Spanish called them CabarĂĄn. In todayâs Romanization it would be Kebalan or Kbalan. The term originally meant people of the plains, as opposed to the Altayal which they dubbed Pusulan, people of the mountains.
Thanks for the clarification. 
Itâs great to see pictures of this kind of house taken as late as the 1960s preserved. I guess the red-brick houses seem more common because they are the ones that have survived the ravages of time, compared to their mud-brick and thatch counterparts.
[quote=âCharlie Phillipsâ]Thanks for the clarification.
Itâs great to see pictures of this kind of house taken as late as the 1960s preserved. I guess the red-brick houses seem more common because they are the ones that have survived the ravages of time, compared to their mud-brick and thatch counterparts.[/quote]
many of the bamboo weave and mud-brick houses would have survived till today actually. Beipu in Hsinchu county used to have a lot of them at least in mid 90s. Itâs land development and reconstructions that are bull dozing them over. Same can be said about the kim-pau-gĂźn houses as well.
I agree with you, of course. Itâs kind of a tradeoff though. The Taiwanese countryside isnât this bucolic ideal of purity and cleanliness like we can see in a lot of (well) developed countries, and it wasnât back then either. Listening to my father-in-lawâs stories of how hard life was at the time leaves me kind of unsure about what I think is ideal for Taiwan. If I could turn back the clock and rearrange things to my liking, I guess Iâd put in a bunch more nature preserves, keep the population at about half of what it currently is, and strive to reach an acceptable level of development that ensures access to vital resources for all citizens while not blighting the landscape with the concrete monstrosities we see today.
Associated Press just released a bunch of newsreels and uploaded this to youtube a few days ago.
Malaria used to be so terrifying here in Taiwan, that Japanese soldiers used to look like a freaking bee keeper when standing guard. Eventually malaria was controlled after the Japanese hired William Kinnimond Burton to design water infrastructures here in Taiwan. Burton contracted malaria while here in Taiwan and died in Japan in 1897.
Ha ha.
Just stumbled across this site: http://www.takaoclub.com/index.htm
Not sure if it has mentioned here. Quite informative with old pictures and stuff.
I find this article about Ishigaki island and coolie mutiny aboard the The Robert Bowne especially interesting.
[quote=âCharlie Phillipsâ]Associated Press just released a bunch of newsreels and uploaded this to youtube a few days ago.
[/quote]
Just look at the buildings. Sometime between the 1970s and today Taiwan ran out of wall paint and hence we have the dirty, rotten buildings everyone associates with Taipeiâs urban landscape.
Just saw this, those are not puppet heads⊠Somewhere in the mountains during the Japanese occupation period.
[quote=âhannesâ]Just saw this, those are not puppet heads⊠Somewhere in the mountains during the Japanese occupation period.
facebook.com/photo.php?fbid ⊠=3&theater[/quote]
Thatâs not a Japanese soldier by the way. Itâs one of those Aiyung, private aboriginal containment militias. The taker of the picture wasnât sure if the person was an ethic Han or Sinitized Pingpu Aboriginal.
[quote=âhansiouxâ]
Thatâs not a Japanese soldier by the way. Itâs one of those Aiyung, private aboriginal containment militias. The taker of the picture wasnât sure of the person was an ethic Han or Sinitized Pingpu Aboriginal.[/quote]
What is an Aiyung soldier? I couldnât find anything in googleâŠ
[quote=âjesus80â][quote=âhansiouxâ]
Thatâs not a Japanese soldier by the way. Itâs one of those Aiyung, private aboriginal containment militias. The taker of the picture wasnât sure of the person was an ethic Han or Sinitized Pingpu Aboriginal.[/quote]
What is an Aiyung soldier? I couldnât find anything in googleâŠ[/quote]
Aiyung (éć, Barrier Volunteers)
zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%9A%98%E5%8B%87
Wikipedia only has the entry in Chinese. After Qingâs acquisition of west coast Taiwan, the Qing government drew a line, the thĂło-gĂ»-kau (ćçæș, Dirt bull ditch), between the Qing territory and the Aboriginal territory. Its purpose is to prevent ethnic Han from grabbing and developing Aboriginal owned lands, and at the same time try to keep the Aboriginals confined and minimize attacks.
Red line depicts thĂło-gĂ»-kau of that certain period
However, the divide didnât really function all that well. Han merchant groups continue to grab lands from the Aboriginals in order to gain access to valuable resources such as deer skin, farm land and camphor. As they do this, the wronged Aboriginal would head hunt according to their tradition. So Han merchant groups would hire militias to secure their interests, and these militias were referred to as Aiyungs.
A famous merchant group is called Jin-Guang-Fu (é滣çŠ), which is a joint Hakka and Holo effort to develop Saisiyat territory Rakkus, present day Beipu (ćć). Itâs a popular tourist spot in Beipu today.
There are many location around Taiwan named after the thĂło-gĂ»-kau or Aiyung bases. New Taipeiâs Tucheng district (ćć) for example, is so named because it was once the line that divides Han and Aboriginals. There are many places named Ai-liao (é毟) or Ai-men (éé) around Taiwan, that were militia posts. The Japanese continued the Ai-yung practise for a while until they replaced all militia with regular Japanese police.
By the way, Beipuâs original name, Rakkus, means Camphor trees in Saisiyat. The name Aiyung derived from the first Sinitized name for Beipu, Da-ai Bei-pu (性éćć), where Da-ai seems to be the phonetic translation for the Saisiyat legend, Taâay, the magical little black people. The militia seems to have gotten the Aiyung name from the location name Da-ai, and became the word for all paid militias defending against Aboriginals through out Taiwan.