Elnorra at the 228 peace park on 2/28. February 28 is a national day of mourning for Taiwan as it commemorates not only a massacre that happened beginning on that day in 1947 but also remembers the thousands of other innocents slain in the aftermath called the "White Terror." this was the 60th anniversary of that day. The conflict was rooted in the strain caused when the Chinese nationalists took over Taiwan following WWII during the war against the communists. The Taiwanese welcomed the Chinese but with the strain of fighting a loosing war with the communists the Chinese were forced to strip Taiwan of all available resources for the war effort. This caused a lot of bitterness and suffering from hunger in Taiwan and when the police confiscated black market goods a small riot ensued in which a man was shot and the police forced to flee. Protests followed all over the island and with the Chinese government fearing they were facing another civil uprising they suppressed the protests swiftly and militarily.

During this day we felt it appropriate to pay our own respects and visited the 228 museum and 228 peace park. It was very busy and I had only a small chance to take this picture because of the crowds.

To give some perspective on rights of assembly and speech in Taiwan today there have been a few huge protests with groups numbering in the hundreds of thousands on many subjects in the last decade and all have been peaceful and without government suppression.

I want to express my gratitude to the thousands who gave their lives to make Taiwan the free and peaceful nation it is today. I have been blessed with the chance to exercise full human freedoms here and it is largely because of those who fought for this freedom.

I copied the following information from Wikipedia:

"Rooted in the 228 Incident on Taiwan in 1947, the "White Terror" describes the suppression of political dissents and public discussion of the massacre under the martial law from May 19, 1949 to July 15, 1987.

During the White Terror, around 140,000 Taiwanese were imprisoned or executed for their real or perceived opposition to the Kuomintang (KMT) government led by Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, according to a recent report by the Executive Yuan of Taiwan. Some prosecuted Taiwanese were labeled by the Kuomintang as "bandit spies" (匪諜), meaning spies for Chinese communists, and punished as such. The "White Terror" left many native Taiwanese with a deep-seated bitterness towards the Kuomintang, Chiang Kai-shek, and sometimes the mainlanders.

Fear of discussing the 228 Incident and the White Terror gradually decreased with the lifting of martial law in 1987, culminating in the establishment of an official public memorial and an apology by President Lee Teng-hui in 1995."

We went with some friends around the north shore of the island on February 24. The stone weathers into beautiful shapes there and the many mountains reaching into the sea with their clear waterfalls are breathtaking to see. We ate at a small harbor named LongTong, which means the dragon's cave. We had a type of oyster called the buffalo’s horn oyster, which even our hosts had never seen. It seems that they will eat anything here! It was a beautiful day and we saw many blowfish in the harbor, which was neat because we had never seen them in the wild. (Oh yeah, the Taiwanese won’t eat the blowfish and think the Japanese are crazy to try because of the possibility of poisoning.) Also you may note the giant light bulbs on the fishing boat in the harbor. It is because they fish at night and the light attracts the fish.

2007 February 21st. These pictures were taken during the Chinese New Year Holiday at the temple of the Queen of Heaven. I am constantly amazed by the skill of the stone carvings. These rural temples are usually good places for solitude. I also learned about another Taoist deity that day: the great ansestor of the tigers! He had a small idol where you can pray for the tigers under the main altar! Quite a cute idea that even tigers can be deified and deserve our respect.