A war about #Taiwan is for the time being of not much value, thus as far as I understood Taiwan is for the time being sort of OK.
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2023/01/10/war-with-china-over-taiwan-wont-end-well-for-anyone/
#taiwan
Typhoon Gaemi makes landfall in Taiwan https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/crg41eg517vo
Typhoon Gaemi has made landfall on Taiwan’s east coast, bringing gusts of around 240kmh (150mph).
Gaemi, which has landed near the city of Hualien, is expected to be the most powerful storm to hit the island in eight years.
Ah, that explains it then. We were supposed to be out of range here in the south, the typhoon was headed for the northern tip of #Taiwan. But with Hualian it hits dead centre. The whole day we had rain and pretty strong wind, strong enough to cause three power outages so far.
Hopefully tomorrow will be a bit better...
Taiwan tops World Mathematics contest - Taipei Times https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2024/07/20/2003821062
#Taiwan topped the World Mathematics Invitational, which finished on Tuesday, with 13 diamond, 39 gold, 56 silver and 36 bronze awards.
I'd say that's not bad for an island of 23m people...
I wonder if all the Beijing thinks all its saber-rattling around and over Taiwan is going to change chip ops there. Okay, Xi, bomb the snot out of TSMC and see how many chips THAT will give Russia.
♲ Russia-Ukraine Daily News - 2024-07-15 21:11:25 GMT
Russia’s military-industrial complex keeps trying to order key equipment from #Taiwan but vigilant banks stop exports🇹🇼 🇷🇺 Taiwanese firms are still seeking ways to export industrial equipment to #Russia, but banks are standing in the way.
Chinese Government Expands Criminalization of Taiwanese Identity
Court Guidelines Aim to Further Intimidate Taiwan’s Population
https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/07/04/chinese-government-expands-criminalization-taiwanese-identity
#hrw #human-rights-watch #human-rights #china #taiwan #中国 #台湾
Nymphia Wind | 📷 Mambo Key | Vogue Taiwan, July 2024
#Photo #Fashion #Banana #NymphiaWind #MamboKey #Vogue #Taiwan
Sadly, this too is Taiwan...
Indonesian band takes stand for Taiwan’s migrant workers | Labour Rights News | Al Jazeera https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2024/7/1/indonesian-band-takes-stand-for-taiwans-migrant-workers
Almost all workers arrive in #Taiwan through an employment agency or broker, which immediately opens them up to exploitation.
“We have to pay them to get us here,” Rudi said, referring to the “placement fees” these brokers charge. “Then, when we get to Taiwan, we also need to pay. They cut our salary to pay for the monthly fees.”
For many, these placement fees can be as much as $9,000. That represents an almost insurmountable cost for the migrant workers who exclusively come from less wealthy Southeast Asian countries, explained Lennon Wang from Serve the People Association (SPA), a local NGO that focuses on migrant worker rights.
Originally from a family of rural farmers in the north of the Philippines’s Luzon Island, Ronalyn Asis had to pay some 120,000 Philippine pesos ($2,035) to cover the costs of her training, plane tickets and placement fees before she started working as a domestic carer in Taiwan in 2014.
WARNING: Long post, many images!
North of me there is a place called Mituo. Before the KMT gerrymandering it was a small village (smaller than the one where I live now) in Kaohsiung county, then it became a district of Kaohsiung city. Mituo has a fishing harbour, but a very small one. I went there once, accidentally, when I got lost at an intersection. I saw the harbour, knew I was wrong and turned around.
Today I got lost again, ended up there again, but thought "Why not?" After all, I was there, so I got off the bike and went around. And boy was I impressed.
If you ever come to Taiwan and get to the West coast sea side, you will see walls. Walls are useful. They protect you from all kinds of unpleasant things, like strong waves or uninvited invasions. People need walls. They do however come with one significant drawback: They look boring.
Many solutions have been suggested to deal with this problem, but one of the most successful throughout history has been to paint them. Where I live, the appearance of the seawall (parallel to the sea) suggests that it was painted by pupils, very likely of the elementary school right next to it. There is nothing wrong with that fact, it merely lets you expect a certain style.
The wall protecting the pier in our harbour is however not decorated at all. Not the least bit. It's grey.
I didn't check the seawall in Mituo, but the pier wall: Whoa! That IS a piece of art!
Everything you see on the wall that is not plain grey cement has been drawn, including all the arcs.
Simply thanks to all the arcs you have the feeling that you can see the sea on the other side, you never feel like walking next to a boring grey wall.
And the images? I had to laugh so many times! Whoever came up with these designs didn't just do it for the money.
The only regret I felt was because you can't climb this wall (unlike ours), you can't see what's on the other side.
I heard pretty strong waves from the other side and there was one spot where the waves would send some water over the wall from time to time, so it must have been pretty impressive.
So we could only walk there and enjoy the images (which I thoroughly did), although I also saw a few people fishing.
One thing that did baffle me though was the complete lack of boats. I saw a number of bollards, mostly in a rather desolate condition, but no boats at all.
It took me a while to realize that I was looking at the entrance basin of the harbour, while the real basin was farther inland.
There I did indeed see lots of fishing boats of all sizes, plus one that looked suspiciously like a motor yacht.
Which is odd, because Taiwan has designated each harbour as either class 1 or class 2, with class 2 only being open for fishing vessels, so yachts may only go to class 1 harbours. Mituo is a class 2 harbour.
However, that was no problem, because I was very obviously looking at a fishing boat that only looked like a motor yacht. How could I know?
Well, this is no joke: The boat had "Professional Fishing Boat" written in large, friendly letters on its hull, across half the length of the boat.
See? It says that it's a fishing boat, right there on the hull, so there can be no doubt that it's a fishing boat.
I wish every problem could be solved that easily...
While I was really envious about their wall, their "beach" didn't really deserve that name.
Admittedly there is nothing golden or white about our beach. Only two beaches on the island of Taiwan are "white" and at least one of them does not contain sand, but tiny shell fragments. If you want a white/golden beach, go to Penghu (Pescadores).
So our beach IS grey, yes, but it opens towards the sea. You can look across the sea from the beach towards the horizon. (Which many people do at sunsets...) But not so in Mituo.
Here you have a small stretch of grey sand inside the first harbour basin, but believe it or not: children were playing there. (Someone needs to tell them about our beach...)
But I have to admit that small Mituo did a magnificent job of making their harbour look and be absolutely fabulous! Should you ever be in the South of Taiwan, try to spare the time for a visit.
And finally, after all those images of walls (sorry for that, but that wall simply DOES look amazing), as proof that my whole story wasn't made up, let me present to you: a professional fishing boat!
#Taiwan #Mituo #myphoto #notmyharbour #art
"Do you see the light?"
Hmm, do I need to get the band back together?
#Taiwan #sunset #myphoto
https://youtu.be/xbq0OuJtErs?t=240
Since they come basically every day, here the executive summary:
China sends 141 military aircraft into Taiwan ADIZ over past week | Taiwan News | Jun. 27, 2024 17:15 https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/news/5896306
That's an average of 20 per day, as you surely noticed. And now remember how UK and other European countries freak out when there is a lone Russian plane flying along somewhere...
Ellis told #Taiwan News that the only other one-week periods that recorded more ADIZ incursions were August 2-8, 2022, when 182 PLA planes were tracked, and April 6-12, 2023, when 169 were detected. The August 2022 intrusions coincided with a visit by former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, while the April 2023 violations followed former President Tsai Ing-wen's (蔡英文) meeting with former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in Los Angeles.
It was quite warm today (no A/C at home), so in the afternoon I went to the beach. Very few people were there when I arrived (too hot before that), so a few other Earthlings were there too, like this little fellow.
He was a little shy, but quite practically oriented. While a few Filipinas had brought a tent (sun protection) to the beach, he came with a complete house.
I can't understand why, but apparently he didn't like me very much and constantly turned away.
But I can be pretty annoying and in the end he gave in.
Thanks. I left him alone after that, but quickly discovered someone else...
#Taiwan #nature #myphoto
Taiwan warns against travel to China after execution threat https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/taiwan-warns-travel-china-execution-threat-rcna159203
TAIPEI, Taiwan — Taiwan’s government raised its travel warning for China on Thursday, telling its citizens not to go unless absolutely necessary, following a threat from Beijing last week to execute those deemed “diehard” #Taiwan independence supporters.
Liang Wen-chieh, spokesperson for Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council, told reporters the raised travel warning also applied to the Chinese-run cities of Hong Kong and Macau.
... and there are more reasons not to switch planes in Hong Kong or Shanghai...
