September 7, 2008 - Art installation outside Taipei 101. And the oft-copied "LOVE" sculpture tiny in the distance.


Motorscooter lot outside the Vieshow movie theater in Xinyi District.

So CNN reports it's been 10 years since Columbine. I never comment on news events as they happen, because they happen and then often they're gone. They're just news events. But I think even news events have a maturation period for their profundity to manifest.

10 years in a life. What would those high school students be now? And how we'd be perfectly happy not knowing a thing about their anonymous lives if they had just been allowed to live, to graduate from high school, to go on to college or jobs or meet someone special or raise families, ideally. Or whatever their ideal was.

And what a special place in Colorado that area is - maybe its the thin air, maybe the beautiful scenery that brings out an organic spirituality. The interviews with parents 10 years on were so grounded and profound. They still have their grief, but they've also grown from it and come to higher or deeper understandings and realizations about life.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Terrified of Flight (764-HERO)
2. Napoleon (Ani DiFranco)
3. Miss Brand-New Day (Southern All-Stars)
4. Jumpers (Sleater-Kinney)
5. Paperback Writer (The Beatles)
6. Today Tomorrow Sometime Never (Echobelly)
7. D.I.Y. (live) (Peter Gabriel)
8. Moonlit Sea of Clouds (k's Choice)
9. Egypt (Kate Bush)
10. Aqualung (Jethro Tull)

December 24, 2008 - Taipei 101, Taiwan. Well, we can't call it the tallest building in the world anymore since the Burj Dubai has officially surpassed it in height, but we still can call it the world's tallest occupied building in the world, as I found out from our proud, local media. No doubt we'll be calling it that until the BD goes into business, which may yet take some time.


I thought I ought to clear out the holiday lomos before they become totally irrelevant in the warming weather. This was a wish tunnel, where they set up a corridor lined with lights and wires, and at the end they supply things that people can write wishes and aspirations on and hang them up to create the walls. This was a long exposure with the 2 braced on the stand that people could write on.

Not being a Christian country, Christmas itself isn't a big deal here, but they know it's a big deal elsewhere, so they use it as an excuse to do something using the various imported themes, catering them to local tastes, which means something on the lines of going out and doing something with the family - much better than making it an excuse to shop.

Although that gets taken care of by the extreme "couple culture" here, and young couples buy into the notion that they should buy gifts for their partners. Chinese culture used to frown upon public displays of affection, but Taiwan youth, in its emulation of Western culture, saw Western youth engaging in it, and then they ran with it to gag-worthy extents. In the U.S., yelling "get a room!" is a cliche, but they need to find an equivalent expression for it here. Especially for the high school students.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. For No Reason (Joanna Wang)
2. Call Me Names (Echobelly)
3. Heart Setsunaku (Yuko Hara)
4. Get 'Em Out By Friday (live) (Genesis)
5. Never-Ending Math Equation (live) (Modest Mouse)
6. 3rd Planet (Modest Mouse)
7. So Far Away (Carole King)
8. Baby Love Child (Pizzicato Five)
9. 4:47 A.M. (The Remains of Our Love) (Roger Waters)
10. Shake (Kristin Hersh)

July 15, 2008 - Taipei 101 on a particularly beautiful Summer morning.

Chinese New Year madness is upon us, and I'm glad to be partaking of none of it, except for enduring long lines at the local hypermart. My uncle called the other day asking when I'd be going down to Kaohsiung, and that was the first I had heard about it. But after my cousins wedding just two weeks ago, I thought everyone would be tapped out emotionally and financially for any festivities. I was tapped out of the whole family thing, so I have no plans to go down for New Years. I've already informed work that I'm available to pick up any slack if needed, and it looks like I will be.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Technicolor Girls (Death Cab for Cutie)
2. Photograph (Def Leppard)
3. Unconditional Love (Shiina Ringo)
4. I Got a Right to Sing the Blues (Lena Horne)
5. Walkin' My Baby Back Home (Nat King Cole)
6. S.O.F.T. (Elastica)
7. So Sad About Us (The Breeders)
8. Secure Yourself (Indigo Girls)
9. Lullaby of the Moths (Helium)
10. The Owl's Escape (Mary Timony)

June 29, 2008 - Street shooting at the corner of Civic Boulevard and Keelung Road. The structure just visible on the left is the elevated freeway over parts of Keelung Road.


Keelung Road just south of Zhongxiao East Road with Taipei 101 behind the street signs. I remember being frustrated at not shooting very much, so that day I made a point of taking whatever random shot occurred to me while riding along. But only these two.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Picture Book (live) (The Kinks)
2. Real Love (Smashing Pumpkins)
3. UFO TOFU (Bela Fleck & the Flecktones)
4. What People Are Made of (Modest Mouse)
5. Back in N.Y.C. (live) (Genesis)
6. Sensation (The Who)
7. The Only Way (Hymn) (Emerson, Lake & Palmer)
8. Leave It (Yes)
9. Home (Kristin Hersh)
10. Symphony No. 2, II. Larghetto (Beethoven)

May 16, 2008 - Intersection of Xinyi and Keelung roads, looking east at Taipei 101, the 2nd highest building in the world. Somehow that doesn't have the same impressiveness as saying "the tallest building in the world". Oh well.

It's been raining for more than 24 hours straight. It may have let up for short periods of less than an hour, but I think it's been pretty much constant since yesterday morning. I think it's from a typhoon to the southwest that isn't predicted to come near us, but the rain is dumping down on us.

So I couldn't do any riding yesterday, on my rare day off with no work and no rehearsal/gig, but I'm quitting my job next week, going in for weekends for maybe a month longer, so I'll have a lot more time soon. Although I'm supposed to be using the time to really try to nail down the language before I leave.

I was hoping to ride out to Taiwan's east coast. I'm doing more day riding now that the Summer heat is gone. It's still hotter than San Francisco ever gets, except during their laughable "heat waves", which to me is just comfortable, but it's all relative.

The other day, I found a road from Xizhi (汐止), just east of Taipei, that goes south to Pingxi (平溪), that I did during the daytime. Day riding still sucks because of the traffic and pollution, and Route 5 out of Taipei wasn't exactly pleasant, but once I got off that main road onto 北31 to Pingxi, it turned out to be a great ride. The climb went up to 655 meters (over 2000') before descending down to Pingxi.

And strangely, I was worried when I started out before noon that it would be uncomfortably hot, since the sun was shining and it was already probably in the low 80s. But as I got out of Taipei and headed up the mountain, it clouded over and the temperature came down, and it was a pleasant climb. I was even worried about rain.

But as soon as I started descending, the clouds disappeared and the rest of the ride was all in sunlight. As good as it gets.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Ai Suru Hito Yo (Sakura)
2. Samurai Showdown (RZA - "Ghost Dog")
3. Cracked Actor (live) (David Bowie)
4. Yume no Tamago (Ichiko Hashimoto - "RahXephon")
5. Chan Chan (Eliades Ochoa - "Buena Vista Social Club")
6. Wonder (Natalie Merchant)
7. Walking in Space ("Hair")
8. Giant Steps (John Coltrane)
9. I'll Be Back (The Beatles)
10. Got To Get You Into My Life (The Beatles - Anthology)

November 2, 2007 - Taipei 101 food court outdoor courtyard in the rain. Maybe next year I'll be in Taipei during New Years to catch the firework display that makes it look like the building's blowing up. Sounds cool. Probably tons of clips on youtube, too.


November 7, 2007 - on the dreary day theme, this is a shot out of an open window at the Taida main library. I dunno, I was sitting there studying, and some worker guy came by and opened the window right near me. I thought, "Strange", but I've seen stranger things in Taiwan. Anyway, as long as the window was open, I pulled out the 2 and took a shot. It's better not shooting through glass.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Spock On (Miss Gloria) (The Pugs)
2. Muzzle (Smashing Pumpkins)
3. Ballerina 12/24 (Steve Vai)
4. Plumbline (live) (Archers of Loaf)
5. Mickey's Monkey (The Miracles - Motown)
6. Lemon (U2)
7. Cold Lampin' With Flavor (Public Enemy)
8. When the Saints Go Marching In (Rebirth Marching Jazz Band)
9. He's Evil (The Kinks)
10. Dolphin in Me (Julie Plug)

from above. . .

September 27, 2007 - Taipei 101, outdoor observation deck, 390.6 meters up (1281.5 feet), looking northeast-ish in the direction where the river system drains into the Taiwan Straits. Yangming Mountain is towards the right, Guanyin Mountain is in the distance left of center.


Looking north towards the Neihu distict. Yangming Mountain now on the left.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Standing In For Joe (XTC)
2. You, You Darling (Duke Ellington)
3. The Show Must Go On (Pink Floyd)
4. Tevye's Dream ("Fiddler on the Roof")
5. Hoshi no Love Letter (The Boom)
6. Everyday is Like Sunday (10,000 Maniacs)
7. Flying Saucer Dudes (Bela Fleck & the Flecktones)
8. Every Breath You Take (The Police)
9. Ruby Tuesday (The Rolling Stones)
10. Noise (The Kinks)

from below . . .

September 27, 2007 - Taipei 101 dwarfs the Statue of Liberty. This shopping building is called New York New York, so I guess it's part of the theme, although there is absolutely nothing else referencing New York. Arguably Starbucks and McDonalds, but those aren't particular to New York. And there's a Mister Donuts - that deserving to be maligned doughnut chain from Japan. What do the Japanese know about doughnuts? What do the Japanese know about getting fat?!


Frame 0, maybe still considered advance frame.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Roxanne (live) (The Police)
2. Gone Hollywood (Supertramp)
3. Flute Concerto in D Major (Vivaldi)
4. Cry Baby Cry (The Beatles)
5. Nostalgia (Archers of Loaf)
6. Home is Anywhere You Hang Your Head (Elvis Costello & the Attractions)
7. Start Together (Sleater-Kinney)
8. State of Mind (Fish)
9. Riddle of the Chamberlin (Helium)
10. Sayonara - Ten no Kaze (Natsukawa Rimi)

advancing frames

x frame - September 27, 2007 - Taipei 101


00 frame

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Clouds (Cibo Matto)
2. Take It On the Chin ("Me and My Girl")
3. Willful Suspension of Disbelief (Modest Mouse)
4. Loaded Painted Red (764-HERO)
5. Guide Vocal (Genesis)
6. Coming Up (Paul McCartney)
7. Cross-Eyed Mary (Jethro Tull)
8. White Russians (demo) (Marillion)
9. Every Day I Write the Book (Elvis Costello & the Attractions)
10. Ignorance (Deadweight)

Taoist Temple Taiwan (TTT)

April 19, 2007 - Walking up to a Taoist temple either on 臥龍街 (Wolong St.) or 軍功路 (Jungong Rd.), one of them becomes the other in the south eastern-ish section of Taipei. Nothing special about it, I just saw it while riding by and thought I'd check it out. That guardian deity doesn't look so impressive in fisheye. I really need to get closer to my subjects.


It was a nice day, so I was taking the long way home. This is the view from the temple looking sort of north west-ish towards more urban Taipei in the distance. The temple turned out to be nothing special, so no shots of it. Besides, I get nervous around the thug-like people who seem to hang around at temples. I think they're taxi drivers.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Friends of the Heroes (The Aislers Set)
2. Just Blues (Kenwood Dennard)
3. Diminushing (Django Reinhardt)
4. Brandenburg Concerto No. 2, III. Allegro Assai (J.S. Bach)
5. Polly (Nirvana)
6. OK/No Way (Mission of Burma)
7. Wasurerareta Big Wave (Southern All-Stars)
8. At Last (Etta James)
9. Lovely Rita (The Beatles)
10. By the Throat (Pretty Girls Make Graves)

Taipei 101 - interior exterior

March 28, 2007 - So in the previous post, there's a boxy, little structure at the base of the 101 building. This is the inside of it, looking up. Duh. Not so little.


Walkway leading from Taipei 101 to the Vieshow Theaters area and more shopping, if you're into that.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Soma (Smashing Pumpkins)
2. Taka ga Koi ya Ai (Dreams Come True)
3. Kiss Them For Me (Siouxsie and the Banshees)
4. Jet Airliner (The Steve Miller Band)
5. Little Babies (Sleater-Kinney)
6. Easy To Be Hard ("Hair")
7. A Campfire Song (10,000 Maniacs)
8. Blow Wind Blow (Tom Waits)
9. Barcelona ("Company" - Sondheim)
10. You'll Follow Me Down (Skunk Anansie)

bikes!

March 24, 2007 - Tour de Taiwan, Stage 7 Criterium. This was the last stage of the Tour de Taiwan which started in Kaohsiung. Not quite the Tour de France (which is next month), but we take what we can get. Unlike the other stages, the Criterium is a short circular course, maybe less than 2 km, that the riders do over and over again, going round and round in circles until they get dizzy and fall over.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Everybody's Gonna Be Happy (The Kinks)
2. Winter Rose/Love Awake (Wings)
3. Minimum Wage (They Might Be Giants)
4. When I Look At The World (U2)
5. Jumpin' Punkins' (Duke Ellington)
6. The Rover (Led Zeppelin)
7. Fire Myself (Mary Timony)
8. To Sheila (Smashing Pumpkins)
9. Helden (David Bowie)
10. The Rum Tum Tugger (T.S. Eliot - "Cats")

Buildings

February 3, 2007 - Daan Park footbridge. I always liked that building on the southwest corner at the Heping East Road-Xinsheng South Road intersection. The windows are a colorful patchwork of, I dunno . . . different shit - hey, I never said I was a poet!

This was in the last days before I moved. I miss that neighborhood. I'm sure my new neighborhood has hidden appreciations that would come out if I suddenly moved again.


February 5, 2007 - Taipei 101 at night. I think I held the 2 on my lap and opened up the shutter for a really long time, and it looks like I did a half decent job of holding it really, really still. I was probably holding my breath. Fortunately I can hold my breath longer than it took to get this exposure.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Quiet (Smashing Pumpkins)
2. Motorway (The Kinks)
3. Leaving Here (Eddie Holland - Motown)
4. Sale of the Century (Sleeper)
5. Natural Disasters (Enon)
6. Punk (Gorillaz)
7. Knives Out (Radiohead)
8. Invisible Sun (The Police)
9. Gettin' Jiggy Wit It (Will Smith)
10. Jigsaw Youth (Bikini Kill)

it stabs at the sky

November 18, 2006 - So this is a continuation of the Cemetery Ride, the end of it, really. That ride took me up the mountains along the southeast of Taipei, and went down a long road (研究院) to the far eastern edge of Taipei, which started looking a bit rural. The end of that road was off my map, so I had to guess my way to 忠孝東路, which took me back here.

This was a time when I switched my sleeping schedule so that I could be up all night, so I was leaving for rides pretty early. So here at the end of my ride was even before Eslite bookstore, which I'm standing next to, was open. That's some pretty bright sunshine coming from the east.


And this building needs no introduction. There needs to be a moratorium on pictures of this building.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Caught a Lite Sneeze (Tori Amos)
2. Groovin' High (Dizzie Gillespie & His Orchestra)
3. Les Promesses (Autour de Lucie)
4. America (She Can't Say No) (Throwing Muses)
5. Given To Fly (live) (Pearl Jam)
6. Shooting Star (Versus)
7. Cheyenne Anthem (Kansas)
8. Inasena Locomotion (Southern All-Stars)
9. Piano Concerto No. 1, III. Rondo, vivace (Chopin)
10. In Search of Peter Pan (Kate Bush)

Flower show, 3 of last 3

November 19, 2006 - Crowded Sunday in the park and I went guerrila shooting in the park, very quick, no thinking, just get an idea and shoot. Ugh, those flower pot sculptures! Creepy!


Northeast quadrant of Daan Park, lifting Bebe high, and Taipei 101 in the background.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Heart-Shaped Box (Nirvana)
2. The Visitor (The Black Heart Procession)
3. Try Counting Sheep (Black Sheep)
4. Life & Soul (The Sundays)
5. Merry-Go-Round (Versus)
6. Why Don't We Do It In the Road? (The Beatles - Anthology)
7. The First Time (U2)
8. I Took a Trip on a Gemini Spaceship (David Bowie)
9. Crazy Baldhead (Bob Marley & the Wailers)
10. Script for a Jester's Tear (Marillion)

and two far

November 18, 2006 - Just a little farther up the road from the previous shots, in fact, even though you can't see them because they're teensy weensy tiny, they're probably in this shot, maybe. All this is cemetery in the fore and midground. Taipei and Taipei 101 are in the background. I'm told those three tall structures are related to the cemeteries and might be separated by denomination! Muslim, Christian, and . . . other?


I forget if I mentioned this ride was a climb. This is even farther down the road, but not after much more climbing. It wasn't too serious of a hill. This area was no longer Muslim. I liked the palms.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Pick It Up, Lay It In the Cut (Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings)
2. End of the Night (The Doors)
3. Come Talk to Me (Peter Gabriel)
4. Tsuru no Sugomori (Katsuya Yokoyama)
5. Hey Jack Keruouac (10,000 Maniacs)
6. Ambulance (Blur)
7. Force Ten (Rush)
8. It Takes All Kinds (Aimee Mann)
9. Layla (Derek & the Dominos)
10. Bonnie & Slyde (Bela Fleck & the Flecktones)

happy new years eve

November 8, 2006 - Xinyi Road, looking east towards Taipei 101. Xinyi Road runs along the northern edge of Daan Park, and is to the right in this shot. I'm standing by a barrier in the middle of the road. The construction barrier is there because an MRT line is being built underneath, and an MRT station is being built just a little down the road in this shot.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. The Narrow Way: Part I (Pink Floyd)
2. Babooshka (Kate Bush)
3. Immigrant Song (live BBC) (Led Zeppelin)
4. Honeychain (Throwing Muses)
5. With Every Breath I Take ("City of Angels")
6. Radio, Radio (Elvis Costello & the Attractions)
7. Aging Astronauts (Helium)
8. Stop Your Sobbing (The Kinks)
9. Market Square Heroes (Marillion)
10. Fly On the Wall (XTC)

it's not all about the big building

November 4, 2006 - Taipei 101 with Taipei City Hall on the left. It's uncredible how ugly and uninviting the City Hall building is. It must have been built during KMT rule days. Even a plain, perfectly symmetric cube would be more aesthetically pleasing and architecturally bold. Well, no, I'm sure they could have found a way to make that boring, too. As it is, I look at the City Hall building (I can't bring myself to call it City Hall), and I just don't want to go into it for any reason whatsoever!

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Jimmy ("Thoroughly Modern Millie")
2. Knuckle Down (XTC)
3. Birdhouse in Your Soul (They Might Be Giants)
4. Black Little Stray (Shannon Wright)
5. Savoy Truffle (The Beatles)
6. Mary (Sarah McLachlan)
7. Crepescule With Nellie (Thelonius Monk)
8. Flavor of the Month (Black Sheep)
9. Itsuka Kaze Ni Naru Hi (Chitose Hajime)
10. Tu Que Has Hecho (Compay Segundo)

台北101附近

September 15, 2006 - Trying to shoot Taipei 101 on a rainy day. Still not sure how to capture the enormity of the building with a fisheye.


Hyun Ae and the poor performance of the lomo fisheye in low light. I think we were there on a Friday afternoon to catch the latest Zhang Ziyi film, which was subtitled, fortunately for both of us. Even with her advanced Mandarin abilities, she admitted she wouldn't have been able to follow the film with them.

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Symphony No. 2, III. Adagio (Rachmaninov)
2. Sleepwalkers (100 Watt Smile)
3. Getting Married Today ("Company" - Sondheim)
4. The Spring of Next Year ("Dear World")
5. Suite for Flute & Jazz Piano No. 2, VII. Intime (Bolling)
6. Shotgun (Jr. Walker & the All-Stars)
7. The Tide is Turning (After Live Aid) (Roger Waters)
8. 等無限時批 (陳昇)
9. Prière De "Bon Augure" (Monks of the Gyütö Monastery)
10. In That Quiet Earth (remixed) (Genesis)

global warming

July 29, 2006 - Taipei 101, the tallest building in the world, with sun flares in the fisheye lens around noon. That was a great week. Sunny, blue skies for a week. And as people have been saying the constant rain in Taipei hasn't been normal, they also said that week was far from normal. The Taiwanese are good at pointing out what's not normal, but they're not so keen at pointing out the cause. You and I, we know better. *wink*

iTunes soundtrack:
1. Ue o Muite Arukou (Kyu Sakamoto)
2. Bernadette (The Kinks)
3. Revenge (Archers of Loaf)
4. Our Time ("Merrily We Roll Along")
5. Once Upon a Daydream (The Police)
6. Koufukuron (Shiina Ringo)
7. Indigo Chiheisen (Spitz)
8. Before You Cry (Camera Obscura)
9. M1A1 (Gorillaz)
10. Stop the Show (live) (Built to Spill)