My first trip to Taiwan, which took place last month, was with a team of professional photographers. They were more interested in the people inhabiting this treasure of an island, than the tourist attractions it has to offer. And it made a world of difference because it clicked with my intuitive finding that the most wonderful thing about Taiwan is its people.
It is difficult to claim to know a place and its people in a tour of one week. So I depended on my teammates for corroboration. He Yanguang, a veteran photographer with China Youth Daily, was embarking on his fourth tour of Taiwan. He first visited it in 1997. "There's not much difference," he said, "not even in the facade."
臺灣之行 那么近那么遠
A family of five enjoys ice cream on a street in New Taipei City.
在臺北市的街道邊，一家五口其樂融融地吃著冰激凌。
And that lack of change could well be the most valuable lesson we carried away from this journey.
Sure, there is Taipei 101, the tallest building in the world when it opened in 2004 until the title was snatched away by the Burj Khalifa in Dubai in 2010. It's certainly sky-piercing or a crane among a clutch of chicks, to borrow the Chinese term, as Taipei does not have a dense cluster of skyscrapers as Hong Kong does.
When I examined it closely, Taipei 101 seems an oversized Chinese pendant, with coins on all four sides. All the symbols of money would take some explaining when the world enters an all digital era when cash may sound extremely quaint to future visitors.
But worry not. Right now, Taipei is a paradise to those who want a taste of the old way. Here, gourmet could mean snacks and street stands, which attract hordes of diners including the middle class and chic youth. This is subversive to my thinking because in the mainland a restaurant could easily have dozens or hundreds of tables in a mammoth hall or flanks of private rooms, often with lavish decorations.
In Taiwan, we were taken to every lunch in restaurants with no more than 10 tables. The service is efficient and the place is clean, but the taste of the food is so memorable we instantly understand why so many are waiting for a seat. I had the best beef noodle I could remember.
I was told that all of these businesses are operated by families and most have a history that goes back half a century or more. And I noticed there are many businesses of this size in Taipei, either downtown or in the suburbs, and they contribute to the feeling of a community. I left Taipei with a strong sense that, though it's a city with a population of almost seven million in the metropolitan area (with 2.6 million in the city proper), it has a touch of intimacy as if it's still a village - only endlessly enlarged. People talk to each other in a way they talk to fellow villagers.
We visited many old streets and night markets, which are unadorned and crowded. Vendors hawk their offerings and bakers ask you to have a taste of their fresh pastry, but they never give you any pressure to buy or give you the nasty look after you tasted something but decided against buying it. There is a friendliness in their voice and their manner that is more neighborly than businesslike.
Every member of our delegation was impressed by this attitude of the people we met. One day we swooped into a fishing port in Keelung and jumped onto several boats. The fishermen were surprised, but as soon as they learned of our purpose they blithely cooperated and even struck some poses for us. "I have not met a single person who is nasty," said Zhang Feng, photographer with The Beijing Evening News.
There are lots of place names familiar to us mainlanders as they are featured prominently in movies and pop songs. I was more surprised by the ubiquitous use of "kindness" and "loyalty" for street names, terms revitalized in the recent campaign in the mainland to read Chinese classics such as Confucius' Analects.
Sure, the display of traditional virtues in such high profile could be window-dressing, but it is more than that. We met a middle-aged woman in Daxi, an old town by the Tamsui River where a century ago cargo ship would dock and turn the place into a hub of trading. Now it's a quiet town with a couple of commercial streets. On one of them, which is quite touristy, we talked to this woman who gave up her job to take care of her father.
The old man has to get around in a wheelchair and his medical expenses have been covered by welfare, but the full-time care by a family member would be something of a luxury to most families in the Chinese mainland. "We get some income from renting out a storefront," she explains, without a hint of bitterness or regret.
In the ensuing days, we encountered other examples of this nature, where a grownup child gives up his or her job to care for an ailing parent. I don't know how popular the practice is in Taiwan, but it's the ultimate manifestation of "filial piety", a concept sanctified in Chinese tradition.
"We just scratched the surface," said Wang Wenyang, photographer with a newspaper devoted to intellectual property protection in China. "We didn't have time to go into people's homes for long stretches of time. But from what we could see, the daily lives of Taiwan people have shown sufficiently the lifestyles and human interaction that are the bedrock of this society. It is heavy on small business and it is full of human warmth. We did bump into two weddings, though."
On Dihua Street in downtown Taipei, I strolled into a store that has a plaque saying this is the oldest store in the city. Now it sells tea from all over China. The architecture along the street probably goes back to the early days of the Republic of China. But at that time, Taiwan was still occupied by the Japanese.
Whether in architecture or food or ways of life, Taiwan seems to have absorbed from all sources, taking what is good and valuable and making it its own. In Ho-Ping Island Hi Park in Keelung, there is a seashore with rocks carved by millions of years of winds and water, similar to the nearby Yeliu Geopark. Despite a gust, a couple of fisherwomen were scouting for a certain seaweed that goes into a local snack. A few of our photographers jumped down to search for the best shots.
Meanwhile, our guide told us this was the location Chiang Kai-shek landed after he retreated from the mainland in 1949. Across the strait lies Fujian province, where most of the early settlers in Taiwan hailed from. For many decades, there was something stronger than the gusty wind to prevent people from calling on each other. Now it's just a short flight away.
After a week of going around Taipei, we stuffed our bags with Taiwan pastry and the memory of a way of life that used to live in ancient textbooks and is now so hauntingly real. It's not the most touristy place, but in an unconscious way it offers a corridor into our past.
By Raymond Zhou ( China Daily )
上個月我和一群專業的攝影師一起去了臺灣，這是我第一次去臺灣。比起那些旅游景點，這些攝影師更感興趣的是寶島上的人。這也給我了一種感覺，臺灣最美的風景是人。
僅僅一周的時間，很難去定義這個地方和這個地方的人如何，因此我向我的隊友賀延光求助證實。他是中國青年報非常有經驗的攝影師，之前就已經來過臺灣三次。第一次來臺灣早在1997年，他說：“這里沒有多少變化，連外觀都沒變。”
在這次旅行中，我們獲得的最有意義的理念就是“沒有多少變化”。
當然，2004年竣工的臺北101大樓曾是世界第一高樓，2010年迪拜的哈利法塔(迪拜塔)的建成使得臺北101退居世界第二高樓。由于臺北沒有像香港那樣高樓密集，臺北101大樓顯得“鶴立雞群”。
根據我的仔細觀察，臺北101大樓看起來像是個放大版的中國玉石墜飾，在四周是錢幣。所有錢幣的標志都可以解釋，當世界進入全面信息化時代時，現金可能在未來變得特別奇怪。
但別擔心，臺北是品嘗傳統小吃的天堂。在這里，小吃和路邊攤也是美食;在這里，每天都吸引著無數的吃貨，包括中產階級和時髦的年輕人們;在這里，飯店顛覆了我的固有思維，因為在大陸，我們的飯店通常有著巨大的、裝修豪華的大廳或者雅間，能夠容納上百桌。
在臺灣，我們幾乎每頓飯都是在那種只有幾張桌子的小館子吃的，但是服務好地方也干凈。當我吃到第一口牛肉面時我就明白為什么這么多人在等位了，因為它的味道實在是太令人驚艷了，這絕對是我人生中吃過的最好吃的牛肉面。
廟口夜市所有的商販都是以家庭為單位的，大部分都有半個世紀甚至更長的歷史。并且我注意到在臺北這樣規模的店家有很多很多，無論是市區還是郊區，是它們讓臺北充滿了濃濃的人情味。當我離開臺北時，我深深的感到，雖然臺北是一個擁有700萬人口的大城市(包括260萬城市人口)，它仍然給人一種親切感，好似它仍是一個村莊，只是在不斷擴張而已。人與人之間的交流非常樸實，毫無距離感。
我們參觀了很多樸素的街巷和夜市，小販們在沿街叫賣，面包師們讓你品嘗新鮮出爐的點心，但他們絕不會強迫你買，或是你品嘗之后沒買，他們也不會甩臉色。在他們的言語和行為中，我看到更多的是鄰里之間的友好，而不是商人的斤斤計較。
我們同行的每一個人都對寶島人民的態度印象深刻。有一天，我們抵達了基隆的一個魚塘，跳上了幾艘漁船。起初這些漁民有點驚訝，但得知我們的目的后非常爽快地答應了我們的合作請求，甚至擺造型讓我們拍照。北京晚報的攝影師張峰說：“在臺灣我從來沒有看到一個人對我甩臉色。”
在臺灣有很多因為電影和流行歌曲而被大陸人所熟知的地名，但當我看到無處不在的“仁義路”和“忠孝路”時還是被震驚了。最近，大陸舉辦了很多閱讀中國經典著作的活動，例如論語等，這些詞語再度引發人們的關注。
當然，用高姿態的方式來展示傳統美德是裝飾門面的，但我們看到的遠遠不止這些。在淡水河邊有一個古老的小鎮名叫大溪，一個世紀前，這里成為了港口，漸漸發展成了貿易中心。現在，這里發展著旅游業，有幾條商業小街。我們在這里遇到了一位中年婦女，為了照顧父親而放棄了自己的工作。
這個老人必須整日待在輪椅上，社保承擔了他的醫藥費，但是要一個家庭成員來全職照顧他，在大陸算的上奢侈。說到這個時，她解釋道：“我們有一個店面，靠租金來掙錢。”言語中沒有一絲苦澀和遺憾。
接下來的日子里，我們還遇到了其他類似的例子，正值壯年的孩子為了照顧生病的父母而放棄了自己的工作。我不知道在臺灣還有多少這樣的事，但是中國傳統觀念中的“孝順”在這里體現的淋漓盡致。
一位在一家致力于中國知識產權保護的報社供職的攝影師王文陽(音)說到，“我們只挖出了表面，沒有時間去深入了解他們，但是就我們現在所看到的，臺灣人已經充分展示了他們的生活方式。臺灣建立在家庭式經濟和濃濃的人情味之上，人與人之間的互動交流是社會的堅韌基石。我們還無意中碰到了兩次婚禮。”
我在臺北鬧市區的迪化街閑逛時，進了一家據說是這里最古老的商店，茶葉銷往全中國。迪化街的建筑能夠追溯到早期的中華民國時期，但當時，臺灣還被日本占領著。
在這里，無論是建筑、食品還是生活方式，它都吸收著所有的資源，取其精華去其糟粕，發展成自己的特色。在基隆和平島的一個公園里，有一片被數百萬年的風吹雨打侵蝕而成的巖石海岸，看起來很像附近的野柳地質公園。盡管這里狂風大作，幾個漁婦仍在這里搜尋著一種能做出當地小吃的海藻，還有幾個我們的攝影師東走西顧尋找最好的角度。
同時，我們的導游告訴我們，1949年蔣介石從大陸撤退到臺灣時就是在這里登陸的。海峽對面就是福建省，大部分最早的臺灣居民也是從這里來的。過去幾十年，有很多因素讓兩岸人民不能來往互通，而如今，海峽兩岸實現了三通直航，人民交流往來非常容易。
一周的臺北之行結束時，我們的包里都塞滿了臺灣小吃，過去曾經只是書本上讀到的臺灣現在深深地刻在我的腦海里。它不僅僅是個旅游勝地，而是能讓我們無意識地回到過去的橋梁。
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