Archive for the 'Taiwan' Category

Mazu Pilgrims

Mazu Madness

Craig April 13th, 2008

Fireworks madness from the Mazu Festival. Don’t forget to take a look at previous posts detailing the origins of the Mazu Pilgrimage and images from the first 2 days of this years festival. Also, check out the complete gallery of Mazu images from which these few highlights are taken.

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Mazu Offering

2008 Mazu Pilgrimage Festival

Craig April 7th, 2008

Saturday April 5th saw the start of the 2008 Mazu Pilgrimage. Among the many gods and goddesses worshipped in Taiwan, Mazu (媽祖), the Goddess of the Sea is perhaps the most revered. Every year, in the 3rd month of the lunar calendar, the Dajia Mazu (大甲媽祖), which is housed at the Zhenlan temple (鎮瀾宮), is taken out on a pilgrimage lasting 8 days and covering 300km. Over the course of the 8 days, more than 1 million people will come out to see Mazu as she makes her way from Dajia to Hsingang in Jiayi county and back again, visiting more than 80 temples. It is thought that the Mazu pilgrimage is one of the three largest religious festivals in the world. Last year I wrote a detailed post describing the history of Mazu. Rather than rewrite it today, I’ll point you here for a look at the orgins of Mazu. This post will just be some images from the first 2 days of this years festival, with photos from Dajia’s Zhenlan Temple and Changhua’s Nan Yao Temple.

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Yangmingshan National Park

Craig March 31st, 2008

Yangmingshan National Park (陽明山國家公園) sits on the edge of Taipei city. With the 1120m Qixingshan (七星山) as the highest peak in northern Taiwan, Yangmingshan is a favored destination for hikers. This post is going to be just photos. Thanks to Todd at The Daily Bubble Tea for the inspiration behind them.

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