Bravo! Kaohsiung

Wow, talking about going out with a BANG. The opening ceremony was very impressive, and the closing one certainly did not disappoint.

This editorial said it the best:

Kaohsiung's success is rooted in the deep sense of community and solidarity in the southern port city around the values of democracy, human rights, free expression, citizen participation and, last but not least, Taiwan national dignity.

It is this set of values that the PRC boycotted and that Ma's KMT government have downplayed since coming to power last May which have now been dramatically returned to the view of Taiwan's people by the World Games.

Congratulation to the citizens of Kaohsiung.

EDIT:
Claudia Jean has a lot of nice reports, information and links on this.

I Wonder How Many People Are LIke This Person...

http://www.hi-on.org.tw/bulletins.jsp?b_ID=92338

I wonder how many pan blue supporters are like this guy.

To translate simply. The author is now very disappointed in KMT, but he/she was a very strong KMT supporter. He/she was very happy when Ma won the election in 2008, but now disappointed and start to worry about the future.

Those are not unusual. What is unusual is...he/she supported pan blue and KMT simply because pan blue express themselves more 溫文儒雅 (means something like politeness, gentleman/lady like, courteous etc). First thing to get straight is not every pan-blue politician are 溫文儒雅. A lot of them are quite thuggish in their appearance and behaviour. However, indeed, all the more popular pan-blue politician, like Ma, or the Taichung city Mayor like Hu, talk in a more gentle...almost feminine like tones.

Personally I don't give politeness too much credit. I think people should be courteous and polite...but those are not major concerns when we talk about something serious like politics. In politics, I would rather put priority on other more important personal quality. Especially in Taiwan's teenager-ish political environment, fervor in comments are sort of expected. Politicians will occasionally raise their voice, talk loudly, and with animated body language...etc in this environment, unless they have the trained mind of Dalai Lama, which I doubt many people have, or they do not give a f**k, in which case they are worse politicians.

However, I know majority of people prefer/like people that talk softly and act politely. It is simply part of human nature. I also know this is actually part of KMT's past propaganda taking effect. In the past, KMT simply labeled pan green as low level rioters, and a lot of people believe it, because they saw the picture and the video of the violent protest. However, they do not know the cause and the reason. They do not understand those violent protesters are fighting for people's freedom in Taiwan. They do not know they are trying to change a corrupted authoritarian government. Those past emotion remain until this day. So even there are a lot of thuggish pan-blue politicians, people do not notice....etc.

However, the main point really is...do you want to base your political judgement and choice simply on how people speak and how polite they are? Just think about it, and you will know how ridiculous that is.

The Pipe Dream

http://www.libertytimes.com.tw/2009/new/jul/25/today-fo1.htm

Some reports come out that indicates the opportunity regarding China's 家電下鄉 (Basically means selling electronic to the rural area, one of the stimulus type economic policy of China) is but a pipe dream.

One nice thing about this section of 大話新聞 is that it recorded all the stuffs officials etc said before, and replay them later to show if they are bull shitting or not. It shows how big of a BS the Chinese officials and KMT had created. One thing I notice is that those Chinese officials seem to have a habit of exaggerating description and numbers etc when answering questions. It is kind of a pattern I noticed over the years...but I am not sure if it is generally true. Unfortunately, once again, there are many idiots that fall for it. What is worse is that KMT actually helps in these lies.

So far, there were the fruits, tourists and now electronic...all pipe dreams IMO.

ECFA Cartoon Shows Many Kuo (郭冠英) in Taiwan

Many nice blog posts regarding the insults of the ECFA cartoon:

• The Far Eastern Sweet Potatoe: How to Insult People
• The View From Taiwan: MOFA Exploit Ethnic Stereotype to Sell ECFA
• The View From Taiwan: Guest Post, very nice one.
• Taiwan Matters: Bigotry as a Tool of Persuation

As all the reports and blogs show, the problems behind these cartoon characters is deep.

Everyone is very surprised that such shameful discriminatory cartoon gets created in Taiwan, and not from any place, but the government itself (or some whomever is hired by the government to create this). It feels that we are going back in time 20 or so years, or rather, such problem still exist within Taiwan society. It is like grasses with deep roots, that get cut during DPP's time in the government, but grow right back after. It shows that the Kuo (郭冠英) incident, like I said before, is but a tip of an ice burg. 郭冠英 is not a single crazy guy. There are quite some people like him. Even Ma, IMO, has this tendency. He just hides it very well. (in many occasions he shows his arrogant and almost colonizer-ish attitude, but they are apparent if one does not pay attention to news or his behavior)

However, although some idiots will actually believe this garbage, majority of people I am sure are shocked and displeased by such creation. I am wondering though...why? If they know these cartoon is insulting, it means that Ma's government is trying to insult people (especially the opposition to ECFA) on purpose. If they actually think this is OK, it means Ma's government is worse than Kuo. Or maybe they are trying to redirect public attention from a bigger problems? I speculate too much....in any case, this cartoon is disgusting and unacceptable. It shows Ma team's incompetence, arrogance, stupidity and...evilness, for the lack of better word.

BS + Lies + Deciets

http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=1009686&lang=eng_news&cate_img=1033.jpg&cate_rss=news_only_on_taiwannews

It has became quite clear that the way KMT works is by BSing and lying.

It does not matter what they do. They are full of sh*t. From constructions in Taipei, domestic policies and statistics, to foreign policies and statements. Like what is happening is Taipei construction now, KMT's actions are getting more and more ridiculous. The latest idiotic news from Taipei is about the new swimming pool.

I hope people in both Taiwan and the US see things clearly.

Disaster Summary

Made some summary about the disaster construction project Ma created over the past few years...so I can keep track. There are just too many of them. The summary is by no mean comprehensive. It is from what I read and heard so far. There are a lot more detail and comprehensive information online regarding these, but most of them are in Chinese.

======================================

Neihu Mass Rapid Transit Line

Problems Summary:

• Service suspended due to various system problems. (People have to evacuate and walk on the rail line to station) LIBERTY TIME PHOTO1 PHOTE 2
  
• Cart is too small and narrow. PHOTO From Mango Daily, LINK 2
  
• Use mid capacity system (skyline with small train) instead of high capacity system (underground with large train). In this case during planning various group already suggested using high traffic system due to the expected high volume of people created from the residential area development. (DETAILS)
  
• Flawed design (Some Detail Analysis) Especially regarding the big curve redirection toward the airport. It is a very questionable decision because the high angle turn, which indirectly cause the narrowness of the train, and the high amount of extra money required. Making a separated straight line toward the airport might be a better option.
  

OTHER LINKS:

1. http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=1005077&lang=eng_news&cate_img=83.jpg&cate_rss=news_Politics_TAIWAN
2. http://www.shadowgov.tw/23304_0_is.htm
3. http://www.shadowgov.tw/23281_0_is.htm
4. http://www.shadowgov.tw/?p=news,detail,23121&target=yan&yan=100&page_no=0
5. http://www.yuyen.tw/2009/07/blog-post_5071.html
6. http://www.yuyen.tw/2009/07/blog-post_10.html

======================================

Maokong Gondola

Problems Summary:

• Service suspended due to various system problems
• Foundation of Tower 16 and others exposed as the soil around them got washed away by rain. Foundation most likely unstable now.
• Bad design or choice of carts (fully sealed, extremely hot in Taiwan's climate)
• No geographic assessment before construction, even though there are already large amount of geographical survey around the area.
  

Other Links:

1. http://www.shadowgov.tw/?p=news,detail,21330&target=yan&yan=100&page_no=1
2. http://www.shadowgov.tw/?p=news,detail,20220&target=yan&yan=100&page_no=2
3. http://www.yuyen.tw/2009/07/blog-post_06.html
4. http://www.yuyen.tw/2009/05/blog-post_09.html

======================================

建成圓環

Problem Summary:
No idea how to write the name in English. But basically this was a traditional market place. Ma decided to construct this new structure to facilitate the market.

• The market place are mostly small restaurants. The design is again sealed which cause high temperature and lack of air flow. The glasses exterior also adds to the problem. Furthermore, each compartment is too small for each restaurants.
• There are a lot of other design problems. Basically it's a incompatibility between traditional market place and an ill-designed and impractical structure.
• In the end all the restaurants move out and the place become a wasted empty structure.
  

LINKS:
Because it's from more than 1 year ago, I cannot find a lot of information on this. But here are 2 blogs containing some comprehensive information:

1. http://blog.lester850.info/archives/2006/07/03/336/
2. http://person1204.pixnet.net/blog/post/16225254

======================================

The Taipei 2009 Deaflympics Swimming Pool

Problem Summary:
This one just came out very recently and there are still not enough coverage or investigation on it yet. Suffice to say it is quite ridiculous because of the very obvious mistakes. The pool should be international standard 10 lanes wide but instead it is built 8 lanes wide. Therefore, the pool cannot actually be used in the game. However, they wasted 600,000,000 NT dollars in it. Really ridiculous. Further tracking on the development of this issue is required.

LINKS

1. http://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/antired-newspaper/article?mid=21808&prev=21820&next=21806
2. VIDEO LINK
3. Taipei Times report
   

================================

Others

There are some other minor ones:

• 羅斯福路公車專用道: Last time I was in Taipei, I visited the place, and it looks like no bus is using it. But for some reason no one gets rid of them yet. Many have complain that those things actually worsen the traffic greatly, increasing the likely hood of traffic accidents. I do not know the detail but I know a lot of people complained for quite a long time.
• 龍山寺地下街: Similar to 建成圓環 situation. The poor design or the choice of location result in the lack of customers etc. Most stores are shut down now.

UPDATE:
Oh crap, I made a big mistake. The stupid pool costs 600,000,000 NT dollars, not 6,000,000.
Report LINK Interesting Taipei Sports Office Director Mr. Fang said the pool is not for Deaflympics. Well, why the heck did they spend Deaflympics budgets on it then?!?!

Kaohsiung World Games 2009 Opening

June 16 2009 Opening. Can find some video on youtube etc. Here is the fire work parts: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Zt0t82Fr7o&feature=related

Bunch of other videos are available. Overall not too bad. Personally I especially like the singing part. The stadium also looks very nice. (NY Times Architecture review here: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/16/arts/design/16stadium.html)

UPDATE: Hehe, this part is pretty amazing, with the special effect, music and stuff. And that roar by Lin is nice: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yuJVnKhpog