This looks almost European, except that it's really not. I liked the colors and contrasts of this scene. The coloured billboards are advertising a new apartment complex that will be built on the foreground. The name of the complex is typical 'image English' (ie only to show how cool and 'Western' it is): 'The largest Cortille in North Taichung'. Anyone ever heard of a 'Cortille' before?

Degrees Celcius. And that's at 11pm. This country is HOT!

Here's a typical example of Taiwanese entrepreneurship: a food truck. Find a corner, park your vehicle and you have a business!

Beautiful clouds on my way to work yesterday.

Star Trek Episode 37. I'm the non-comformist on the right. The diving/snorkelling was fantastic. The variety of coral and sea life in the water around the island is spectactular. If you've never been snorkelling/scuba diving, I highly recommend it - it's a totally new world under the surface. Next purchase: a waterproof housing for my camera!

Here's a great pic of one of the most photogenic people I've ever met - Tracy Sparrow. Taken in front of an old fishing boat on Green Island.

So a bunch of mates and I visited Green Island which is South East of Taiwan, about an hour's ferry ride from Taidung. It's a former penal colony that has been open to tourists for quite a few years now. It's home to some very beautiful scenery like the shot above and has some of the best coral reefs I've ever seen. A good place to visit if you have the time.

I visited the science museum and they had this interesting display about population growth. This pic doesn't look half as eerie as the real display does.

Another classic mistranslation on the side of a scooter.

I also visited Taipei's national palace museum. This is probably the most amazing piece of carving I've ever seen. It's made from a single piece of ivory and inside the outer spere are another 17 concentric speres, all perfectly fitting inside each other. How they were carved I have no idea, but it's an incredible piece of art.

This is a 66000kg steel ball that slowly swings to counteract the swing produced by high winds on 101's 508 meter structure.

So I took a trip to Taipei and went up to the 89th floor of the (ex)tallest building in the world, Taipei 101. It's a great experience and you'll see the whole of Taipei if it's not cloudy like it was when I was there. It's amazing that you're actaully above the low clouds on the 89th floor.

The bread loaf from outer space. Na, just fiddling with my cheap and infinitely playable laser pointer. Wow, those things are interesting! Try shining one through some crumpled cellophane at night and see what happens...

Advertisers never fail to amaze me with their ingenuity. This is a semi opaque advert applied directly to a building. Presumably the occupants can still see out of their windows.

I was at a beach about 30 mins outside of Taichung the other day and encoutered these amazing symetrical patterns that the local crabs make around their holes. Not quite sure why they go to all the effort of rolling perfect little sand balls and arranging them so well. Any enlightening comments would be appreciated :)

Sorry to post a pic such as this, I guess it's not all roses here in Taiwan. Some taiwanese people don't seem to know how to take care of their animals and many have no concept of respect for non-human life. This was outside a pet shop, in the heat of the day. Appalling :(

Did you know that good cake and cafe needs no bush? I must say, this is news to me.

Back in Taiwan, this is one of the funniest mis-translations of the Chinese language, I have ever seen. Enjoy! (Click on the picture to bring up a larger version)

OK, last one not of Taiwan. At least it's Asia this time. On the way from Johannesburg to Kuala Lumpur for my connecting flight home. How can you not love flying (turbulance aside) when this is the view from the window?

"That is not Taiwan, Roger!" I know, I know, but I can't resist an opportunity to promote my beautiful home country, South Africa. Taken at Kenton On Sea, Eastern Cape province.

Strictly speaking I shouldn't be posting this photo, because it wasn't taken in Taiwan at all and photographically it's not great either. In fact, it was taken off the coast of Madagascar from the window seat of a 747 I was flying in on my way back to South Africa for holiday. A few hours before we landed, I witnessed the most spectaculat lightning display I have ever seen. The entire sky was lit up by hundreds of simultaneous flashes of lightning from a bunch of huge clouds. That's got to be one of the most amazing natural things one can ever witness.

Those avid followers of this blog (do such strange creatures exist, I wonder?) will recall photos from a trip mates and I took to Sun Moon Lake, a natural (I think) reservoir about an hour south of Taichung. Well, I visited it again, and this time it was really beautiful, with low lying clouds decorating the surrounding mountains. Here's a panorama. Sorry it's only 1024 pixels wide, but that's all that 'Hello' allows.

Here's a stack of 'ghost money' that is burned by a large number of Taiwanese folk in the hope that it will financially provide for ancestors in the afterlife.

I'm not quite sure what these people were doing, but it had something to do with the incence holder. If you know, please leave a comment :)

A lot of pride, time, effort and skill goes into constructing and decorating your average Taiwanese temple. As an example, look at this beautiful stone carving, just a small section of an extensive amount of decoration on one of the older temples in Lu Gan.

I visited a town called Lu Gun with a few friends recently and visited some temples there. This is one of my favourite recent photos - a door to one of the older temples.

This is one cool looking Japanese transformer robot. I wish I was a kid again, because this beats He-Man by a mile.

Most large Taiwanese companies have an annual banquet to thank employees, eat food and generally to throw around a bunch of money and look good. My company's banquet was no different, complete with all the hype and fanfare that accompanies Taiwanese events. The food was good, if unusual, but the best part was the huge amount of cash that was casually given away by management.

Pine trees, mist and mountains are the order of the day at Shi Tou. It's a really beautiful spot.

It's been a long time since I added anything!!! Sorry to all you folks who actually visit. Well, this photo was taken by my good friend Rob Sparrow when a bunch of us visited Shi Tou forest recreation area. I think it's a great pic and I'm kind of jealous of him for taking it ;)