Yellow Mountain Fever
There is a favourite restaurant of mine in the misty mountain of Yamingshan that has the best tasting chicken in Northern Taiwan. While Annie and I were having lunch there on the weekend we wondered off to take in the sites. Directly behind this restaurant is what seems like at first glance an abandoned field. Our eyes were a little sharper today and as we zoomed in we began seeing some things. Things that we thought were interesting.
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| At first it was a small white pot. |
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| Then as we kept walking around....a white jade suiban. |
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| Penjing style rocks resting under the dried grass. |
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| We have more suiban. |
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| A bonsai pot that had a rock in the shape of a mountain concreted inside. Unfortunately, it was smashed. |
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| Further back we found about 50 more suibans like these! They were all scattered throughout this farmers field. |
I love suibans and rocks. I know I am a simple man but to find so many of these I had to have some. We went about asking the locals who owned this land. We were directed to a friendly man sitting on a chair a few hundred meters away. As we approached him he gave us a big smile and began telling us that his dream was to recreate the scenery of Yellow Mountain in China where he once visited.
This man, now retired, was once the owner of a trading company. Because he was inspired and mesmerised by what he saw he ordered 10 tons of rocks that were found near the mountain area to be shipped back to Taiwan where he could go about creating mini landscapes. He told us that over time he has chiseled away at the rock s that he bought and has made close to 8,000 individual scenes.
These are some of his larger pieces. If you look closely you can see how he has concreted piece by piece together to come up with what looks like a large mountain.
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| I liked this one so much I bought it. |
I was secretly hoping that this guy was going to say something like, 'Oh, I have been waiting for someone like you for years! Please take as much as you want." However, we took some time to agree on a reasonable price for what he has created. Fair enough!
He then took us on a tour around his house. I was unaware that there was actually a house in amongst the trees and long grass. We were thrilled to come upon some smaller compositions. Over the years he had taken a great deal of time and creative effort to construct literally thousands of these!
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| This is the great man here. |
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| A lot of these guys were in a cracked suiban. |
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| Having a close up and personal. The rocks really were detailed and intricate. |
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| On the way out. These rocks and the moss covering them are moving to a new home... |
