David on Formosa

Democracy's Dharma: Religious Renaissance and Political Development in Taiwan is a new book by Richard Madsen. Madsen was formerly ordained in the Maryknoll Order which brought him to Taiwan in the late 1960s. He later left the order for an academic career. He is currently Professor of Sociology at the University of California.

Democracy's Dharma studies four religious groups in Taiwan. Three of them are Buddhist: Fo Guang Shan (佛光山), Tzu Chi (慈濟) and Dharma Drum Mountain (法鼓山). The other is the Taoist group of Xingtian Temple (行天宮). It is based on the thesis that these groups have contributed to the development of democracy and civil society in Taiwan. Robert Green has reviewed the book in the July 2008 Taiwan Review. Read more »

• Michella rafts the Xiuguluan River in Hualian.
• Taiwanese Identity on the real story of Taiwan's peoples.
• Darren photographs the Wanhua Produce Market.
• Six Trains, Two Boats, One Adventure is the blog of a journey from Wales to Taiwan by train and boat. 
• Christine on the Taipei Film Festival.
• Foreigner's Guide to Film Culture in Korea reviews The Terrorizers at the Taiwan Film Festival (in Korea).
• Sponge Bear on Taiwan-Japan relations. 
• Patrick notes the problems of cycling in Taipei. 
• Michael Turton has an interesting historical document dispelling Chinese claims over the Senkaku Islands.

In the news: John Tkacik has written a must read article about the status of the Senkaku/Diaoyutai Islands. Richard Bush on the state of Taiwan-China relations. Reuters travel article about Kaohsiung. 

Events: The Tibetan Olympic Torch returns to Taiwan this week. The Taipei Film Festival runs until 6 July. Check the events calendar at Taiwanderful. You can also add your own events there. 

I am going to take a break from doing the weekly links over the summer vacation. 

They are Flying (飛行少年) is a documentary directed by Huang Chia-chun (黃嘉俊) about a group of 30 boys from the Faith Hope Love Youth Academy (信望愛少年學園) in Hualian who ride around Taiwan on unicycles. 

Like Island Etude it highlights some of Taiwan's beautiful scenery in the journey around the island. However, the real story here is that of the boys and the two men, Reverend Huang (黃明鎮牧師) and  Lu Su-wei (盧蘇偉), who inspire and lead them on the ride.

The boys come from troubled backgrounds. Many of them have been victims of domestic violence; some have run away from home and others have been in trouble with the police. The director Huang Chia-chun said that the background of each of the boys could be a documentary in itself, however he could only include the background stories of a few of the boys in the two hour documentary.  Read more »

• A-gu on the state of aboriginal affairs. 
• Prince Roy recalls his last week in Taipei.
• Shu Flies has great advice about studying at Shi-Da.
• Darren visits the Taipei Fish Market. 
• Todd writes about Momo TV visiting his school. 
• Michael Turton on the SCMP's alternative reality. 
• Poagao discusses the Uncanny Chinese Valley. 
• Felicia writes about Su Beng's opinion on the Diaoyutai/Senkaku Islands. 
• Taiwan Picture of the Day is one year old. 
• Doubting to shuo on the difficulties of dealing with virus outbreaks. 

Events: William Mellot will have a photography show at Hud La Voos in Tainan on the 28 June. The Taipei Film Festival continues until 6 July. Bike Smiling is on Sunday 29 June. Meet at the Ren'ai Road gate of Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall at 3:00pm. 

Carrie is also sharing some link love. Please check my shared items at Google Reader and Taiwan links at del.icio.us for more.

A while back I wrote about cycling to Wulai and noted that the road continued on past the police checkpoint and up into the mountains. I took advantage of the perfect weather today to ride further up the road along the Tonghou River (桶后溪). 

This area is popular with cyclists, hikers and people that just like to camp out or swim in the river. Being a weekend there were a few people around, but there was never a feeling that it was crowded. People must like coming up here because it provides a great experience of nature and quietness only a short distance from Taipei. The scenery really is superb, the river is crystal clear and there is no karaoke! Read more »

Free Burma protest in Taipei 

19 June is Aung San Suu Kyi's birthday and an international day of action for the people of Burma. The Taiwan Free Burma Network (台灣自由緬甸網絡) organised a protest outside the British Trade and Cultural Office in Taipei. Members of the Burmese community and other groups also took part.

Human rights groups join the protest

The British Trade Office was chosen as the venue for the protest because Britain is still a large investor in Burma even though the government has discouraged people from travelling to or investing there.The protest called for the release of Aung San Suu Kyi, the world's only Noble Peace Prize Laureate who is currently imprisoned. 

The Taipei Times also has a report on the protest: Students protest Aung San Suu Kyi's detention.

Doublewide performing at The Wall

In the evening there was a "Free Aung San Suu Kyi" concert at The Wall featuring performances by Oxymoron, Doublewide, Underflow and Valhalla. It was a great line up of bands who were all seriously loud! Underflow also performed at the Burma Cyclone Relief Concert last month. 

Valhalla performing at The Wall

*More photos in the Free Aung San Suu Kyi Concert set at flickr. 

The tenth Taipei Film Festival (台北電影節) will be held from 20 June to 6 July 2008. It features some 250 films from around the world.

In Wuchang Street in Ximending there is a special event in conjunction with the festival called the Taipei Movie Walk. The Outdoor Cinema Park has an exhibition of hand painted movie posters from around the 1960s. The ones pictured above are by Chen Zi-fu (陳子福). 

The Paris Nightclub (夜巴黎舞廳) is also open with a special exhibition about the movie Jin Da-ban's Last Night (金大班的最後一夜). The interior of the nightclub really is something of a trip back into the past and well worth checking out. 

Taiwanese feature films showing in the Taipei Awards section at the festival are Candy Rain (花吃了那女孩), Beautiful Crazy (亂青春), God Man Dog (流浪神狗人), Help Me Eros (幫幫我愛神), Orz Boyz (囧男孩), Cape No. 7 (海角七號), Soul of a Demon (蝴蝶), Summer's Tail (夏天的尾巴), Winds of September (九降風) and what on earth have I done wrong?! (情非得已之生存之道). There are also some interesting documentaries and short films from Taiwan. The Japan/Taiwan co-production Tea Fight (鬪茶) is one of the festival's closing films. 

The City Vision section of the festival features films from Jerusalem and Dublin. The Global Chinese Cinerama has films from the Chinese-speaking world. There is also a huge range of films from all around the world. There should be something to interest everybody. 

The venues for the film screenings are Zhongshan Hall (中山堂), Shinkong Cinema Complex (新光影城) and the Taipei County Cultural Center (臺北縣藝文中心演藝廳). Tickets are available from www.artsticket.com.tw outlets in advance and also from the venue box offices during the festival.

• Pinyin News on how things are named in English.
• Michael Turton on the politics of nuclear power.
• New Mandala on the former KMT soldiers in Thailand becoming Thai citizens. 
• Taiwan Green Party's presentation at the Global Greens Conference (bi-lingual). 
• Once Upon a Time in Taiwan visits Yeliu.
• Tea Masters says the quality of this spring's Oolong teas is down.
• Ni Howdy on the issue of disposable chopsticks.
• Pacific Morning Post on the differing views of the China-Taiwan detente. Rank contrasts a good and a bad article about Taiwan. 
• Travel around Taiwan on Ma's silence on the Diaoyutai incident. Ni Howdy on Ma the Warrior. The Far-Eastern Sweet Potato asks what is behind the Diaoyutai incident? 

In the news: The Age has a long article about Taiwanese politics. The Taipei Times interview with DPP chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen. Taiwan's wind power industry gets a boost. The ITRI develops dye-sensitized solar cells. 

Events: The Taipei Film Festival runs from 20 June to 6 July. I will post a preview of the festival later this week. 

Please check my shared items at Google Reader and Taiwan links at del.icio.us for more.