The first Monday of this year was also the first day of the twelfth month on the traditional lunisolar calendar. As they do at the start of every lunar month and again on the fifteenth day countless people across Taiwan positioned circular braziers in front of their homes, and set about burning sheaves of joss paper.
The ritual burning of incense and joss paper (which English speakers sometimes call ghost money, spirit money or votive currency) is central to local religious and ancestor-worshipping traditions. Unfortunately, it has a noticeably detrimental effect on air quality, especially in urban areas.
Because some
<strong>May 10 to May 16</strong>
Many elderly people wept as the crowds flooded Raohe Street (饒河街) on May 11, 1987.
It had been over a decade since the street was this busy, the Minsheng Daily (民生報) reported. Locals set up altars along the way, praying that the grand opening of the Raohe Street Night Market would reverse their fortunes.
It was Taipei’s first night market with government-mandated traffic control hours, banning cars from 5pm to midnight.
“This is a great way to manage a night market, and other locales should follow suit,” the article stated.
There were still some kinks to
•••
Hong Kong’s most celebrated restaurants are the kind of Michelin-rated palaces to gastronomy that you can find in cities across the world. They congregate at the top of sky-scrapers, boasting views across the bay, with its gaudy nightly light display.
Most of them are fine, some are even excellent, but the places that make the biggest impression aren’t these aerial cathedrals to dim sum but the strange, spartan boxes that grow like mushrooms into the very architecture of the city.
One such place is Tsim Chai Kee, a noodle bar with all the design flourishes of a young offenders institution. In the basement, an elderly woman prepares a mountain of wantons, creating the fist-size balls with a single hand and popping them on a table that sags under the weight. On a busy day they can shift thousands of them, which is no surprise; this is the food of gods, the giant prawns giving each mouthful a satisfying crunch, the broth rich with umami. Each bowl costs less than