Giant Lily-Pads at Shuangxi Park (雙溪公園大王蓮)

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Shuangxi Park and Chinese Garden is a two hectare park in Taipei City’s Shilin District situated between Chiang Kai-Shek’s former Shilin Residence (士林官邸) and the National Palace Museum (故宮博物院) at the base of Yangmingshan (陽明山).

The park features beautifully crafted pavilions, courtyards, arch bridges, zig-zag bridges and a man-made lake that is surrounded by a beautifully maintained landscape designed according to the standards of what you’d typically find in Southern China’s gardens and also with the concept of Feng-Shui in mind. 

With all that being said though, the park isn’t a very popular tourist attraction and only really attracts local residents who want to enjoy a bit of the outdoors near their homes.

That is however until the Taipei City Government filled the lake with the giant lily-pads as part of their effort to show the beauty of Taipei during the Summer University Games that were held in late August.

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Before I start I should probably mention that quite a few people mix up Water Lily's and Lotus flowers and think that they are the same thing. While they are both beautiful aquatic flowers, the lotus is one that stands high above the surface of the water and has those scary-looking seeds. Water Lily’s on the other hand float peacefully on the surface of the water and have big ugly lily-pads around them.

In actuality these giant lily-pads at Taipei’s Shuangxi Chinese Garden and Park (雙溪公園) have been all-the-rage as of late with lots of photographers, models and even the mayor of Taipei descending upon the grounds to get photos of the small lake filled to the brim with these giant lily-pads (大王蓮).

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When I parked my YouBike at the entrance of the park one of the first things I noticed was that there was a well-known local Instagrammer at the gates. We had never met before but we both live in Taoyuan, so instead of walking up to her like a creep, I sent her a message and said hello to be polite.

When I entered the park and got my first look at the lily-pads I was kind of amazed - Not only was the lake completely full of them but they completely covered almost every part of the lake making it seem as if there wasn't actually even any water in it.

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These giant water lily-pads which are native to tropical regions of South America are not endemic to Taiwan, so their appearance over the past few years in Taiwan has been one that has attracted a lot of people in any of the locations that have featured them. 

Since 2013 the lily-pads have been cultivated in Taoyuan and Tainan as part of their respective Lotus Festivals which take place every summer when the flowers are in bloom. In 2013 and 2014, the giant lily-pads made their first appearance in Taipei but only appeared again after a three year hiatus this summer. 

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The giant lily-pads which can reach widths up to 130 centimetres are delicate and it takes a lot of effort to cultivate them but when they are fully grown they are known for their ability to sustain heavy objects. 

The ability to stand or sit on the giant lily-pads makes for quite a unique photo opportunity and if you know anything about Taiwan you’ll know that there are obviously going to be lines of internet models, old ladies and families wanting to take their turn to take a photo on these lily-pads.

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I’m not particularly sure how long these lily-pads will last, so if you’re free any time in the next few weeks you may want to take the opportunity to visit the park to check them out before they disappear again. 

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Map / Location

 

Address: Intersection of Fulin Rd. and Zhishan Rd. (台北市士林區福林路與至善路交叉口)

You can take a bus to the park if you want but its actually just a short ten minute walk or less than a five minute Youbike ride from Shilin MRT station (士林捷運站). When I arrived at Shilin Station, I just grabbed a Youbike and parked it outside of the park and then rode it back. 

If you prefer to take a bus however, leave Shilin Station through Exit and from there take bus 206, 255, 303, 304, 620, R4 or R30 to the Taibei High School Stop (泰北高中站). It is a short walk from there.

Since you’re going to be walking either way I think you might as well just walk or ride a bike from the MRT station instead of waiting around for the bus, but it's really up to you!

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Gallery / Flickr (High Res Shots)

Mid-Lake Pavilion (湖心亭)

Taichung Park (台中公園) is a 10 acre park situated within the downtown core of Taiwan's central Taichung city. The park is the oldest in the city with a century-old history dating back to the Japanese Colonial Era.

The massive park is an important recreational area for the people of Taichung with all of the typical sporting amenities you'd find in any other park in Taiwan but also features several important pieces of Taichung's history mixed in with jungle gyms, basketball courts and a massive lake for kayaking and canoeing.

Original known as Nakanoshima kōen (中之島公園) the park was constructed in 1908 and has been listed by the Taichung City Government as historical site thanks to some of the historical monuments found within that date back as far as the Qing Dynasty.

I'm not going to focus on each of the historical monuments found within the park but I'm going to make more than one post to explain in greater detail what I perceive as both the good and the bad aspects of the park.

My first post is going to focus on the positive with the beautiful Mid-Lake Pavilion while the second post will be a bit of a rant about the deliberate destruction of Taiwan's history due to the tumultuous political nature of life in Taiwan and its experience based on colonial rule.

With the first post about the park I'm going to focus on the positive with the beautiful Mid-Lake Pavilion (湖心亭). The pavilion with its over a century year old history has been around so long that it has become one of those defining features of an ever-changing and expanding Taichung city.

The construction of the pavilion and the man-made lake that surrounds it was completed on October 24th 1908 (明治41年) and was to coincide with the celebrations that marked the completion of a railway line that connected Kaohsiung with Taipei and Keelung in the north.

As one of the Japanese colonial governments major development projects, the ceremony that would celebrate the completion of the railroad was to be a grand one with Prince Kanin Kotohito (閑院宮載仁親王) coming from Japan to participate in the ceremony. The railroad, which stretched almost the entire length of the western side of Taiwan was thought to signal a new era of peace and stability in Taiwan and help to usher in a new period of modernization that would bring economic stability to the people of the island.

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​As the inauguration ceremony was to be held nearby the Taichung Train Station, the pavilion was to be used as a place for the prince to escape the sun, enjoy some fine Taiwanese tea and relax. Interestingly, I have seen some references that implied that in 1923 Crown Prince Hirohito had also visited Taichung as well as the pavilion, but I can't actually confirm whether or not this is true.

As a staunch supporter of state Shintoism, it was important for Prince Kotohito to see Shinto shrines set up in each of the places he visited on his trips to Taiwan and during his visit to Taichung, he insisted that a shrine be set up nearby. A few years later the Taichung Shinto Shrine (たいちゅうじんじゃ) was set up within the park and only a short walk away from the pavilion - I'll go into more detail about the shrine in my next post about the park.

​If you didn't really know much about the history of the pavilion, you probably wouldn't be able to distinguish that it was built with a Japanese prince in mind. The pavilion was designed in a way that blended the concept of a traditional Japanese tea house with that of Western architectural design.

The double-sided pavilion (雙閣亭) sits above the man-made lake on cement slabs with each side of the pavilion being facing a 45 degree angle away from the other. The frame of the building was built with cast iron while the interior and parts oft he exterior are made of Taiwanese cypress. The roof of the pavilion is probably the most "Japanese" part of the structure but still differs from the traditional Japanese roof designs that are still common in both Taiwan and Japan. Each of the four-sided pavilions has a roof with a high arch.

For photographers, the Mid-Lake pavilion is one of those defining images of Taichung and is an excellent subject to shoot both during the day and the night. The pavilion currently isn't open to the public as renovations are taking place to repair the interior but should be open again sometime in the future.

If you are in Taichung a stop by the beautiful Taichung Park is highly recommended - The park is easy to access and is just a short walk from the train station. The pavilion is one of those century-old historic buildings leftover from the Japanese era and is excellently preserved so I recommend checking it out if you have time.

I'll be posting again in the next week or so with my less positive review of the Taichung Park, so if you're interested in a bit of criticism (hey, its the Internet, people love negativity) check back to see what I have to say. 

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Sun Yat Sen Memorial House (逸仙公園)

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The Taipei Train Station is the largest transportation hub in Taiwan and from the station you have the option of taking trains, the high speed rail, the Taipei MRT, intercity busses and city buses - You can even grab a YouBike and ride a bicycle around the city!

The area is about to get a lot more convenient in the near future with the completion of the expansion of the Taipei Train Station and the Airport Express project that will offer the same type of high speed express trains that are common in many large metropolitan areas around the world but also MRT access all the way to Taoyuan!

The area around the station is popular with backpackers for its convenience with several hostels available as well as for shopping with the newly opened Q-Square mall (京站), an electronics mall, the Mitsukoshi department store and (I have to mention) Bo-Ai Road (博愛路) which is affectionately known by photographers as "camera street".

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Tourism-wise, the area around the station only has a few sites that would be of interest to travellers which include the historic Beimen Gate (北門), the 228 Peace Memorial Park (二二八和平公園), Dihua Street (迪化街) and the Dadaocheng Wharf (大稻埕碼頭). There is however a little known piece of ROC history situated within a park near the station that doesn't attract a lot of tourists and isn't really found in many guide books, but if you're stuck in the train station waiting for a train you might want to take a walk over and check it out.

The Sun Yat Sen Memorial House (國父史蹟紀念館) not to be confused with the Sun Yat Sen Memorial Hall (國父紀念館) is a small Japanese-era wooden house situated within Yixian Park (逸仙公園) that is dedicated to the founding father of the Republic of China and is the location where the man, who is known as the "Founder of the Nation" (國父) stayed for a short time during one of his visits to Taiwan shortly after the 1911 Xinhai Revolution (辛亥革命) which overthrew the Qing Dynasty.

Sun Yat Sen (孫中山) is an extremely important figure in modern Chinese history and was the founding father of the Republic of China. Strangely, he is also important to the so-called communist regime in the People's Republic of China which memorializes him as a revolutionary who initiated regime change and allowed for further revolution within China proper.

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No matter what your politics are, Sun was one of the most important figures of the 20th century and to this day continues to be one of the few figures revered on both sides of the Taiwan strait. In life Sun was a physician, politician, revolutionary and a writer and was one of the great thinkers of the time and his political philosophy of the "Three Principles of the People" (三民主義) is one that helped modernize Asia with regard to political thought.

Sun can be a bit of a confusing figure to westerners due to the fact that he went by so many names. He was born Sun Wen (孫文) and also went by Sun Deming (孫德明) which later became Sun Yat Sen (孫逸仙) while he studied in Hong Kong and then his most popular name Sun Zhongshan (孫中山) which was "Nakayama" and a product of his time spent in Japan.

If you can keep his names straight you're likely to notice that city districts, streets, schools and parks all over Taiwan go by a few of his names and the park for which this memorial house is situated in is no different as it is named "Yixian Park" (逸仙公園) which is the Mandarin pronunciation of the Cantonese "Yat Sen".

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The park is a beautiful Japanese-style garden and is very simple in nature and actually quite a relaxing place to visit in the middle of the concrete jungle of Taipei. There is a small pond filled with Koi fish, tree-covered benches and a pavilion with a plaque in remembrance of Sun.

The house in the middle of the park is where Sun stayed and was a former Japanese hotel named Ume Yashiki (梅屋敷) or "Plum House" in English. The traditional wooden Japanese-style house was built in 1900 while Taiwan was still under the control of the Japanese empire.

Sun made a stop in Taiwan in 1913 for a few days and stayed in the hotel (which was considered to be quite extravagant for the time) before heading to Japan. By that time the revolution to overthrow the Qing Dynasty was complete but the road to democracy in China hit a bump in the road when Yuan Shikai (袁世凱) railroaded the government, instituted a system of warlords and dedicated to proclaim himself emperor which led to decades of strife and the eventual Chinese Civil War. Sun's visit to Taipei was a part of his efforts to start a second revolution (第二革命) which was meant to overthrow Yuan but ultimately failed.

Despite only staying in the hotel for a few days, the hotel was appropriated by the Chinese Nationalists when they retreated to Taiwan and ultimately became a memorial site for the man who they considered to the be founder of the nation. The park and hotel today are not in the original location as it had to be moved to make way for the expansion of the underground Taiwan rail system which fed into the nearby Taipei station. In 1983 the park was closed and moved 50 meters away from the original location reopening to the public in 1987.

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Now that you know the history I'm going to speak plainly - You might notice that there are only photos of the park and the Plum House from the outside. I didn't actually even bother stepping into the house. Why you might ask? There are strict rules that you are not allowed to take photos in the house. I don't particularly understand why such rules are in place in this area, it makes absolutely no sense and is probably one of the factors why the park is relatively unknown. It's actually quite unfortunate when you consider that the park is such a nice little space within the city and has the potential to be a nice little tourist attraction. 

When a tourist spot has arbitrary "No Photo" signs all over the place and guards standing around to enforce it, it just makes me want to leave. I'm not sure if others feel the same as I do about this kind of thing, but my primary interest is photography and helping to promote Taiwan. I feel like I'd like to recommend this beautiful park to people but this really left me with a bad taste in my mouth! The government spends a considerable amount of money on the upkeep of the park as well as having staff there to give information to guests and guided tours. If they are investing that money they should probably do a much better job promoting it. 

There isn't much English content available online about this place, so if you'd like a more balanced (non-photographer) opinion about the park, be sure to check out Taiwan Explorer's blog post from a few years back: Sun Yat Sen Memorial House and Yixian park.

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If you'd like to visit the Sun Yat Sen Memorial House and Yixian Park simply walk out of the East exit of Taipei Main Station and walk for 2-3 minutes down the Civic Boulevard (市民大道). Entrance to the park is free and it is open between 9-5 each week from Tuesday - Saturday (Closed on Mondays). If you visit enjoy the history and take a photo inside the house as a form of tourist protest!

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Gallery / Flickr (High Res Shots)