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Went to Yang Ming Shan (Yang Ming Mountain) today. Last week I went to some trade convention to listen to speeches in Chinese most of my Saturday with my marketing class, so I didn't have class this morning. So went with one of my classmates from marketing class to look at the sakura flower and calla lilies instead of going to school. Above, I'm plucking lilies to give to my new host family, which I just moved in with this evening.
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Took a few pictures while going there. Yang Ming Shan is a lovely place, and there's no doubt I'm going back there again some times to take pictures with my new DSLR. Went there many times before while living at Joni's house. She lives quite close to the mountain.
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Angela, who brought me here, lives just a bit closer as her home is in Beitou, which is just on the foot of the mountain.
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Some strange bridge were on the road. There's a small waterfall with a bit of scenery further ahead.
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People around here loves circle doors.
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There you go: Waterfall. Okay. Further on...
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This is Xiao Youkeng. In the mountains of Taiwan you can often find hot springs. Especially if a lot people bother to live there. The white gasses that comes up is mostly steam and sulphur. It smells a little, but it's the smell of hot spring, so people are pretty used to it and otherwise will get so quickly.
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Turn around and you'll see a small town (or hamlet?) with a lot of white flowers. This was our destination.
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The next two months will be the flowering season for calla lilies. Zantedeschia Aethiopica I think they'd be called. Maybe they're a smaller variant or different species these in Taiwan.
Xiao Youkeng there in the background, see?
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Angela sells coffee at a nice café there during weekends, which is an advantage, since the flowers in the picture above belongs to the shop.
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A grasshopper! :)
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How considerate of me to take a close-up for myself to post here. Now you can also see how it looks.
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Actually the weather has been really bad the recent few days, but it just started to behave a little yesterday and went really well today. What a lovely coincidence.
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Wow. Those chicken are so small!
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Tadpoles! :D
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So that's how I ended up walking around in the mud and plucking calla lilies. Since Angela's "Boss" owns them and I look like Leonardo, whom she is a fan of, I can get to pluck these. I hope I didn't cause too much inconvenience for the tadpoles living in the shallow water.
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Nice people there.
People be sure to visit Illy Café when you go to see the Calla-Lily Festival at Green Valley (ç¶ å±±è°·, LÇ– ShÄ�n GÇ”), so that perhaps Angela can get a salary raise.