Saturday, February 14, 2009

Uncle William and His Dogs

1/25/09 The only thing one ever does during the Chinese New Year is eat, and then eat, and then eat some more. This gets to be tough from time to time. So, before launching into heavy duty eating today, Uncle William decided to take me for a walk, to the Taipei National University of the Arts (TNUA) Campus.

The TNUA campus is but 5 minutes walk from the front door of Uncle William's place. The school is located on hundreds of acres of land, beautifully landscaped and with fine view over the Taipei basin. Uncle William makes it a habit to feed stray dogs in his neighborhood--and the abundance of stray dogs is a problem here in Taiwan. Many Taiwanese buy dogs from pet stores or pet stands in the night market, and then realize they don't want to keep pets anymore due to space constraint. Some would just abandon the dogs and let them loose!! It has gotten a bit better over the years but one can still fequently see stray dogs in the City of Taipei.

We walked around the campus and Uncle William showed me his usual path. This campus is so nice and spacious. There are all kinds of large sculptures placed here and there on the campus. The view is very clear today. Uncle William's dog friends heard his whistling and showed up like little children jumping about him. He fed them, and played with them a little bit, and then we walked about.
Uncle William also showed me the swimming pool. He swims here at their fantastic indoors pool every moring and is a part of the local community swimming troop. I may consider coming here to swim in the evenings, too.
After about an hour of walking around in brisk pace, we strolled back to the apartment and now I'm ready for that big New Years Eve meal...


6 comments:

Anna said...

Would love to see pics of the dogs. What does Uncle WIliam feed the dogs?

As for swimming, my FAVORITE form of exercise. A must if you have access to a nice pool. Only problem, too much chlorine bad for hair.

Where have you been? Haven't chatted w/ you in ages.

Anonymous said...

It's not true, I mean CNY is not all about eating, it's eating and drinking and than eating and drinking and especially drinking and eating (drinkingrefers to all kind of stuff, from bubaneicha to gaoshancha to what ever else they come up with, including the famous "drunken chicken soup" ;).

Sounds like a nice place to walk around and take pictures, will contact you for informations once I have a bit time on hand.

suewun said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
suewun said...

Anna, I will take some pics of dogs JUST FOR YOU.

Michael, thanks for visiting the blog and yes, please excuse me for forgetting about drinking. Drank I did, indeed. You will surely find the TNUA campus a good spot for your professional photography. Let me know and I will provide a personally guided tour...

葉狀師 said...

Dear Sue,

Unfortunately, Pin-Hui won't be available this Friday. Can we postpone the lunch to next week (we will go back to Hualien this weekend)?

CY

suewun said...

Ching Yuan,no problem and I sent an email to you...let me know which day is good with you next week!

Sue