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Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Global Voices Online on Taiwan

Global Voices Online, a fantastic peek into the blogospheres of 200 nations, has great stuff about Taiwan, like this collection on transportation and the east coast. The proposed highway down the east coast was an important topic in the DPP primary debates -- headlining the Taipei Times presentation of it -- and is highly controversial. The post collects local bloggers musing on where things are headed....

In the essay on outdoor recreation, ‘Conservation Esthetic,’ Professor Leopold wrote, ‘Recreational development is a job not of building roads into the lovely country, but of building receptivity into the still unlovely human mind.’

The total area of Taiwan is about 36,000 sq. km, and mountains account for 30% of the surface area. The Central Mountain Range has been an important barrier stretching from north to south. It stops typhoons approaching from Pacific Ocean going to the western plains and stops western invaders from going to the eastern areas. Ever since Taiwan was colonized by China and Japan, transportation between the east and the west has played a critical role in the local community development, government control, and natural resource depredation....



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6 comments:

  1. 寶拉April 19, 2007 at 12:59 PM

    Hi Michael,
    Wow... I never expect I'll find you again~ This is Paula who was never being your student but still sneaked into the your class...Hopefully you know who i am. Great blog. Great Taiwan. They funny thing is , I found your globe by searching the blogs about Tibet...

    ReplyDelete
  2. 寶拉April 19, 2007 at 1:02 PM

    Hi Michael,
    This is Paula... Surprise!! I was the one who was in your class without the student ID... Remember me? Are you still at Taichung? So glad to see you in here. Great articles. Great Taiwan!!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Michael TurtonApril 19, 2007 at 3:43 PM

    I remember you Paula. You asked for my help with some writing you were doing, right?

    Michael

    ReplyDelete
  4. Michael FaheyApril 19, 2007 at 5:37 PM

    I subscribe to the Global Voices Taiwan section, and in general I agree that they are doing a wonderful job.

    Now I wish my Chinese was as good as some of the folks doing these translations, but I'm still going to point out that the clearly non-native English detracts from the message. It's hard for the English-speaking world to take Taiwan's voice seriously when the message is a bit muffled. On the other hand, the more translation the better.

    Coverage of Lesheng and the East Coast highway issues has also been a bit biased (especially Lesheng).

    And it is really a shame that the Taiwan section has to be labeled 'Taiwan (ROC)'. Why not just good old Taiwan? At least it isn't Taiwan, Province of China.

    Enough kvetching.

    ReplyDelete
  5. 寶拉May 10, 2007 at 12:45 PM

    Yes. I tried hard to search for the website you gave me but it's been removed from my computer...You can image how surprised I am to see you once more. Are you still at the same University? I sometimes ride my green bike into the campus. It also remind me of visiting you again... Hopefully I could buy you a bevarage some time. haha.

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  6. Michael TurtonMay 10, 2007 at 4:55 PM

    Yes, I am at the same university. But I am very busy and I spend M-T-W each week in Tainan. I am here all day on thursday. Come see me if you are not busy!

    Michael

    ReplyDelete

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