The Old Quarter of Hanoi, as its name indicates, is one of the oldest area in the city. The Old Quarter is famous for its streets that are packed with century-old shophouses specialising in a particular trade, such as shoes, bags, toys, medicines, metals, bamboos etc. The speciality of each street is reflected by the road names.
The St Joseph’s Cathedral in Hanoi was opened in 1886, a year after the French colonial officially occupied the country of Vietnam. The cathedral still holds mass twice daily and is probably the most famous church in Hanoi.
The text below the statue reads Regina Pacis, which if not mistaken, is the Italian words for Queen of Peace… an alternative title for Virgin Mary.
Ngoc Son Temple (Đền Ngọc Sơn; Temple of the Jade Mound) is located on a small islet at Hoan Kiem Lake and is connected to the land via the Huc Bridge (Thê Húc; Morning Sunlight Bridge).
A group of Korean animal rights activists held a demonstration at a large dog meat market in Seongnam-si (near Seoul) last weekend to protest against dog eating.
Dog meat is a common food in Korea; Koreans have been eating dog meat for thousand of years. One of the popular dishes is Bosintang (literally ‘invigorating soup’), a traditional Korean soup with dog meat as its primary ingredient which is very popular during summer season.
It’s estimated that over a million of dogs are slaughtered every year in Korea to meet market demand. The younger Korean generations however are beginning to ditch this tradition.
Some local foods in Jiufen, a small town in Taiwan which I visited in late April 2008…
The Dragon Boat Festival (Duanwu Festival) is celebrated by the Chinese on the fifth day of the fifth month on the Chinese calendar (June 8 this year).
The festival is celebrated to commemorate ancient poet Qu Yuan, who jumped into a river and killed himself after his country was conquered by the other.
Locals who admired his patriotism fed rice dumplings to the fishes in the river which he committed suicide so that the fish would not disturb his body… some others also rode on boats and beating on drums to scare away the fishes for the same purpose.
An aboriginal dance performance (video) in Hualian, during my Taiwan visit in late April. The video quality is rather poor because I was recording using a digital camera and not a viewcam, but it should be pretty cool if you have not witnessed similar stuff before…
There are about a dozen aboriginal tribes recognised in Taiwan, not sure which particular tribal dance it was.
The Taiwanese aborigines’ culture actually shares similarities with the aborigines in South East Asia, including my homeland Malaysia. They are all considered as Austronesian people who shared the same ancestors some thousands of years ago.
In fact, the bamboo-stick-dance in the video can be seen in Philippines and Malaysia-Borneo as well. It’s a small world after all :)
A Saudi woman wants a divorce because her husband tried to sneak one look at her face after 30 years of marriage.
The 50-year-old woman followed the tradition of her native village near the south-western city of Khamis Mushayt and kept her features veiled at all times.
After keeping his urge of curiosity for 30 years, the husband somehow decided to try lifting his wife’s veil as she slept to take a look at her face, and it proved as a costly mistake as his outraged wife woke up during his sneak peek and is now demanding a divorce.
The woman said that her husband apologised and promised never to do it again, but she insisted she wanted a divorce. This is not the first example of Saudi husbands with wives forever shrouded in mystery.
Don’t mistaken this as an Islamic practice though, it’s just a very old tradition practised by a tiny minority of women in remote areas of Gulf countries, and an odd one obviously.
