You Can't Take the Taiwan out of the Surfer

Well, I couldn't access my blog from the mainland thanks to the great firewall of China, so now that I am back in the States I will try to fill in what happened during my last days in Taiwan and while in China over the next few entries.

School finished on the 24th of August and I left for the mainland on the 29th, which left me a few days to fill. If you recall, my original plan was to seek waves in the South, but weather was not on my side. Reports came in that Kending, the main Southern surf spot, was flat. At the same time, Jason, the friend who braved the crowds with me on my last surf expedition, called in to say it was double-overhead in the North, an aberration for this time of year. I responded to this call-to-arms by hopping the train for Yilan, armed only my surf trunks and the phone number of Brother Song, owner of a surf-shop/dormitory that rents boards and beds for the night. A mix-up caused by poor cell-phone reception and a thick Taiwanese accent left me stranded at the wrong train station for an a few hours, worried that I might not get to the beach before sunset. Things worked out, as they do, and Brother Song's daughter found me and got me to the beach with an hour or so of sunlight left.

The swell had died down and the wind had picked up, making for sloppy head to shoulder high waves, with sets at perhaps one to two feet overhead. I rented a 7'6" fun board, as there were no short boards to be found. The paddle out was into the wind, and brutal. Out of shape from a summer of hitting the books, and unable to duck-dive the plank I had rented, I only made it outside 3 times. On the fourth paddle-out as I marked my progess against a jetty 50 yards up the beach, I realized I was going nowhere. I hopped the next inside reform back to the beach and called it a day. Overall it was fun to be in some bigger waves again, though they tended to die right after the drop-in, then reform further in on a sandbar. For those of you familiar with Mondo's, north of Ventura, you'll get an idea of the conditions.

After a night of sleep frequently disturbed by late-night arrivals of surfers from other parts of the island chasing the swell, I made a 6 am dash for the waves. The swell had further died, but conditions were clean and glassy: consistent waist-high waves with occaisonal head-high sets. I went with a 7'2" fun board this time, figuring I didn't need to duck-dive, and wanting the extra float to compensate for my weak paddling muscles. This turned out to be a great morning and I caught numerous waves, though it was really a day for long-boarders in the end. I swapped to a bigger board and upped my wave count for the final 40 minutes before completely exhausting myself at about 9 am.

A solid breakfast and a nap restored me and I contemplated another session, but the offer of a free-ride back to Taipei tempted me to return to the dorm to pack my bags. After an hour, my ride still hadn't showed. A stroll back to the beach failed to find him, as well. Finally, as I scoured the surf-shops along the narrow road that fronts the beach, I spotted him doing a little "bai-bai", that is, burning incense in front of a pile of food offerings and ghost money in front a shop owned by his friend. After the ceremoney he apologized and explained that it was the beginning of ghost month on the lunar calendar, and a friend had asked him to offer some incense for the success of his store, and to protect it from the hordes of roaming spirits would that flood the world for the next 28 days. He had no way to politely refuse, and no way to contact me, so he just went ahead with the offering, hoping I would still be around when he was done. While on the whole, surf culture is surprizingly stable the world over; surfers wear the same fashions, read the same magazines, watch the same videos; surf lingo is even consistent, or imported into Chinese via direct translation (inside/outside, shoulder/head high...) but there are still moments like these when local culture prevails, and even the most dedicated beach bum becomes a devotee of the local proctector gods.