On the afternoon August 23 1958 a barrage of artillery came falling onto Kinmen island from Communist held Quemoy (Xiamen) about a two kilometers away....My father in law happened to be there ...caught in the open. He dove in a ditch and then scrambled from spot to spot and eventual safety. The barrage would continue for 44 days and destroy much of the island's above ground structures. After that shelling continued on a rigorous every other day schedule until 1979 when the US recognized the PRC and broke ties with the Republic of China. Kinmen for decades was the front line of Chinese civil war that lingered on after ROC forces fled to Taiwan.
Today, however, Kinmen has fallen back asleep and while there are still
troops there, there is almost no tension. Much of the island has
become a national park, famous for bird watching. Wheat, sorghum and
peanuts are grown...mostly to make the island's famous Kaoliang liquor
(from the sorghum) and Emperor's candy (from the peanut). A huge
tunnel carved into rock along the SE coast in the 1960s to host 42
small supply ships is now a tourist site... now visited by more
Mainlanders (who take a 20 minute ferry) than Taiwanese. Kinmen today
has a sleepy relaxed feel... It's only 24 KM long and a few wide. The
roads are quiet and good for biking and the villages have a rustic
charm. It's a short hour flight from Taipei making it a doable day
trip or a nice weekend stay
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| European style home built by local who emigrated overseas |
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| Traditional Kinmen style home |
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| US provided tank at the 823 museum |
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| Supply tunnel and tourist trap |
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| Local gods at a temple |
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| Kinmen "old street" |
Especially interesting is "Maestro Wu's knife shop. The Maestro takes some of the one million plus shells that fell in 1958 and crafts them into knives...Talk about recycling. One shell yields 65 knives!! I bought some kitchen knives for Hsiu-ling . Here he is the "Maestro" in action.
Unlike the PRC temples in Taiwan are very active with lots of social and religious activities. We stumbled on a "bazaar" at one of the local Kinmen temples...and the gods were getting funky
