Hway Jee temple

[Hway Jee temple] [Shih Lin Elementary] 
[Wen Trung temple] [memory garden] 
[dah liao layer] [yellow leaf plantlife] 
[Kai King Legend] [Wen Trung God and Scholars]

title: hway jee temple

artist: Wu and Wu ( team members )

In 1684, Taiwan was officially included in the Ching empire, and thus more and more immigrants from the coastal provinces of mainland China came to Taiwan, the two most distinctive people being the Drungs and the Chuans.

hway jee templeLater, residents worshipped Guan Yeen Buddah in Chee-Shan Rock ( the Taiwanese pronunciation of the word "rock" is similar to temple).  And that's how Chee-Shan Rock got its name.  

memorial stamps at hway jee templeLegend has it that the crops near this area were eaten by bugs, and the Kai King intervened and killed all the bugs, making the Drung tribe believe in Him more and more.  Thus in 1752 everyone pitched in and built the magnificent temple called the Hway Jee Temple. ( meaning the temple which helped us )

<<Mr.Shee's interview>>

Q : You helped develop and organize the cultural hallway of Hway Jee Temple.  Please tell us more about it.

A : About five years ago, I felt that Chee-Shan Rock is a great cultural treasure to teach our children, so i started developing this idea.  Originally it was in the front and because of expansion reasons it was moved to the back.  I finished all the photographing and language descriptions by myself.  The Taipei mayor at the time, our present President Chen ordered that students will be tested on local cultural, and so parents swarmed into this temple to copy off the information in the cultural hallway.  That's why I photocopied some of the most important sites and made them into pamphlets.

Q : Is the old town of Chee-Shan Rock near the Shen Nong Temple right now?  Isn't it a little too far for students then to go to school from there?

A : Yes, it is.  People nowadays have cars and so a little walk makes them tired.  But in the old days, transportation still relied heavily on foot, this type of distance is quite normal, actually.  Everyone walked to school.