February | 2019 | Chris & Sue's Excellent(?) Adventures

Monthly Archives: February 2019

Former residence of Marshal Zhang 張學良, Taipei – part 3/3

This is the third post on our visit to the former residence of Marshal Zhang 少帥禪園 in Taipei. Part 1 is about the buildings. Part 2 tells the story of the famous resident. This post covers our lunch at the restaurant.

Zhang Xueliang 張學良 who was under house arrest over a 40-year period lived here for a long time. For his story, see part 2.

The restaurant offers four set menus – no a la carte dishes. We ordered the Young Marshal’s Menu and Lady Zhao’s All Fish Menu.

Traditional Chinese food served in the style of a Western style tasting menu.

Zhang Xueliang emigrated to Hawaii in 1990 and died there in 2001 at 100 years old. The restaurant claims that they researched his diet and designed the meals accordingly.

Lady Zhao is 趙一荻 aka Edith Chao (nicknamed 趙四小姐) was the mistress of Zhang who accompanied him for many years in this residence. Her preference for fish in her diet is unknown to us.

According to Wikipedia, to accommodate the mistress, Zhao begged for and received the acceptance of the wife.

The liquid was not there when it came out. I took too longer taking the picture.

Obviously, some one spent time designing these dishes.

Traditional chicken and abalone soup cooked in a bowl with a heavy lid.

Le Creuset concept. All the goodness remains in the soup.

A Chinese meal must have some rice. Right ?

The different colorful plates added to the experience.

We were pleasantly surprised by the meal. Highly recommended.

Former residence of Marshal Zhang 張學良, Taipei – part 2/3

This is the second post on our visit to the former residence of Marshal Zhang 少帥禪園 located just outside of Taipei. Click here to read the first part.

We booked a table for lunch at the restaurant which offered a very limited tasting menu.

The restaurant is in what seems to be the main building of classical Japanese design with windows intricately latticed.

It was a weekday; there were only four or five occupied tables at lunch. The interior is not luxurious but somewhat modern and Japanese, with a display of a small fountain, hanging plants and what seemed like potted giant bonsai trees.

The whimsical decorations continue …

The soft and comfortable details seem ironic since this is one of the places of house arrest for Marshal Zhang which lasted nearly 40 years, although he was treated well. He gained his freedom in 1975 when he was in his 70’s.

Zhang Xueliang 張學良 was the effective ruler of Northeast China and much of northern China after the assassination of his father, Zhang Zuolin 張作霖 (the “Old Marshal”), by the Japanese on 4 June 1928. His father as a warlord was in 1920 the supreme ruler of Manchuria.

In the 1930’s, the leader of the Republic of China at the time, Chiang Kai-shek, focused on fighting the communists within China rather than the threat of the Japanese.

He was detained in Xi’an in 1936 by Zhang Xueliang and another general in order to force the ruling Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang or KMT) to change its policies regarding the Empire of Japan and the Communist Party of China. This detention precipitated a political crisis, known as the Xi’an Incident 西安事變.

The crisis ended after two weeks of negotiation, in which Chiang was eventually released and returned to Nanjing, accompanied by Zhang. Chiang agreed to end the ongoing civil war against the communists and began actively preparing for the impending war with Japan.

Once Chiang were away from Zhang’s loyal troops, Chiang had him put under house arrest near the Nationalist capital, wherever it moved to. In 1949 Zhang was transferred to Taiwan.

There is a picture of Zhang and Chiang’s son at the residence.

After Chiang’s death in 1975, he gained some freedom but it was not restored officially until 1990. He immigrated to Honolulu, Hawaii, in 1993 and died of pneumonia in 2001 at the age of 100 there.

The food at the restaurant was very good. See our next post.

Former residence of Marshal Zhang 張學良, Taipei – part 1/3

Happy New Year of the Pig !

We visited Taiwan in November last year. It has been many years since we lasted visited this island. We only had time to see Taipei.

Upon arrival, we checked into a spa hotel in Beitou 北投 in an area north of Taipei, which is famous for its volcanic sulfurous hot springs. Nearby is the former residence of Marshal Zhang which has been turned into a commercial enterprise – 少帥禪園 that include a tea house, a restaurant and a foot spa.

The residence comprises several small buildings built on a steep hillside overlooking Beitou and the Thermal Valley 地熱谷. The buildings are connected by walkways and stairs.

View of the roof of the residence and Beitou in a distance.

The gardens are very lush and well-tended. There are lots of little cutesy ceramic animals scattered all over the place. A bit too much if you ask me. I am pretty sure there were none when the Marshal was living there. You will notice them in the pictures.

The whimsy decorations soften the historical purpose of the residence – it was a place of house arrest for Zhang Xueliang or Chang Hsueh-liang 張學良 (1901-2001) nicknamed the “Young Marshal” (少帥), who was detained for almost 40-year period (1949-1975).

His study includes a photo of the “young marshall” and his lover 趙一荻 (nicknamed 趙四小姐, later his second wife) who accompanied him at this residence.

We know very little Modern Chinese history. My school did not teach Modern Chinese history.

He was a Manchu warlord who became a republican marshal and played an important role in shaping the Chinese world as we know it today. We will go into his story in the next post.

The residence was originally a part of the complex of the Xin Gao Hotel, built in the 1895-1945, Japanese colonial period.

In 1920, it was turned into a club for the Japanese military. During World War II, it was also a spot for the final pleasures of kamikaze pilots before they headed out on their suicidal missions.

A building which housed the guards who watch over the young marshal is converted into a tea house (open only in the afternoon). A beautiful set of drawers surrounded by soft toys and knickknacks is visible at the entrance to the tea house.

There is a place to soak one’s feet in warm sulfurous whitish water piped in from a nearby hot spring.

Flanked by banyan trees with hairy aerial roots, it was a shady, breezy relaxing spot. Perfect after some walking and just before lunch.

We booked a table for lunch at the restaurant. Our next post will feature the story of the young marshal, to be followed by a post on the fabulous food we had.

Random photos #376 – 385

These are the photos I (Chris) took and posted on Facebook. The series was started in March of 2013. There is no theme – just something random and visually interesting. We gave each a title and noted where it was taken (to the extent we could remember the city).

random photo #376 – dolphins – penang