最喜歡這一張，完全不需要修片… 天空藍，建築弄得很好且「作舊」的完成度也很高，水平抓好等待光線跟沒有人經過的時候就很漂亮

會想起小時候家附近的矮平房雜貨店，下午時分的陽光從窗戶鑽入就是這樣

這張桌子跟上頭的書籍等很有味道

古早鉛字打字機，這東西小時候還有在印刷廠看過…

不是Keroro軍曹喔… XD

這天還是下雨，所以只有去看了學校裡頭的 Museum of Anthropology，雖然以印地安文化為主要典藏，但數量之龐大實在很可觀，隨便繞繞一天就過去了… O_O”

下面這張很有趣… (注意看說明板的文字敘述 )

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

晚上的漢堡餐也不錯，但跟台灣的好吃又便宜相比就弱掉了 XD
    

看完 slide show 之後要大張圖(2400)的請跟我說。

怨念是抽獎沒抽到 T_____T。

這天下午先來到鳳林，這邊有一座名稱相當有趣的「校長夢工場」日式建築。原來鳳林鎮為目前台灣出產各級學校校長最多的地方，累計至今已經有一百多位鳳林人擔任過學校校長。這可能跟客家人(鳳林為客家人居多，而花蓮、吉安則是閩南居多)個性勤奮，再加上過去這裡為製菸的重鎮，所以鳳林人才栽培出這麼多的校長人才。類似鳳林背景的還有高雄美濃鎮這個客家村，過去一樣也是製菸為主，而有錢人家也較多，至今美濃為全台灣出產最多博士的鄉鎮。雖然隨著台灣都市化的情況越來越嚴重，鳳林與美濃的製菸工業也逐漸沒落，這樣的紀錄或許過個十多年之後就會被打破，但這段歷史能有地方被紀錄保留下來總是令人開心。

離開校長夢工場，在鳳林鎮上轉轉就可以發現到四落的煙樓建築。雖然雖然這個純樸的客家小鎮不再製菸，但從煙樓外的介紹文字與圖像多少可讓人揣摩過去的繁華。

離開鳳林的時候，已經稀落地下起雨來，心想原本計畫好的行程可能就此泡湯。但沒想到越往北走天氣反而更見清朗，到了吉安還出現了大太陽，於是就按照原本的計畫去探訪慶修院。

日治時期，日人為推動官營移民政策，在東台灣花蓮港廳區內的吉野（今吉安鄉）、豐田三村（豐山、豐裡、豐坪）、林田（今鳳林鎮大榮村、北林村）建立移民村，因此今日在這些地方還可以看到日治時期所遺留下來的建築物，而慶修院便是以前的吉野布教所，因為保存良好現在已經被列為三級古蹟。

在慶修院裡頭最有名的之一便是四國靈場八十八所石佛。在四國原本就有這八十八所石佛，信仰虔誠者便會行遍四國巡禮拜佛，然而因為路途遙遠，所以便有了把這八十八所石佛迎來供在一起，以方便人們可以時常祭拜祈願。而這個習俗在日治時期便被主要移入吉野的四國人帶入，於是便有了吉野布教所這樣的地方與這些石佛(大部分的石佛都已經重新刻製)。(其他介紹: 1、2)

另外在慶修院附近也有一戶房子，是日治時代村長的家，至今仍然被保留下來，可能目前的住戶有對它進行修繕，所以沒有十分的日式風格。

另外在小巷弄街道中的貓也十分可愛，不過比較怕生就是了…

During the walking city tour of Bruges, the tour guide notified there is a small and cute village named “Damme” near Bruges. He recommended me to visit there as he knew I rented a car for traveling.

So, on the day leaving Bruges to Namur, I visited this small village. All the way to Damme is RIVER and TREE TREE TREE TREE… a lot of TREES… Monotonous, but very freshing and joyful while driving through these trees~

However, as I was getting close to Damme, there’re many travelers and cars heading into the village. The police officers even enforced traffic restrain. I was wondering why there is a crowd.

After I pulled my car in a place by the road and walked into the village center, I found there is a fair.

That’s why so many people are gathering in this small village. Records, CDs, paintings, and Booooooooks!

Every city has as least one church, and Damme is not the exception. The church in Damme is not so large. However, as sun lights shed into the church through glasses, you probably have the feeling of God or some other holy stuff. Anyway, quite solemn and stunningly beautiful.

In front of the church’s entrance, there is a large tower. The purpose of this tower is not so traceable, at least I asked the ticket seller, but he also knew nothing about the tower. The tower is made by bricks and stones, but most of the stairs are make by woods (only a few are made by stones).

The helix stairs look beautiful in the cooler tone color temperature.

After hundreds of stairs, this charming village and great country scenes are presented.

Next stop is Namur.

I waked up very early, and arrived Ghent around 9. In the early weekend morning, this city was still in her sweet sleep with her colorful decoration.

I parked the car outside the city and paced along the river and the streets.

Suddenly, after a turn, I found a guard decoration on an old wall. I wondered this old building is a church, but most churches in Belgium should be in Gothic style or Roman style in general. And the area of this building is so large, and rounded by a high wall. Besides, I could find a large garden through some cracks of the wall.

Some Belgium travelers were also interested in this building, and we decided to knock the wooden gate and hoped there would be someone can answer and tell us more about this building.

Fortunately, a lady answer the door, and tell us about the building. Well, in Dutch. The kindly travelers tried to explain to me, and I finally knew this building is not open to the public. However, there was a special activity in the afternoon (2 or 3 p.m., I am not so sure now), so it would open after a few hours.

That’s fine, I can go to visit the city first, and get back here later for this building and the special activity.

Basically, I walked along the water. Scenes at the banks are really great and lovely. Somehow this capital of East Flanders made me relate the Love River in Kaohsiung.

The first architecture caught my eyes is Belfry. Well, it looks like a church, but it’s not! It worked as a bell tower to report time and a warning watch tower (Well, like the Town Hall of Age of Empires?!).

You can have a 360 degree view from the top of Belfry. Such as Saint Bavo Cathedral.

and Saint-Nicholas Church.

The Ghent Festival likes a carnival and is a collection of concerts, displays, installation arts and performances. You can find one of them in any place of the city (most of them are around the town center region). The festival usually lasts for more than one week. There would be different performances at the same spot everyday, so you can watch a lot if you stay long enough.

Well, there was a concert at the plaza in from of Saint-Nicholas Church. It seems an activity of the festival!

You can take a seat, order a glass of beer, and enjoy the concert. Well, the cherry flavored one is good. :p

After a few encores, I left the concert and headed to the old building I found in the early morning.

As I walked into, I found it is not a building, I guessed it should be a residence house with a large garden. Oh~ the interior is really old and beautiful.

After I checked some information flyers and asked the guides, I found this is a military training center in the old ages. There is a small building, which was a dinning place in the old ages.

Many people sitting in the building or gathering at the entrance, my curiosity made me walk to the counter to get more information about the activity which would be going on here. The staffs said this is a concert, and I should have a ticket to get in. However, I do not have a ticket… As I think I should leave after take a glance of this old dinning building, a man (I guess he is the host of this concert) came to me and asked me where I came from. I thought he must be interested in why a Asian face with casual (not formal, at least) dressing showed up at such kind of occasion. Anyway, he was surprised that I came from Taiwan and accidentally get into this old arch. He gave me a ticket and invited me join this concert with the enthusiasm.

This concert is cello solo and cello-violin duet.

Lovely concert. I also bought a CD as a souvenir. Then, waked back the town center and threw myself back into the festival.

There were more and more people in the town center, and you can find more and more performances on streets.

They even created a beach on the street!

As walking and watching the performances, do not forget the historical archs. nearby.

Saint-Nicholas Church

The old post office

The ugliest building in Ghent. Actually, this is a church, but the tower at the right side is never finished. Although many generations of people in Ghent think it’s the ugliest building, it also becomes a landmark of Ghent.

Beautiful river bank.

You can also find charming decorations on streets.

The tour map indicated this is the most beautiful building of Ghent. Well, I just think it’s the most colorful. :p

Another place I was interested in is Forza Ritmica, which was an abbey in the old ages. Now, this place become a residence region, the expensive type.

Although I only stayed in Ghent for one day during the festival, I thought Ghent is an interesting and lovely city, which keeps the old buildings well, makes travelers easy to walk around for sight seeing, and also ensembles new style arts.

↓Minnewater，很漂亮的地方。

↓Bruges 有著北方威尼斯的稱號，水道、遊船穿梭其中。

↓這張沒什麼故事，只是覺得藍天白雲加上建築的顏色很漂亮而已。:Q

↓大清早一群跟著主人出來散步的狗兒們。

↓下面三張是高級住宅區，不過以前這一帶是監獄，而現在這些高級住宅就是將以前的監獄改建的。唔，台灣好有將舊市鎮區建築改建很成功的例子嗎？

↓當地人們的休閒活動。呃，把它想成大型的打彈珠遊戲就可以了 :Q

The watercourses

Bruges is much closer to the ocean hundreds of years ago than today, and it was a city of trading and water transporting importance. Today, you can still see the water-lock-bridge in this city.

The end of this watercourse was the palace of trading in the past. (Actually, this watercourse went deeper than today.)

The watercourses are not used for transportation today, but they do become beautiful scenes in this city. (Well, after the government cleans them up. Just like the Love River in Kaohsiung city.)

The Financial City

Not today, but Bruges had been a financial city. The financial activities was rising and flourishing from early 13th century. As a trading center, there were a lot of financial activities in Bruges. In 1309, the first “bourse” (stock exchanging center) was built in Bruges. The old brouse in Bruges is the “Fries Museum” today, and you can not be aware of money smell there anymore. (only fries ).

The name of this city

Well, there are many versions about how the name, Bruges, comes from, but I love the one coming up most.

Because this city was a financial and trading center, so people here had to defense invaders. They facilitate the watercourses and expand them as the city moat. Concerning both transportation convenience and defense, many gates and bridges were built. So this is a city of bridges, and people called it “Bruges” later on.

As an important city, it’s not surprising there were many races in this city. And, people of different races liked to gather in different places, so you can find some streets named by some races or countries, such as Spanjaardstraat.

Abbey and Priest

There are some abbeys in Bruges, just like other cities. But, surprisingly, there is a priest school in Bruges, named Grootseminarie. More surprisingly, there are only a few students in this school, and only one student graduated in 2009. There were about 50 graduate students half a century ago. Although they can drink beers in the breakfast and be close to God, I still think they should find some ways to pull more students in. :p

Lace

Belgium is famous by high quality lace. Although most lace products in the world are exported from China today, you can still find many local lace products in Belgium. At the age of Crusades, there were many poor widows. So they can only lived in a small house. Look, what a small, short and low door! The small door also inform us that the height of people in the past is lower than today.

Those widows lived in the northeast region of Bruges, and they started to sew and weave laces for money and keeping their daily lives. The high quality of laces made Bruges renowned for years. However, with the increase of personnel cost, most lace industries have moved to China or other Asia countries.

Beers

Belgium is also renowned for its beers. Bruges had many breweries in old age, but only one left today — De Halve Maan(the half moon). They provides tour covers introducing the brewery and the whole process of making beers.

They had produced many brands of beers, and here is the wall of beer cans.

In Belgium, drinking beers can be a serious thing, not like in Taiwan. Actually, each beer has its own glass, which has the label and a designated line. If you pour a bottle of beer correctly, the boundary of beer and froth would be at the designated line, and the top of froth is just at the fringe of the glass.

Buildings

There are a lot of old buildings in Bruges, and you can find the revolution of building styles here. For the following picture, the left building was built in 1644, you can find the stairs-design frontage, and the same as the middle building. However, the building in the right was built in 1776, the frontage became arc design.

The Gothic style buildings can be found in Bruges. Pointed arch, ribbed vault and flying buttress.

↓flying buttress (the left most tiny part XD)

↓ribbed vault

烏山頭水庫是台灣最古老的水庫之一，早在荷蘭時代就已有簡易的水利設施，當時稱之為「三腳埤」，後來改稱「官田溪貯水池」，為水庫的前身。另外，由於由空中俯視，蜿蜒曲折狀如珊瑚，故又稱「珊瑚潭」。

水庫真正完工是在日治時代，當時日本指派技師山田與一來台勘查與規劃，從西元1920開始動工，引曾文溪、官田溪之水，在中游溪谷烏山頭處築水壩，直到西元1930年才完工，日治時代是全台灣最大之水庫，也是最大之水利設施，主要用於灌溉，為單一目標水庫。烏山頭水庫與嘉南大圳都是日治時代的偉大工程建築，若沒有這兩項工程，現今的嘉南平原不可能成為台灣的米倉。

而這兩項工程都應該感謝八田與一這位工程技師，由於有他以及其他工程人員的努力，才有盛產稻米的嘉南平原。下圖的照片為在烏山頭水庫大壩邊上的八田與一銅像，其後可見八田與一與妻子外代樹之墓，每年水利會也會定期在此舉行追思儀式。雕像為1931年7月，台灣總督府嘉南大圳組合員工為表彰其功勞所贈送。

旁邊亦有日本人所立的石燈籠，為日本石川縣人所贈，石川縣為八田與一的故鄉。

1930年5月完工(耗時九年半)的烏山頭水庫土堰堤長1273公尺、高56公尺，滿水面積13平方公里，貯水量達15,000萬公噸，為當時東亞規模最大之土堰堤水庫。而嘉南大圳送水、排水水路總長達16,000公里，灌溉面積近15萬甲。下圖為水庫與大圳完工時所立的殉工碑，以紀念為工程犧牲的人員，其上有八田與一所寫之紀念碑文。

整個嘉南大圳分成南北兩個水道，北水道涵蓋麻豆、下營、新營、嘉義等區域，南水道包含善化、西港、安定、府城台南等地。供水時須透過閘門來控制水往那個水道輸送，下圖為控制的閘門的部分組件，透過這些組件可以開關閘門，舊有的閘門於水庫與大圳落成時啟用，歷時70多年，直到 2001年新的水道閘門落成才功成身退。附近仍保留了當時載送工程人員、家屬、材料、用品的火車頭。

早年建立的水庫少有閘門式的溢洪/洩洪道，烏山頭水庫也不例外，對於蓄水的調節排放都是靠「自然溢流陡槽溢洪道」，讓雨季時水庫不至於潰堤造成更大的傷害。

另外，烏山頭水庫為一離槽式水庫，相對於在槽式直接在河川上興建主壩，離槽式水庫需要興建引水道將河川的水流引入水庫中，所以如果查 google map 的衛星圖片會發現烏山頭水庫根本不在河道上喔。

檢視較大的地圖

過去工程技術沒有當今這樣進步，因此在烏山頭水庫沒有類似石門水庫那樣高聳的大壩，而是用寬厚的土堤，這樣的工程方法也讓整個水庫和周邊的景觀能夠巧妙的合而為一。

初春傍晚的烏山頭有如世外桃源一般，相當的寧靜，除了大門口的售票人員與在此工作的員工之外很難得看到其他遊客，樹木與大地開始從灰褐裡頭冒出綠意。

註：大部分照片是用 Contax Carl Zeiss Distagon 28mm/f2.8 拍攝

離開EMP之後就前往University of Washington，喔，UW附近好多餐廳可以吃，而且都不貴，真是個幸福的地方啊～～

古董級圖書館！我非常喜歡從玻璃漫入的陽光！！！！