A Stroll Around Beigan

If you come at Lantern Festival to Bei­gan, an island in the Ma­tsu chain, you will be there at just the right time for the “Bai­ming Carnival.” In Fu­zhou dialect, bai­ming refers to the ritual whereby, in the period around Lantern Festival, each village sets a specific night on which to worship the deities, laying out all kinds of foods as offerings. This is one of Ma­tsu’s most important folk culture events, and many Ma­tsu people living in Taiwan proper return home at this time for the festivities.

During the Horse Feed Cultural Festival, “tranquility wind lanterns” are hung up at Banli Da­zhai, an old house in Banli Village, to pray for the wellbeing of local people.

Mindong (Eastern Fu­jia­nese) architecture is a distinctive feature of Ma­tsu. ­Qinbi Village on Bei­gan is the best-preserved and most representative Min­dong settlement. Facing the sea, their backs to the hills, the village’s stone buildings are arranged in a charmingly haphazard way, following the local terrain. Since being renovated the old houses have regained their vitality, and as homestays and restaurants have moved in, tourists have come here too. Staring dreamily out to sea and letting one’s mind go empty for a while brings a kind of simple happiness.                                                    

During the Horse Feed Cultural Festival, which marks the opening of the Baiming Carnival on the 13th day of the first lunar month, deities borne on palanquins converge on Banli as a prologue to their procession around the area. (photo by Jimmy Lin)

During the procession, each household burns “horse feed” as an offering to the horse ridden by the White Horse King.

Simple scaffolding erected on the beach serves as a platform for repainting fishing boats.